It’s cold and wet here today so I’m browsing photos I took on our New Zealand trip back in 2012.
I came across a picture I took from the ferry as we as we crossed over from the North Island to the South Island. At first glance it looked like a mistake, just a shot of empty grey water. Zooming in though revealed a sea bird with distinctive markings on its wings and with a bit of searching I was able to identify it as a Cape Petrel.
Ken
I didn't know I'd seen this sea bird
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stuck
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I didn't know I'd seen this sea bird
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Graeme
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Re: I didn't know I'd seen this sea bird
Another very fine action shot Ken.
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StuartR
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Rudi
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Re: I didn't know I'd seen this sea bird
The image is still quite sharp after having zoomed in so much.
Interesting markings.
PS: The height above the water indicates that he has recently filled the tank.
Interesting markings.
PS: The height above the water indicates that he has recently filled the tank.
Regards,
Rudi
If your absence does not affect them, your presence didn't matter.
Rudi
If your absence does not affect them, your presence didn't matter.
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Re: I didn't know I'd seen this sea bird
The shutter speed was 1/1000th sec so no loss of sharpness due to motion blur. That means any lack of sharpness will be down to the quality of the lens, together with electronic noise from using a high ISO setting (1600 in this case) but those are sort of limitations that can be mitigated by photo editing software. I used DxO PhotoLab v5.9 (inc. it's DeepPRIME noise reduction algorithm) for the RAW to TIFF conversion and then a bit more spit and polish in Affinity Photo v2.0.4.
The original image was taken with a Tamron 55-200mm (non-image stabilised) zoom set at about 100 mm. I guess I didn't zoom to 200 mm because I didn't have time to think and I just grabbed the shot as the bird flew past at speed. Once you take account of the camera sensor crop factor and then the crop on the frame, the focal length of this image is about 850 mm.
Apparently the 'Cape' in 'Cape Petrel' is the Cape of Good Hope. Presumably therefore you've seen these birds?
Ken