"Fish Toss"

[David Salem]

Been having a fun time trying to catch Terns in fun and different poses. This is a Elegant Tern doing a fish toss. They perform this technique to remove seaweed and debris from the just caught fish.
They climb up after they catch the fish, toss the fish up in the air, then skillfully catch it and then eat it on the wing. Pretty fun to try to capture. Hope you like it.

1DX---600mm---f6.3---ss1/4000---ISO640---HH@6:15am---35% crop.

Thanks as always for looking and for your input. I appreciate it.

David

[Steve Kaluski]

Hi David, superb behavioural image, the text compliments & helps to have a greater understanding of the action. Love the BKG just wished the red/magenta wasn't around the lower wing LHS, what is it?Would love to have some of that light and to be able to shoot at a lowish ISO to gain a greater SS. :S3:

Nice work. :cheers:

TFS
Steve

[David Salem]

Hey Steve, Thanks.
That's part of the BG. I could have spent time trying to remove it but I didnt want to mess with it. Allot of times it looks worse when you try rebuild the BG around the primaries and then try to blend it out.
Thanks again

[vishaljadhav]

Superb image all techs are spot on
such a perfect moment captured, I like the choice of keeping it vertical

[Steve Kaluski]

Allot of times it looks worse when you try rebuild the BG around the primaries and then try to blend it out.

Totally agree David, sometimes it's best we just accept these things. :w3

[David Salem]

Thanks Steve, I have come to your conclusion more and more. :)
Thanks Vishal.

[Tobie Schalkwyk]

Beautiful! Just the bird on its own already makes the picture so the tossed-up fish is the cherry on the cake!Everything sharp and detailed - well done!

[Doug Brown]

It doesn't get any better than this one Dave! Not an easy frame to capture, but you nailed it; dynamic wing position, great eye contact, and a perfectly placed fish.

[keith mitchell]

David I don't see how you could better this excellent image.

Keith.

[christopher galeski]

Brilliant capture,competion winner.well done.

[Marina Scarr]

This is without a doubt the best up-close fish toss I've seen anywhere. Congratulations on capturing this difficult behavior and actually getting the prey in the frame! Love the water droplets as well. The BG doesn't bother me one bit.

[William Dickson]

Beautiful capture, well done David

[Stu Bowie]

Hi Dave, you just keep turning them out - excellent work. What an incredible inflight pose, and capturing this behaviour is very well done. I really like the overall exposure, good detail on the far underwing, and overall nice and sharp. A fine image and congrats.

[Daniel Cadieux]

What a wicked cool pose this is!! Even the fis is pointing in the right direction. Not sure what else to say but bravo!

[John Robinson]

All been said. ! Excellent picture.
JohnR

[David Salem]

Thanks everyone for the comments. I'm glad you like the shot.
This is one of three in the sequence I caught. The other two have the fish even closer to the Tern but I liked this one best because of the "wicked cool pose" as Daniel so eloquently stated. Thanks again.

[Bill Dix]

Wicked Cool is is. An amazing pose, and beautifully captured. I won't ask how many frames you went through before catching this pose, with the perfect HA and the eye of the fish. Just catching terns in flight is difficult enough for most of us. This is truly amazing.

[Binu John]

Wow! What a great pose you captured! It couldn't get any better than this. One of the best fish tossing shots I've ever seen. Love the vertical crop, pose, action and dual color BG. Even the fish gave you a perfect HA :S3: Very well done!

[Mike Poole]

One for the wall - simple as that!

[gail bisson]

WOW! This is amazing.
You get 9.999/10 from me. I didn't give you a perfect 10 because of the BG area behind the wing which I noticed right away. :tinysmile_shy_t:
A contest winner as is but if I was framing it for the wall I would fix the BG area.
Gail

[Diane Miller]

This is incredible! I'd give it an 11 on a scale of 1-10.

I experimented to see if the colored area couldn be fixed without cloning. (BTW, when I opened it in PS I noticed it doesn't have an embedded profile, although it does appear to have been converted to sRGB. The profile can help most browsers display the colors more accurately.)

I went to quick mask mode and painted this selection (see a sticky in ETL for more info). Then I made a Hue-Sat adjustment layer, which incorporated the selection as a mask, and played with changing the reds in both hue and sat. Didn't work any miracles, and neither did Selective Color, but it helped a little.

With that amount of color contamination removed, though, I'd bet you could select the feathers well enough with PS's Quick Selection tool, feather the edges a couple of pixels, and clone out the rest of the color. Failing that, Topaz ReMask is amazing for selecting an object.

[Geoffrey Montagu]

Jaw dropping, remarkable capture. The story told adds to this brilliant image. The IQ is outstanding, and getting the fish toss as you've done……..Award winning.





Geoffrey

[Aidan Briggs]

Well done all around David, an extremely difficult scene to capture. You nailed it!

Bravo!

[arash_hazeghi]

Excellent shot Dave, the best of this behavior I have seen. I wouldn't touch anything. well done

[David Salem]

Thanks everyone for the nice comments. I appreciate it.

Thanks Diane for taking the time to work on the image and for the education.

I think Gail is right, if I decide to print it I will fix the BG in the wing, otherwise it stays the way it is.

[Sandy Witvoet]

Everything about this image ROCKS! I'm in awe.....

[Karl Egressy]

This is absolutely insanely amazing, David. Stunner!!!

[Richard Flack]

What a stunning image David! Love the story that his captures.

[Joseph Przybyla]

David, I am in awe, simply an amazing capture. The bird, the wing position, the fish....

[Satish Ranadive]

Fantastic image.

Regards,
Satish.

[shane shacaluga]

Nicely exposed and super flight pose. The fish toss takes it over the top!!

BG issues do not bother me.

TFS

[Robert Kimbrell]

What an image, I have seen this behavior, but never anything close to this. A real top shelf image.

[BenBotha]

One of the few where the only comment should be, IMHO, fantastic shot!! Ben

[Joe Murphy]

A real stunner David.

[Shawn Zierman]

Wowser! Love the long winged pose and the vertical presentation that fits it so well. One heck of an image sir!

[Sridatta Chegu]

No words! Superb pose, great action and moment. you just nailed it!

[David Salem]

Thanks again everyone for taking the time to comment on the Image. I'm really glad you liked it!