I am late posting today because difficult connections and delayed flights got me into Portland airport at mid-night and home at 1 AM this morning. I slept in. 🙂

A few days ago I ran a series of Great Blue Heron head shots. Today’s offering is another head shot series, this time of Great Egrets. Egrets and Herons, of course, are closely related, and display the same photogenic tendencies. They pose a lot in the course of their normal activities, and, at places like Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge and Viera Wetlans in Florida, they allow relatively close approach.

The first two shots are, clearly, of the same bird at Viera Wetlans. The bird was on the bank of the dyke and I pulled up next to it and shot it at 840mm equivalent out the window of the car. I love the delicacy of the back-lighted bird. The next shot is at Merritt Island and the bird was a little further away. This took the 1.5x digital tel-extender function on the Canon SX40HS for 1240mm equivalent. The final shot, again at Merritt, was even further away, and I used the Canon SD100HS behind the eyepiece of my ZEISS DiaScope for a 1600mm equivalent. The last two are cropped for composition.

All shots in Program with iContrast and –1/3EV exposure compensation. 1) and 2) f5.8 @ 1/640th @ ISO 100/125. 3) f5.8 @ 1/640th @ ISO 200. 4) 1/500th @ ISO 160. f4.3 effective.

Processed in Lightroom for intensity, clarity, and sharpness.