Brown Booby

Brown Booby (Sula leucogaster)

This image of a brown booby on its nest was captured last week on Cayman Brac, a sister island of Grand Cayman. The tour of Cayman Brac was fascinating and free (government sponsored). Please e-mail me if you would like more details. I'll eventually post more info in tripadvisor.com but won't get to it for a little while.

I recall one of my guides telling me that this is the male. However, I should have asked him how you can tell the difference! I'll post an image of the female at a later date.

The nest was perched on the edge of a very substantial cliff in the midst of sharp, white rocks. I could capture the whole bird in a full frame but it looked crowded in the frame and it was difficult to back up and still see the bird. He was in a recess in the rocks. Also, the white rocks provide a distraction and the really interesting part of this bird was the face. All this meant a fairly large crop (to 4.7 MP) to obtain a more interesting image.

Two other complications were the reflection of bright sunlight from the rocks and the length of the birds beak. It was too easy to blow out the lighter colors in the bird or to obtain an out-of-focus bill tip.

I considered cloning out the background shadow in the upper rhs and maybe even the tail. However, I decided that it was pretty hard to be distracted from the face of this bird. So, I let things be as they were.

All comments most welcome.

Merry Christmas to you all!!


1D Mark IV, 400 mm f/5.6, 1.4x TC, hand held: ISO 400, 1/1000 s, f/18, -1/3 EV, 4.7 MP after cropping, slightl NR, exposure adjustment, sharpening.