Sorry Duncan but the only thing in the photo that is in focus is the very tip of the beak. I believe you have cropped the pic too much and have sized it to a size that is just too large to see the complete pic without scrolling. If it were mine I would recrop the original to include the complete head and than resize the cropped portion to 800 wide by whatever....Dave

Dave, take your point about scrolling and have resised to 800 high which should enable most to see it all. my mistake.

I like this concept ........
The beak only in focus gives it a totally other dimension...
How ever I can understand that some would like to see this beautiful bird in a total head shot all in focus...
About the hight from the image I agree , don't go over 800 pixels and maybe pressing F11 wwill help also to get a bigger view....;-))
Best regards.................Fons

I wish I had taken the shot at a higher aperture from a bit further back as well but as with everything you get a few choices and little time! I felt this gave the sort of view prey would get as their last...in practive the bird was actually reacting to my prescence and (politely) requesting I leave her alone; in hindsight the lens hood was seriously at risk!

Normally I would like to see the eyes (pref whole head) in focus but I think the fact that you were lucky enough to have his mouth open you get away with it and it becomes a completely different style of image.

your comment suggests that it does work at the level intended, and I will admit it's growing on me! btw there is no vertical crop at all - 4ft and 224mm gets you close.

that's how I like them too! I was taking such shots when I obviously got a little close for the bird and I was suddenly faced with this in the viewfinder! Needless to say I took the shot first - then retreated!

Duncan - I think the message in your photo is about as clear as could be - it says, caution; danger; don't mess with me, etc. I like the photo a great deal because the message is so clear and I suspect it might do well in the commercial market where the message must be obvious. Very good work.

appreciate you comments and it's interesting that you raise the point of communication. amazing how clearly animals can make their intentions or 'feelings' clear without speach isn't it!

I love it. Excellent view right down his gullet. Who cares about eyes when it's the beak that's going to get you???

Very dramatic.

I have finished output for printing from the original RAW file and have substituted the (my) final one here as well. I don't think anyone's comments are affected apart from possibly Dave's initial one re crop - which I have reacted to!