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Black-collared Hawk
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Black-collared Hawk



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A Black-collared Hawk with a piranha for lunch - Pantanal, Brazil

A Black-collared Hawk with a piranha for lunch - Pantanal, Brazil
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cameraCanon EOS-1D X

settings Aperture f/5 ISO 2500 Shutter 1/1250 Focal Length 300/1 

upload_dateAug, 2015

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1912

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Action Award
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Top Shot Award 22
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Legendary Award
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Contest Finalist in It Is A Wild World Photo Contest
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15 Comments |
JDLifeshots
 
JDLifeshots August 02, 2015
Awesome capture!
christinebollmanndecker
 
christinebollmanndecker September 28, 2015
So beautiful
Arzhtatiana
 
Arzhtatiana September 28, 2015
A great shot! Congratulations!
sarahlharden
 
sarahlharden September 30, 2015
Amazing!
Paraskeva
 
Paraskeva October 06, 2015
absolutely fantastic
photosue50
 
photosue50 October 08, 2015
Wow, beautiful
nandicmb
 
nandicmb October 08, 2015
Congratulations on your Contest Finalist win in It is A Wild World Photo Contest!!
JDLifeshots
 
JDLifeshots October 08, 2015
Congrats!
ReneeBlake
 
ReneeBlake October 13, 2015
Fabulous capture ! Congrats !
valeriehanson_1568
 
valeriehanson_1568 August 20, 2016
Stunning
nitti
 
nitti September 01, 2016
Outstanding!
sharilee
 
sharilee January 25, 2017
WOW EXTRAORDINARY SHOT!
null_and_void
 
null_and_void March 09, 2017
beautiful capture
Weng PRO+
 
Weng March 10, 2017
Thank you all. I must admit that I failed to capture this superfast hawk despite many attempts, and had to return the following year to try again ????
Weng PRO+
 
Weng Jan 06
Thank you for your encouraging comments everyone! 💖

Submitted to Photo Contests

Tags

#Black-collared Hawk #raptor #pantanal #brazil
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Behind The Lens

Location

I was standing precariously in a small motorboat with the camera on a tripod in the Pantanal, Brazil. One false move and I would have been swimming with the alligators!

Time

This was taken at 4pm in the afternoon. The sun was harsh and much higher than I would have liked. But when the hawk turns up...

Lighting

Wildlife doesn't allow me much control over lighting, and I have to depend entirely on Lightroom to balance the lighting as best I can.

Equipment

Canon 1Dx with a 300mm f2.8 L II on a Series 5 Gitzo carbon-fibre tripod with a Wimberley gimbal head. Image taken at f5.0 1/1250th sec ISO 2500

Inspiration

I love dynamic wildlife shots, and there cannot be anything more dramatic than a hunting raptor. I was warned that the Black-collared Hawk was extremely fast even before I left home, but I was confident that I'd get the shot as I've never failed with this type of shot. In the event, the hawk proved much too fast fast for me. All I got was a bagful of bits of the hawk, and out-of-focus to boot! I had to return the following year and dedicate the best part of a week to get this shot.

Editing

Although adept at Adobe Photoshop & Lightroom, I only do a minimal amount of tweaking with wildlife shots. In this shot, the highlights have been toned down and Clarity set to 20. It was then cropped and sharpened.

In my camera bag

A Canon 1Dx (full frame) with 300mm f2.8 L II, & a Canon 7D II (APSC) with 600mm f4 L II, 1.4x III, 2x III extenders, a spare battery for each of the cameras. As most locations are extremely dusty, I try my best not to swap lenses. Extenders are only used as a last resort because of this. A large Series 5 Gitzo carbon-fibre tripod with a Really Right Stuff fluid-gimbal head completes the set. A laptop loads everything into Lightroom for selection and serves as a backup for the images also in the memory cards in the camera.

Feedback

This hawk is much too fast for even a Canon 1Dx. There was no way I could get a lock on the hawk as it approaches the fish. In the end, I pre-focused on the fish instead, left the camera in autofocus mode and started firing as the bird approached the fish. With a sackful of luck, I managed to get the picture.

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