Puffin
Puffin on Latrabjarg cliffs, Iceland
Puffin on Latrabjarg cliffs, Iceland
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Jan, 2016Views
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Awards
Action Award
Zenith Award
Creative Winter Award
Curator's Selection
Legendary Award
Member Selection Award
Spring Selection Award
Winner in Iceland travels Photo Challenge
Top Choice
Superb Composition
Outstanding Creativity
Peer Award
Absolute Masterpiece
Love it
Magnificent Capture
Virtuoso
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Behind The Lens
Location
This photo was taken ion the West Fjord cliffs of Látrabjarg, it is the westernmost point in Iceland and the largest bird cliff in Europe, home to puffins, guillemots, razorbills and gannets.Time
This was shot around 4pm and was actually one of the last photo I could take there as we needed to be at 5.30pm in Brjánslækur to catch the ferry to Stykkishólmur.Lighting
As the cliffs are facing west the sun was in front of me the whole time and the color of the puffin made it difficult to find the right balance to get a photo not over or under exposed. On the other hand these conditions created this nice Bokeh in the background, thanks to the reflection of the sun rays on the ocean waves. The light is probably better in the morning but it was raining earlier in the day and it was a 4 hours drive to get there from our hotel in Ísafjörður anyway.Equipment
This was shot hand-held on a Nikon D7100, with a Nikon AF-S VR 70-300 F/4.5-5.6G lens @170mm F5.6 without flash.Inspiration
One of my goal of this trip to Iceland was to come back home with a nice portrait of Puffin which for me is one of the most beautiful birds with the Scarlet Macaws, the Toucans and the King Penguins.Editing
This one was taken at the end of a two weeks trips around Iceland and the country is so beautiful that my memory cards were almost full. So I was ended up shooting mainly in jpeg and forgot to switch back to raw when I arrived at the cliffs. I adjusted the exposure a bit but the post-processing was obviously limited due to the format and I didn't crop the photo so this is pretty much how it looked on my camera.In my camera bag
Camera: Nikon D7100 Zoom Lenses: Nikon AF-S VR 70-300 F/4.5-5.6G; Nikon AF-S VR DX 16-85mm F/3.5-5.6G Prime Lenses: Nikon AF-S 85mm F/1.8 G; Nikon AF-S 35mm F/1.8G. Flash: Nikon SB-700 Tripod: MeFOTO RoadTripFeedback
I'm a traveler before being a photographer so my first advice is to travel and see the world with your own eyes not only through your camera. Before leaving on your next adventure try to think of the kind of photo you want to bring home and what the conditions are more likely to be like there (bright light, dark forest), then try to reproduce these conditions at home and practice as it's very frustrating to find yourself in the perfect location without being able to take the shot you wanted so get to know your equipment and how to use it in manual mode before leaving. As for all wildlife shots the key is patience, go where they live and wait for them to show up, the more you wait without moving the closer they will come. I was expecting to see many Puffins as Iceland is home of more than 8 millions of them but I've actually seen only a dozen as May was a bit early in the season. I've seen some of them in the Eastern Fjords but the breathtaking scenery of Látrabjarg is much better for photography.
