My worst Nightmare!
by diverss

Comment by Teafran:
Ok...so the author is afraid of...the sky? Agoraphobia? Pyrophobia? The intent is unknown, thus not terribly effective as a nightmare.

My worst Nightmare!
by diverss

Comment by Titia:
I take it it's not the beautiful sunset, but the blackened earth you're referring to?

My worst Nightmare!
by diverss

Comment by bspurgeon:
The end of time?

Ptarmigan
by diverss

Comment by karmat:
CRITIQUE CLUB CRITIQUE
by karmat

Compositionally, this shot is lacking. The bird is in the center, which can work sometimes, but because it is such as small part of the picture, it really gives a haphazard, unbalanced feeling to the shot. Having the bird fill a larger part of the frame, or having it on one side (probably the right to give the appearance of flying into the frame) would have made that element of the shot much stronger.

Technically, you have nailed the exposure and focus (on the bird). The details are visible, but there is enough contrast that it doesn't appear "flat." Had you been able to blur the trees/plants in the background, I think that would have made the bird stand out more. Looking at your settings, perhaps you could have dropped down to a lower ISO number, a lower f-stop number and gotten a more shallow dof. Of course, I have no idea how far away you were from the bird, or how close the bird was to the background, so even that may not have helped. As it is, though, with the background vegetation being only slightly less focused than the bird, the bird kind of just blends in.

Overall, it is a fairly good shot. I could see it being used for a postcard depicting native animals of this area, but it doesn't give a really strong feeling for anything but that, and some voters may have been wanting "more" context.

Karma

Ptarmigan
by diverss

Comment by Yo_Spiff:
I'm glad someone can spell this birds name right. I can't.

Ptarmigan
by diverss

Comment by Covert_Oddity:
The contrast between the sparkling white snow and the trees is good. I like the way you have captured the bird taking flight, but I would have preferred to see it more to the right of the frame to give it space to "fly into".

Ptarmigan
by diverss

Comment by raish:
Very nice picture. Postcard? Hmm...

Ptarmigan
by diverss

Comment by michaelmonn:
subject is very obscure and might not be ideal when placed centrally like this

Ptarmigan
by diverss

Comment by Teafran:
This would make a good background image for a hunting lodge card or similar. The little white blooms typical of a snow shot are distracting - not by much though.

Ptarmigan
by diverss

Comment by jdixonsd:
Nice shot.