Dark-eyed Junco
We had about a foot of fresh snow last night. While the snow storm slowed down this morning I made a few clicks of the birds that try to survive the winter here in eastern Iowa. Dark-eyed Juncos are present by the dozen and are among my favorite birds to photograph.
The challenge is always to separate the dark eye from the rest of the upper part of the bird. Getting a little bit of light on the eye ring is key and it helps if the eye has a hint of catch light, even if it is the reflection of the flash that was used to bring out some colors. The flash also helps to tell the story about “Winter-wonder-land”. The background has to be dark if you want to see the falling snow. A slower shutter speed makes for nice snow trails but this morning I wanted to capture more of the calm that follows a snow storm. Without totally “freezing” the snow flakes in the background the desired balance was attained at 1/640 s for this image.