Wildlife Birds #2

Another from the same photo shoot as the Emu photograph ‘Eye-to-Eye‘. This time of the Australian Cockatoo in flight at Healesville. I shot this with the Canon 300mm F2.8L IS wide open at F2.8 ISO400 1/2000th of a second to freeze the action. Tracking birds in flight is not easy – this was one of only a few good sharp frames where I was also very happy with the pose. In order to make the Cockatoo better stand out from the background I created a second layer in Photoshop, converted it to Black and White and then masked off the Cockatoo. This effect dramatically helps in isolating the bird and creating a clear point of focus.