We all naturally gravitate to the longest lens in our kit when shooting wildlife. It’s a natural reaction…But it can be a creativity killer. During this amazing session with a family of Northern Hawk Owls in northern Minnesota, I completely forgot about the wide angle lens in my bag. In fact, I was even putting the crappy 2x teleconverter on my 400. But I realized this bird perched in a scraggly Black Spruce would make a great silhouette. I intentionally underexposed to make the bird and trees black and then converted the image to a warmer white balance to increase the orange color, simulating the sunrise. Turns out, I really like this image! It is better than 95% of my telephoto shots from this morning. It shows the perching behavior and, more importantly, the habitat that these day-hunting owls make home.
The lesson? The wide angle lens can be a wonderful wildlife photography tool.
2 responses to “Wide Angle Wildlife”
Wes Bailey
August 12th, 2010 at 09:04
Hi Sparky,
I agree! Great shot; I’d really like to get a fast superwide one of these days primarily for sky photos at night, but of course for landscapes, and as your post shows quite nicely, wildlife images too!
photonaturalist
August 13th, 2010 at 13:16
Thanks Wes,
My superwide is the Sigma 10-20mm.