Photo Copyright Scott Bourne
On my last trip to Alaska we had some great sunsets and on the day I made this image we had a beautiful orange glow in the sky.
I saw this Coast Guard supply ship in the distance and I realized that it was going to pass right under the sun. I also saw a flock of eagles fishing nearby, so I asked the captain of our small boat to position us so that I could shoot directly into the sun in an attempt to line up the boat with the reflection from the sun.
Because there were lots of eagles in the vicinity, I also knew there was a slight chance that if we were lucky, an eagle might pass through the shot. I was prepared to make the photo either way.
I was using a Nikon D4 and a Nikon 300mm f/4 AF-S IF ED lens, hand-held. I set my camera to aperture priority and ISO 560. I wanted to enhance the natural color so I underexposed the shot by one stop by setting the exposure compensation dial to -1 EV.
I was shooting RAW so I didn’t bother to change the white balance from auto – I knew I could play with it in post. But the camera appeared to be getting a nice WB anyway so it was no problem.
I wanted to have as much detail in the foreground and back ground as possible so I set a large depth-of-field by selecting a small aperture – in this case f/19. I used the PATTERN exposure mode of the camera and selected AFC for continuous AF in the autofocus mode.
I then made a few test shots and checked my histogram. I liked what I saw and decided to get busy. I knew I’d only have a few minutes before the sun set completely, and while I would have preferred the eagle fly directly through the sun, I saw this guy creep into the right side of my view and let go with a three-shot burst. This was the best of the bunch with the eagle flying directly for the sun and the mountains, the ship and the setting sun in the distance.
As is often the case, I picked my background before I settled on my final subject. This approach has served me very well over my photographic career and it’s something you might try, no matter what subject matter you shoot. Finding a suitable background that ADDS to the story rather than distracts from it is key to a winning image.
Good luck.
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Filed under: Photography, Shooting Tagged: How I Made The Shot – Eagle & Boat At Sunset, Scott Bourne 
