One Shot, Three Pictures

Despite being the hottest day so far in our Summer, and with the added insult of around 90 - 95% relative humidity, I went out for a walk. I even did a good stretch of the Cliff Walk, which has no shade anywhere (although at least there was a slight breeze off the water from time to time). But I have no AC here in my apartment, just a fan in my bedroom window, so I needed to get out and about.

And I was rewarded. On the little beach at the end of Marine Ave. there were a bunch of Ruddy Turnstones, a member of the Sandpiper family, running around looking for goodies in the cast-up seaweed and racing around in front of the slowly-advancing tide. I got lots of shots of them, both with and without the telephoto lens. One shot really stood out, because it not only offered an excellent bird portrait in a tight crop, it also had some scenic elements that made a wider crop possible as well. So I played a little. First I did a very tight crop to get a good portrait of the bird. Then I expanded the crop so that I got some beach and some of the advancing tide. Then I converted that shot to black & white. I like all three, so here they are.

Portrait of a Ruddy Turnstone:

"Watchin' the tide roll in...":

"Watchin' the tide roll in..." in b&w:

Of course, having used the line as the title for the photo, I just had to include the song as well - the late, great Otis Redding singing "(Sittin' on) The Dock of the Bay". Yeah, I know it's a beach not a dock, but the tide rolls in no matter where.

Photos & text © 2009 by A. Roy Hilbinger