Another New Zealand bird

This one is a mallard, common throughout the world, not a particularly unique New Zealand species like so many of the ones I saw down there. But I like the photo for its colors and the ripples in the water. I wish I'd been able to crop it so the bird was just entering the frame rather than just leaving it. It is better to include the spot where your subject is about to be in a few seconds rather than where it has just come from. It makes the photo somehow more "readable" -- you can imagine lingering over the scene for a while. But if the subject is on the edge about to leave the frame, it's the end of a story.

However, in this case, the reasons I chose to do it this way were twofold: first there was some ugly stuff in the water directly above and to the left of the duck that I wanted to crop out; and second, the interesting colors and movement going on in the water were below and to the right of the duck. So I was stuck. To ameliorate the negative effect of having the subject about to leave the frame, I've placed the photo on the right of the text.

This one benefits greatly by being blown up, so be sure to click on it and view it "full size" (as full as I could make it on Blogger). I printed this at 16x20" and framed as a gift for a friend who had said it was one of her favorite photos of mine.