Michael Scott

Down on the Leeds/Liverpool canal near Shipley, between Saltaire Brewery and Dockfield Mills, live a family of swans. There is a pair of adults and three signets, which are growing up quite fast. I took Ted for a long ride in his pushchair this morning and we passed the swans. We stopped for a look and they all swam over, expecting bread which we did not have.

The adults were wary but let me creep quite close with my camera, hissing at me to let me know where the boundary was (I was about 1 metre away). With only 55mm of lens to play with, I had to get extremely close for this shot.

I have tried photographing swans so many times, yet have never achieved a shot that was any good, so I was really happy when I saw this one come out of the camera. Although I was crouched as low as I could get without actually lying prostrate on the grass, I was sufficiently high enough to ensure that the only background was the water of the canal. At f5.6 at this close, the water is nicely out of focus. The drip of water falling from the end of the swan’s beak was a complete accident of timing. I in no way attempted to capture it, and the first I knew of it was when it downloaded onto my computer.

I have sharpened the image a little to make the swan stand out even more from the background. My first attempt was way over the top though and I ended up with a black line around the neck that was very obvious at full size. I also had a bit of blue/yellow chromatic aberration around the beak and neck. This is the first image that I have really noticed it on, and that I have ever tried to remove it on. Using the sliders in Aperture, and not fully understanding the cause of it, I think I did OK. I am still not entirely happy with the top of the swan’s head though; it’s not quite right.

If you view the image at full size and look at the swan’s eye, you can see a reflection of the sky and the Dockfield Mills building that was behind me when I took the image. I’m really pleased with this!