This was a very dark and dreary day. I drove up to Squamish, BC and wandered the rivers and back channels specifically to shot eagles but had a heck of a time with light. Ended up using a little fill flash with a flash extender and power set to 1/4 to get this shot. At that I was shooting at 1/125 at what amounted to over 500mm (200mm x 1.7 TC x 1.5 crop factor). Found this dirty (probably 4th or 5th year) eagle eating a salmon carcass he had dragged up on the rocks along the river. Not the greatest shot but considering the light I'll take it. A younger eagle came along and chased this one off this carcass but the pictures of the action just did not come out sharp due to low shutter speeds and long zoom.
Used Nikon 70-200mm f2.8 VR with Nikon 1.7x TC
Converted and processed from RAW using Capture NX
Cleaned in Noise Ninja
Resized and sharpened in PSE4
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I like the moment and look captured here but wonder if the composition would be stronger cropping vertically at about the back edge of the right (left as viewed) leg since the tail feathers are already out of frame, making the current composition look hacked off. Tightening the crop would also bring more attention to the scene (scavenging).
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