Water birds are likely the most popular subjects for wildlife photographers. They live almost everywhere, often in large colonies. And they don’t eat a photographers like other wild species do They can be beautiful too.

Like this James’s Flamingo I captured at Lagoon Chaxa in Los Flamencos National Park in Chile. It is true, you can see them in Zoo too, but you need to visit them in the wild if you want to see them in the flight.

As they can fly very fast (up to 60 km/h) I had to use fast shooting mode at 5 frames per second and continuous AF tracking mode. The camera had difficult time to track the motion of the bird as the lens was heavily slowed down by the teleconverter. However, it managed to capture a decisive moment when the bird almost touched the water where he decided to land. My only job was to convert the picture to B&W as I think the color does not bring any value there. And I like it more.

The Andean Fox (Lycalopex culpaeus) is one of a very few animals that can survive in hostile environment of the Atacama Desert. One of the interesting facts about the Andean Fox is that it is actually not a fox. It is rather a species of wild dog. It is member of Pseudalopex (false foxes) genus and member of this group are located mostly in South America where they call them “Zorros” or “Lamb killers” although they don’t kill lambs any more.

I met this one near Chilean-Bolivia border close to Paso Jama crossing. It was hiding in remains of one of abandoned houses that are located in that area of the desert. I was going by car in the road close tho these houses. As soon as I spotted him I grabbed my camera with telephoto lens resting in back-seat of my car and captured a series of pictures. Since I had no support for my camera many of my shoots were blurred, but at least some were sharp.

The Indian Flying fox is one of the largest bats in the world. Despite being just a bat it is a really large animal. Its wingspan ca be just as large as gold eagle – 1.5m. They live in large colonies in India, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri-Lanka and close countries.

I captured this one during my honeymoon stay on Maldives. I spotted him during the day in middle of banana plantation. Bananas are their favorite food so he probably enjoyed his lunch there. I quickly hide underneath one of banana plants. When he spotted me, he probably started to think whether I am harm or not and then flew away. The second shot is just from the moment just before he left. You can see his nice skin.

I captured these shoots handheld. That’s why I preferred fast shutter time and cranked up ISO a bit. In those moments I am really happy that I shoot with a FX camera. Also since I shoot during a bright day I had to spot meter on the bat body. That’s why there are some lost highlights. But since they are in background I don’t find it disturbing.