Nikon D850
ISO 720
600mm
f/6.3
1/2500 sec.
Sandpipers, Assateague Island National Seashore, Maryland, USA. One of my most recent images from a short trip to Assateague over the Thanksgiving break. I live in Pennsylvania now but grew up in Maryland taking summer vacations on the Eastern Shore. The infrequent trips back to Ocean City for Dumser's ice cream and Thrasher's fries are pleasantly nostalgic but early off-season mornings on nearby Assateague Island are the highlight. Free of summer bugs and hordes of beachgoers.
Small groups of sandpipers work their way up and down the beach, hunting small sea life brought in by the waves. They constantly run back and forth, fleeing and following the waterline. They pay almost no heed to humans on the beach, making it fairly easy to photograph them as the group passes by. I shot nearly 1000 frames that morning but was fortunate to get a few with the elements here: symmetry of the birds, dramatic foam formations balanced against smooth sand, all brushed by cloud softened light.
Processing was light: crop, minor tonal and contrast adjustments, sharpening and denoising, and a little spot removal.