This is a black-bellied plover on the beach in the northern Outer Banks of North Carolina. It clearly wants something in the sand! To make this work I needed to be at eye level, so had the camera on the sand.

This was natural light. Bokeh was easier here because I had nothing but ocean behind the bird, but the trick was to have enough definition in the background so that you know it's an ocean. So I shot with an OM System OM-1m2 and 100-400mm lens, ISO 1600, 1/5000 sec to freeze the detail, and f/7.1 to add a little definition behind the bird. Post-processing actually isn't much here, just changing highlight and shadow a bit to ensure the details stand out on the bird.

The end result: one sees a bird doing something with the ocean behind, but not distracting.

Thanks for the consideration and any comments!