Perfect harmony

Off work today, having swapped with a colleague. Looking at the weather forecast, I think I got a good deal, as the rain cleared by 1pm, to an afternoon of glorious sunshine. The rest of the week is set to be cloudy with more rain showers...

I popped out before doing the school run for a little wander down the River Arun just at the point where the Arundel Wildfowl & Wetlands Centre backs on to it. I was rewarded with quite a few sightings of birds overhead and on the river itself, as well as a small herd of cows on the river bank who were determined not to let me pass.

These majestic swans were in full flight down the river just at the right time for my shutter!



This photo has given me some trouble though - it's the first time I've processed an image in RAW and I'm not sure it's made it better, just made it more complicated ;-)

I've also agonised over the composition of this one. Even with a zoom lens, I wasn't that close to the swans, so this has been cropped quite a bit, yet cropping to show just the swans didn't work, in my opinion. I then decided I wanted to include their reflection, and the colours in the sky and Downs - hence cropping in portrait, but this was after several abortive attempts. Comments would be very welcome if anyone has the time to view the original shot...