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Alexander Viduetsky took this shot in Playa del Rey, California, where had gone to see and photograph a burrowing owl that had been spotted earlier by a local birding group. He found it and photographed the owl, but while he was standing by the fence, trying to line up a better shot, a hummingbird appeared out of nowhere and perched on a branch about 20 feet away. “This Allen’s hummingbird was so handsome that I simply couldn’t ignore it,” he says. Viduetsky took at least 10 shots, and submitted what he felt was the best one.
He says that sometimes his best-quality photos come at unexpected moments, which adds fun to his expeditions. The day he photographed the hummingbird was very cloudy, and Viduetsky saw little chance of getting high-quality images in the low light. However, he says, “the absence of a bright sunlight actually helped me to get a very detailed and accurate portrait of this colorful bird.”
This image was a Top 100 photo from the 2013 Audubon Magazine Photography Awards. To see all of the photos, click here.