On an early December morning a group of Sandhill cranes left for their daily flight to the feeding fields near Bosque Del Apache National Wildlife refuge. It was bitter cold on the high desert near Soccoro, New Mexico and an unusual light snow was falling on the ponds where the Sandhills had spent the night.

Sandhill Cranes can appear ungainly in certain activities but when they take flight they are the epitome of grace and beauty. Similar to cranes in Asia, most notably in Japan, they are very similar in appearance to their Japanese cousins the Red Crowned cranes. The difference being Red Crowned cranes have black tail feathers that droop like a bustle where as the Sandhill crane has straight shorter tail feathers.

This is a photograph reimagined into an art image by the use of software programs and hand manipulation of the elements of the images on the computer. The purpose being to elevate a normal photograph into a vision that brings out the emotional content of the scene while still keeping the primary elements, the cranes, in their original captured state. In other words, Birds in Art.