Dark side of the heron

Trying some more silhouette and backlit work on the herons yesterday morning before work, I used an aperture value of 40 at 400m to produce the star-like halos often seen in night and landscape photography. These actually result from the eight blades of the aperture diaphragm in the lens. Positioning myself to make the most of the dawn light I managed to get several of the reflections to bend around the bird's head creating the glitzy portrait below.