Ruurd Jelle van der Laij has been fascinated with nature from a young age and loved nothing more than bird watching. So him becoming a nature photographer and ecologist was almost inevitable. Throughout the many years he spent observing and capturing birds, he noticed something interesting, and actually quite funny. “When you get the time to take a series of pictures of one single bird, you will always have one or two frontals in between. I realized from the start that they made the birds look completely different. From that moment on, I decided to focus on it and make sure I would have at least one frontal in each series. Some birds start to look like angry birds, some funny or even ridiculous,” he said in a statement to Bored Panda.
It’s true, while most birds look majestic from most angles, something about their frontal images is just too funny. The same cannot be said about all birds, of course. For birds of prey, like owls, frontals are their normal way of looking at you, so the photograph will only be fun if they cock their head to the side. No explanation can do the job better than the pictures themselves, so without further ado, take a look at some beautiful birds from a completely new angle.

Image Source: Ruurd Jelle van der Laij
To see more of Van der Laij's work you can visit his website, Facebook, or Instagram page.

Image Source: Ruurd Jelle van der Laij

Image Source: Ruurd Jelle van der Laij

Image Source: Ruurd Jelle van der Laij

Image Source: Ruurd Jelle van der Laij

Image Source: Ruurd Jelle van der Laij

Image Source: Ruurd Jelle van der Laij
Related: 19 Gorgeous Birds You Might Not Have Seen Before

Image Source: Ruurd Jelle van der Laij

Image Source: Ruurd Jelle van der Laij

Image Source: Ruurd Jelle van der Laij

Image Source: Ruurd Jelle van der Laij

Image Source: Ruurd Jelle van der Laij
Related: Top Winners of the 2020 Bird Photo of The Year Competition

Image Source: Ruurd Jelle van der Laij

Image Source: Ruurd Jelle van der Laij

Image Source: Ruurd Jelle van der Laij

Image Source: Ruurd Jelle van der Laij

Image Source: Ruurd Jelle van der Laij

Image Source: Ruurd Jelle van der Laij

Image Source: Ruurd Jelle van der Laij

Image Source: Ruurd Jelle van der Laij
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