A SELF-taught wildlife photographer has captured the incredible moment an elusive bird landed on her head.

Two years ago, Sophie Luby, from Orford, began wildlife photography as a hobby.

Sophie was inspired after spotting a woodpecker near to her home so she dug out an old camera and began researching everything wildlife photography related.

The 29-year-old now spends her weekends travelling around with her camera.

And her talent has been recognised after footage she shared of an encounter with a kingfisher has gone viral – attracting more than one million viewers.

Last month, Sophie, who is a technical manager at Rock Oil in Warrington, headed to Kirkcudbright to a kingfisher hide.

Warrington Guardian:

On her first day here while sitting outside the hide, much to Sophie’s disbelief, a kingfisher, which is described as an elusive bird, landed on her head while she was camouflaged.

She decided to return the next day and set up cameras that were pointing at her on the off chance that this may happen again.

After sitting still for most of the day, a kingfisher landed on her head again.

She managed to capture both pictures and a video of the kingfisher on her head – both of which blew up when she uploaded them to Instagram.

So far, the video has more than 100,000 likes, one million views and she now has more than 24,000 followers.

“You have to be completely camouflaged and hidden for one to even come anywhere near you,” Sophie told the Warrington Guardian.

“And if they see any sort of movement, they’ll just fly away.

Warrington Guardian:

“When it catches a fish, it bangs it to stun it so that it isn’t wriggling around in its belly.

“It was banging the fish against my head, I was shaking because I was laughing so much.

“I thought with me laughing it was going to get scared and fly off, but it just didn’t care about me at all.

“After a couple of times I was just getting used to it, but it was just the sensation of the feeling of its little feet on my head.

“I could feel it walking around.”

What makes the situation even more special, is that Sophie’s incredible talent and hobby is self taught.

Reflecting back to when she first started wildlife photography, Sophie said: “When I look back on my journey, it is crazy to think of how much I have learned over the last two years.

“It has been amazing really.

“I didn’t really know anything about photography but I just loved going out and seeing wildlife.

“Once I got that picture of the woodpecker I wanted, I was hooked.

“I was like ‘Ok, what’s next?’ What else can I get a picture of?'

“I have just been gradually learning more stuff over the two years.”