Stunning photo

[pcgpcg]

There is a stunning photo by Majeed Badizadegan published online here…
http://www.washingtonnature.org/fieldnotes/march-2017-photo-of-the-month

My question… how could a camera shutter freeze some droplets of water, but still capture movement of other water particles in such a blurred fashion?

I’m not posting this to pass judgement on the photographer or the merits of the photo, regardless of how it was achieved, and I hope any discussion does not go in that direction. I’m a photo editing neophyte and I'm simply curious about the technical aspects of how this photo might have been created.  Is this a natural phenomena or was some photo editing involved? If so, how? Any idea?

[dreed]

My question… how could a camera shutter freeze some droplets of water, but still capture movement of other water particles in such a blurred fashion?

Depth of field but more likely, different aspects of the water are traveling at different speeds and also quite possibly of a different nature. It looks like part of that photo is a mist, possibly created by the previous wave.

[Farmer]

It's in the accompanying words:

"The spray from the waves that came before it created a rich and thick atmosphere, the lingering color in the sky from a brilliant sunrise. The wave itself took on this shape because it was colliding with another wave that came before it."

It's not blur, it's the remnants of the previous wave impacting with the new one.

It's a fantastic shot!

[Larry Heath]

Strong wind from left to right with respect to the picture is aerosolizing the tops of the wave, also as previously suggested a return wave again traveling from left to right may have “stood up” a wave traveling right to left further enhancing the aerosolizing of the tops of the wave(s). Basically the wind is taking the tops of the waves off.

That is my two cents.
 
OH, and it is a stunning image!

Later Larry