Liftoff / 3 seconds

@danthro: Visible difference as in position of the swan's wings?

He was beating his wings really hard on the way up (and not making that much forward progress), whereas for landing he was mostly holding his wings aloft to slam on the brakes, but skidding across the water at high speed.

I was very lucky with the timing of the landing shots. He was moving very very quickly and I caught sight of him as he came in to land, so was fortunate to catch the moment of initial touchdown in the first shot - you can see the V of his wake, but no splashes from prior bounces.

@danthro: hmm. I think the swan kept hitting the water on take off and on landing. In the series above the top shot is the first in the sequence. He has his feet out of the water in the first two shots but kicks down again (third shot) to get more momentum.

I guess the clue with the landing shot is that in the first shot there is a smooth wake and only one splash, from his very first touchdown. I wasn't quite fast enough to get him before he hit the water. You could also argue that the splashes of water become steadily less intense (i.e. less height/less white) as the landing series goes on.

All of this is made up, since I have no expertise whatsoever about how swans fly, take off or land :-)