Small Bird Photography Learning at Woodbridge Island / Table Bay Nature Reserve
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| Pied Kingfisher : Table Bay Nature Reserve / Woodbridge Island |
Photographing perched small birds
With all the questions I get with regard to my perched small bird photography technique (with my standard Bird in Flight photography settings), I thought it was about time to provide more detail regarding settings et al.
For many new and experienced photographers this is a different way of shooting perched birds. Generally one will assume that perched birds will be photographed with a long lens (with Image Stabilization) and / or on a tripod (or some other form of stabilization).
During my own skills development process with Birds in Flight photography I would at times encounter a few smaller perched birds (in the Table Bay Nature Reserve close to Woodbridge Island). I used to ignore them at first, as I was on a mission for fine-tuning the Canon EOS 7D Mark II's AF and to master my Birds in Flight photography techniques. The smaller birds around the Table Bay Nature Reserve / Woodbridge Island are rarely perched for more than a few seconds at a time - I quite like this unpredictability, as its making the capturing more natural (as in the the true wild).
Early one morning in the goodness of our local summer light I captured a few smaller birds without changing any settings on my camera - with the understanding that the fast shutter speeds that I generally use - 1/3200 - 1/4000s - should work to stop (any) motion and the good light should keep my Auto-ISO in manual mode down. My lens does not have Image Stabilization and I'm quite experienced in its application for Birds in Flight photography. These days I rarely change any settings for the perched birds as I don't really see any real advantages over using any other settings (i.e. Av Mode with lower ISO's),
The images posted here are generally all with the same settings without any changes to my Birds in Flight photography settings. The only exception is, when I have enough time, I would change my standard large Zone AF mode to one of the smaller AF areas.
- Canon EOS 7D Mark II camera body
- Canon EF 400mm f/5.6L USM lens
- Lexar Professional CompactFlash UDMA 7 32 GB
- Sandisk Extreme Plus SDHC™ UHS-I Card 95MB/s 32 GB
Exposure / Other Settings: Canon EOS 7D Mark II / EF 400mm f/5.6L USM Lens
- Manual Mode
- Aperture: f/5.6
- Auto-ISO 500 - 800
- Focal Length: 400mm
- Shutter speed: 1/3200 - 1/4000 seconds
- AF On - Case 1 [Various Zones]
- No IS (None-IS lens)
- Lens Autofocus on
- Handheld
(Click to Enlarge)
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