Birds (no Puffins)

I love birds, but have always been too intimidated by how quickly they move to have seriously thought about them as a photographic subject in their own right.

I have persevered and whilst I definitely cannot claim to be an expert in bird photography now, I have learnt some settings and approaches that result in the odd good shot, and I am learning all the time.

I still cannot really capture birds in flight very well, but if they are relatively still, or slower moving, then I can just about manage. It helps that I can delete the empty ‘it was there a second ago’ images from my photo library and pretend it never happened…

Settings and Approach

90 to 280 mm lens (f/2.8 to 4.0).

Shutter Priority, with the shutter speed set to between 1/500 and 1/1000 seconds to freeze movement.

ISO set automatically or limited to ISO 400 to try and keep noise to a minimum.

Challenge: Low light, light direction, meaning a balancing act between ISO and shutter speed. Speed of the little tricksters.