Birding and Bird Photography

Haha, thanks! Most of the pictures of the ducks in the water aren't even cropped. They were all suuuper close to the viewing platform, it was crazy! That Ibis was super close, too. He stretched his wings out like that 3 separate times. I think it was the only Ibis there, too.

Oh, and after looking through my pictures and picking up any species that I had forgotten about seeing, my bird list this year is up to 74 species.

 

You can probably tell where i live with the redheads photo

 

You take some good shots man, you outta come down to the texas coast, you will see 74 in one weekend, or atleast pretty close to it.

 

Thanks! It's all because I saw Ben's and wanted to be that good.
Seriously, especially during migration. Maybe my mom and I will make a trip out there sometime.

Ben, do you ever have trouble focusing on your waterfowl? During my trip to Colusa there were three other photographers with me and I just talked to one of them and he said that his photos were a liiiittle bit out of focus, same as a lot of mine. They look fine when you're looking at the whole picture but once you zoom in you can tell that it's fuzzy. Doesn't seem to happen with the other birds that I have photographed, like that fox sparrow from a few weeks ago.

 

Just checked out all of your photos. I'm jealous of those species! The fulvous whistling-duck, especially. I've never seen one of those before.
Ruddy ducks are probably my favorite waterfowl. They're so adorable!
And Damn! That pelican shot

 

Heck i was thinking the same about yours. We dont get the scoters, eiders, oldsquaw, goldeneyes, and harlequins down on the texas coast.
Ya i had to take quite a few rapid shots to get the diving pelicans. If your hardcore for birds, you should seriously think about making a trip to the tx coast. They have over 400 different species sightings a year in Corpus Christi. I like taking pics in general, but i figure if you can capture birds, theres some talent involved there, agreed?

 

Yeah I was trying to get the eye, but we were wondering if maybe it's the iridescence on the bird's heads that mess up the auto focus a little bit. This was mainly happening with widgeons and the Ibis, less so with the pintails.
I didn't even think about reducing the shutterspeed. I was trying to increase it to stop all motion because I thought I was getting a little blur instead of it being a little out of focus, but I see looking back how that's the wrong idea.
Thanks!

We don't really get any of those either, I think you might be confusing me with Chenbro in New Jersey. I'm super jealous of those birds, too!
Agreed, lots of movement and anticipating how and when they're going to move. Lots of body language reading through the lens.

 

The way autofocus works is that it depends on contrast to maintain focus. For Canon cameras, there are certain focus points that are better than others-read your manual. There are also AF modes. "one shot" allows you to focus and recompose. But if you are shooting wide open and the subject is moving, you'll want to choose AI. One other thing that I find really helps is back button focus. You let go of the shutter, you lose focus. AI focus mode. Also, remember your DOF calculations and focus on the eyes.

 

Oh yea sorry shawman, i lost track of whose pics were whose. But you have some sweet pintail shots, and that shovelers plumage is as good as it gets.

Hey Ian, im digging that spoonbill and black skimmer shot

 

Hey shawman, howd you get so close to that snipe?

 

Thanks!

 

Thanks for the advise on focus, guys, I'll play around with it!

Really nice pictures, Ian! I really like the colors on the green heron. They're always in the shade in the arboretum for me so the colors are always kinda muted.

I was in a vehicle on an auto loop and was in the passenger seat. We drove by and I just happened to see him out there on my side, luckily. I don't think I cropped that picture, either!

Thanks! And are you thinking of the tern? I didn't see a skimmer in Ian's pictures. I don't know what species of tern it is offhand, I'd have to look it up, but definitely not a skimmer.

 

Ya your right, def not a skimmer, looks like either royal or caspian

 

I just looked at the book, I'm thinking Forster's Tern. Based on the bill with the black tip and the long tail I see Common and Forster's and then to distinguish between those two the Common has a gray belly and the Forster's is white. Ian's looks like a white belly.

 

They were described as Caspian Terns which is what I named the file. But when I looked it up at home, I thought it was more like a Forster's.

 

Yall are probably right, im a little rusty on my shorebird ID, im a waterfowl kinda guy lol. Whatever it is, its a nice pic.

 

Kevin is awesome with his IDs. Me? Not so much.

I would have called them skimmers just because of how they were fishing. Just amazing to watch them.

 

Shorebirds suck to ID in the field. The only way I can get them is by taking a picture and comparing it to a book later...Terns are pretty much the same, too. I'm normally a passerine guy, but I've been doing a looot with waterfowl lately...I'm in a waterfowl ecology course right now, which is my most interesting and exciting class at the moment.

Haha, thanks! Once you can tell birds by family it gets a lot easier to ID them in the book, even if you don't know anything about the species. Practice helps, too.

Nice! This needs to be a new comment image or something.
"You need to Stop Posting now..."

Have you been taking these photos recently? At the demo day you were saying you needed to get out to shoot more, have you gotten out since then?

 

Nah. I'm recycling

Took the dog out for some long hikes this week. I do need to head out sans pup.