More bird flight photos – Port of Brisbane

[Dennis]

Originally Posted by Dennis

>snip
As I said, its early days for me and I’ve dialled the following settings into a Custom User setting so at the twist of a dial, I’m ready to go:

• Canon 40D + Canon 400mm F5.6L lens
• 1/1600 sec exposure
• F5.6 aperture
• ISO400
• Low speed continuous shooting (3.5 frames per second)
• The Lord’s Prayer!

>snip
Cheers
Dennis

I thought I had better explain why I chose these manually selected settings, as they are not random!

They come from the “Sunny F16 rule” from my days of 35mm film photography. The rule is that on a bright sunny day, with your aperture set to F16, the correct shutter speed for a medium tone scene is the reciprocal of the film speed. A black cat in a coal cellar or a polar bear in snow are not medium tone scenes!

So, in my case, we have the following:

• F16 at 400ASA gives 1/400 sec – this is the Sunny F16 rule which is the equivalent of:
• F11 at 400ASA at 1/800 sec
• F8 at 400ASA at 1/1600 sec
• F5.6 at 400ASA at 1/3200 sec

So as we open up the lens aperture, we need to use the next faster shutter speed to compensate.

You will note that instead of using 1/3200 at F5.6, I have used 1/1600 to let in one more stop of light for early morning, late evening, side lit birds, etc. and to “expose to the right of the histogram”

Looking at the Histogram seems to confirm that this is a good setting for the conditions I tend to shoot under, although I can easily alter the shutter speed if the lighting conditions change. Here is a nice write up on exposure.

Cheers

Dennis

Useful links:
http://www.bwps.org/res/tips/sunny_16/
http://luminous-landscape.com/tutori...exposure.shtml

[Dennis]

Originally Posted by AlexN

Matty.. Once you get L glass you have to understand... You wont want anything in your collection of lenses BUT L glass... It can detract greatly from the amount of money you can throw at astronomy...

I bought 1, I was hooked, now have 4 and I'm broke.

Hey Alex

I very much look forward to meeting your L glass, whoops!, I mean meeting with you at the Qld Astrofest!

Cheers

Dennis

[iceman (Mike)]

Brilliant shots, Dennis! The 4th one would've been fantastic if the water had been smooth to allow reflections!

I hope you can get out under the cold dark sky again soon

[Dennis]

Originally Posted by iceman

I hope you can get out under the cold dark sky again soon

Thanks Mike! LOL! Over the last couple of months I have needed to keep reminding myself that this is an astronomy forum, with sub-forums for secondary interests and not a bird photography forum! I mainly blame Alex, Jeanette and Ving for leading me astray!

Although I must say, you have to shoulder some responsibility as your photos from a trip to the zoo some while ago certainly contributed to my current malaise!

Not to mention RB’s contribution….

Cheers

Dennis

[jjjnettie (Jeanette)]

Originally Posted by Dennis

Jeanette posted some excellent photos of some Ibis in flight just recently, using a non-L Canon lens and in my book, they were very good indeed for a very challenging subject.

Dennis, It's not only not an L lens, it's not even a Canon. I'm using a Sigma 70-300mm lens. While it's cheap it's not so nasty in my opinion.
According the comparative reviews that you gave me the link to, this lens is very good up to 200mm, but CA increases after that and is a big problem when used at 300mm.
I've not thought to use a tripod for my birds in flight. The images I took are all hand held. Maybe I should do my pics a favour and mount the camera.

[Dennis]

Originally Posted by jjjnettie

>snip
I've not thought to use a tripod for my birds in flight. The images I took are all hand held. Maybe I should do my pics a favour and mount the camera.

Hi Jeanette,

Generally, a tripod is a very good idea. I have found that using one with either a lightly clamped ball and socket head, or a gimbal head such as the Jobu Design unit, really helps minimise the shakes and makes the session less tiring. I ended up purchasing a light weight carbon fibre Giottos tripod, weight 1.6 kgs, as I kept on leaving our heavier one at home due to the sheer bulk and weight.

I have a couple of ball heads – one (heavy model) from Slik and a lightweight model from Velbon. The Velbon one is more suited to bird flight as I can back off the locking knob a tad, which puts a small amount of drag on the ball allowing me to smoothly follow the bird in flight. The Slik one isn’t as smooth; it tends to grab a little.

The Jobu Gimbal head has the advantage that it was designed for the purpose and you can let go of the lens/camera and it remains parked, whereas the ball and socket will flop over due to the imbalance.

When I am out for a couple of hours at a location, it is so much more comfortable to have the camera mounted on a tripod rather than have it in hand. This really does reduce fatigue, makes the outing more enjoyable as you can still rubber neck the skies and terrain and if you spot something, just grab the camera and swing it around on the tripod head.

Narelle is usually there too, using bino’s or a spotting scope, so we have extra eyes. We also take one of those walk stools so we can sit down for short rests, and we usually take a flask of tea and some sandwiches to keep hydrated and maintain energy levels.

Cheers

Dennis

[Dennis]

I should also add that in my 30 years of photography, mainly recording day trips, outings, holidays and hobbies rather than serious stuff, I have used non Canon, non L lenses such as Pentax, Tamron and Sigma and they have all served me well – I still have them!

I think that the current family of modern lenses from folks such as Sigma, do provide superior image quality as I understand that their designs are optimised by computer aided design software and they use modern materials, manufacturing methods and testing procedures.

So, although we do joke and banter about the L lenses here on IIS, they really are not absolutely necessary unless you are into examining every single pixel or need the waterproofing, heavy metal or have to use them wide open.

Cheers

Dennis

[RB (Andrew)]

Low speed continuous shooting (3.5 frames per second)

Just a quick question Dennis, how come you're using a 3.5 fps rate?
How does the 40D perform at full speed (6.5 fps)?
Wouldn't it help using the higher frame rate or are you trying to minimise vibration?

[AlexN]

Originally Posted by Dennis

So, although we do joke and banter about the L lenses here on IIS, they really are not absolutely necessary unless you are into examining every single pixel or need the waterproofing, heavy metal or have to use them wide open.

Too true... I couldnt bring my self to sell my some of my sigmas/tokina lenses.... Its sad to say but I still have a canon 35-80 kit lens from an EOS 3000 film camera... It should be in the bin with the noises it makes during focusing,

[Dennis]

Originally Posted by RB

Just a quick question Dennis, how come you're using a 3.5 fps rate?
How does the 40D perform at full speed (6.5 fps)?
Wouldn't it help using the higher frame rate or are you trying to minimise vibration?

Hi Andrew

Thanks for the question. I’m still building up my knowledge of the 40D and its operations – it is effectively my 1st camera with a motor drive capability.

When I first tried the low speed, I noticed that when panning to keep the bird in frame, occasionally, the camera would stop shooting as I suspect the buffer was full, so it had to wait to complete writing data to the CF card. I currently use Sandisk 4G III cards although I am aware that you can get faster cards.

Also, I’m a bit nervous about the potential hammering the system will take if the mirror flips up and down at 6.5 fps to allow for AF follow focus?

Cheers

Dennis