Best practice for shooting birds?

architectfadi

architectfadi

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Hi,


I have seen amazing birds photography on this forum but what focus settings, exposure modes etc... Do people use?
Thanks
 
architectfadi said:
Hi,

I have seen amazing birds photography on this forum but what focus settings, exposure modes etc... Do people use?
Thanks
Click to expand...

I'm by no means an expert but for birds in flight I use a fast shutter speed around 1/1000 or faster, an aperture to get enough DoF, about f5.6-f8 if possible and a high ISO to suit the exposure for these settings. Continuous focus (af-c on nikon) is also needed and depending on the background 1 or 9 focus points. Spot or centre average metering on the bird is useful, matrix metering can work well but it depends on the conditions which metering mode is best.

Have a look on Flickr, many show the settings used and it can be a great way to learn. Settings do depend on the conditions, bright weather allows faster shutter speed but rain/snow can give atmosphere. When there is snow on the ground its great for photographing birds, the snow act as a giant reflector shining light back upwards and lighting the dark areas under the wings.

This is quite a good tutorial: http://www.johnstuartclarke.co.uk/photographing-birds-in-flight
 
architectfadi said:
Hi,


I have seen amazing birds photography on this forum but what focus settings, exposure modes etc... Do people use?
Thanks
Click to expand...

Hi, you will more as like get mixed opinions as really it depends on what lens you have,if you are going to use a tripod how close you are to the subject and a host of other factors. Basic ground rules would be to use a shutter speed equal to or greater than the focal length you are using,@300mm =1/300 or more, @400mm = 1/400 or more. That said you can still get away with a shutter speed much lower if you are confident with your shooting technique,as in it has to be pretty stable. Regards to metering I do not stick to one type all the time although spot probably gets used the most,single point focus on the subjects eye is what you should aim for. As for aperture it depends how close you are to the subject and with what lens,dof can be very shallow at the best of times. Your best bet is to start taking a few shots if you are interested and start posting them up for feedback. Hope this has been some help to you.
 
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Many thanks, very useful link. I was surprised to find that my shutter speed of 1/500 wasn't fast enough and had some motion blur in my photos
 
Birds wings move very very fast specially on take off, this surprised me too a few times.
 
It really depends on not just what lens your using but the situation as well.

I think we all work out "go to" settings for different types of shot, but generalising them into perched or in flight I use/used to use the following.

Perched - At least 1/500th second, aperture F2.8-F8 dependent on the lens ( I want my backgrounds out of focus as much as possible), shooting mode is usually manual. If the bird is dark ie a blackbird then I'll add some + exposure compensation to ensure its not underexposed, metering mode depends on the situation/light but generally I'll use spot metering.
Focus mode is one shot or single, drive mode is single shot.

In flight - 1/1000th second minimum up to 4000th max, if the sky is bright I'll always add up to two stops of + exposure compensation to ensure the bird itself isn't underexposed as even spot metering the sky tends to fool the meter.
Focus mode continuous AF, drive mode burst or continuous shooting, again shooting in manual mode.

If you prefer auto modes then go for shutter priority as the shutter speed is more critical than the aperture, if the min shutter speeds quoted cause underexposure adjust the ISO to compensate, its far better to shoot at a higher ISO than a slower shutter speed.
 
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As other's have said, it's really kind of dependent on subject/situation, but it's also quite camera dependent.

Assuming we are talking lower end cameras (i.e. not pro models) and birds in flight; I would use either continuous focus and 21 pts (fewer is "faster" but also "harder"), or 51 pts if the BG is just sky.

Metering mode on lower end cameras would probably be CW with some +EC set for the brighter BG (sky), or manual metering/ exposure.

I use high end Nikons with very fast AF/tracking. I also use spot metering most of the time (*requires* fast AF tracking). I tend to be in aperture priority with auto ISO set (limited) and min SS set.
Set this way I select the aperture and the camera automatically uses the lowest ISO and the highest SS possible for the aperture selected. I would use any Nikon set this way (other than spot metering). Canons/Sony etc won't work nearly as well set like this (other than the newest high end Canons).
 
If you have a garden, it is a good place to start. Set up a feeder or two and practice getting good shots.

Both in the garden and elsewhere it is useful to know the habits of birds and what they are likely to do.

For example, the finches tend to sit and stay so when they are on a feeder they are likely to stay for a while.
The tit family rarely stay still for long and grab food and fly off, and the smaller members of the family, such as coal tits, move very quickly.

Some birds are much more tolerant of the proximity of humans than other. In the garden, getting close to a robin is easy and I have also found coal tits to be be fairly tolerant. Jays, woodpeckers, magpies are, in my experience, very wary and tend to fly off very quickly.

Dave
 
Tringa said:
If you have a garden, it is a good place to start. Set up a feeder or two and practice getting good shots.

Both in the garden and elsewhere it is useful to know the habits of birds and what they are likely to do.

For example, the finches tend to sit and stay so when they are on a feeder they are likely to stay for a while.
The tit family rarely stay still for long and grab food and fly off, and the smaller members of the family, such as coal tits, move very quickly.

Some birds are much more tolerant of the proximity of humans than other. In the garden, getting close to a robin is easy and I have also found coal tits to be be fairly tolerant. Jays, woodpeckers, magpies are, in my experience, very wary and tend to fly off very quickly.

Dave
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:plus1:
 
You could do worse than study some of the shots on this web site:

http://www.claredrewellphotography.co.uk/p763848523/h2e36317#h2e36317

She is an acquaintance of mine and is a member of this forum. She takes some breathtaking shots of birds and other subjects and is not frightened of showing her camera settings. Just click on the "i" in the top right corner of the shots.
 
Knowing about your subject pays dividends, fieldcraft and patience can alllow you to get closer to your subjects.
 
RichardTaylor said:
You may find this into to bird photography tutorial, of mine, helpful.

http://digital-photography-school.com/forum/tutorials/212470-introduction-bird-photography.html
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Richard, not having a go, but can i ask why don't you offer any advise on the forums themselves other than posting a link to your website, if the forums are happy for you to do it fair enough :thinking:, but wouldn't it be better for the forum if the info was actually on here for others to read :shrug:.
 
I'm very interested in this & have just been out to my local country park and fired a few shots off. I will PP them tonight and post them up, but this thread is a good read & has already highlighted a couple of issues i may find when going through my shots from today.
 
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