First crack at birds, Owls at Muncaster

[PaulF]

Hi,

Went to Muncaster Castle yesterday with the family. There is an owl sanctuary there where they have a lot of breeding pairs of varies types of owl, some cute and some evil looking

They also do a 'Meet the Owls' thing at 2.30 everyday when they bring a few of the hand reared birds out to feed.

I have never tried to shoot birds of prey before and although they weren't 'in the wild' still found it interesting and they are impressive birds to see.

Here's a couple of images, any advice on how to do this better? I think the shutter could have been quicker but the light wasn't brilliant.

The larger versions are on my Flickr.

1.

DSC_9022 by PaulFa, on Flickr

2.

DSC_9031 by PaulFa, on Flickr

Thank you for looking.
Paul.

 

[Cobra]

Not bad for a 1st attempt at all

Although Owls do appear to move quite slowly, they do actually move quite quickly.
And looking at the EXIF, 1/1000th should have been OK
But I think that they are a tad soft, due to the wide open? aperture (2.8)

I'd be inclined to shut it down a little (and of course up the speed to compensate)
Also have a read through this if you have time LINKY
Hope that helps.

 

[Martyn...]

Here's a couple of images, any advice on how to do this better? I think the shutter could have been quicker but the light wasn't brilliant.

Thank you for looking.
Paul.

They look fine to me, the eye is in focus, which is the main thing to aim for.

As Cobra says you need to stop down the aperture a little to increase the depth of field and sharpen things up a bit, just up the ISO to compensate, your D7000 should be able to handle that OK, there is always Noiseware to help clean them up a touch.

1/1000 sec is plenty fast enough for something that large and steady, you could probably have dropped to 1/500 and still been fine.

 

[PaulF]

Thank you Cobra and Martyn. That article is very interesting, just wish I'd seen it before Sunday

I take your points about the aperture, I had it wide open to get the fastest shutter speed I could, I don't like raising the ISO too much if I can help it.

I'll bear that in mind though for next time, thanks.

Paul.