First Pics from D40

[grey.squirrel]

Only had my D40 for a day but been going crazy with the telephoto lens, it isn't VR and these were all hand held. I also realise I've gone a bit crazy on the retouching side but hope you all like. This was my first go at wildlife/bird photography and was just messing with settings trying to get to know my camera, never the less I'm pretty chuffed .

All photos are the following:

ISO - 800
Shutter - 1/125
F-stop - 5.6

1 (my personal favourite)

2 (was gutted as the mother was feeding this one but didn't get my lens out in time ... lesson learnt lol)

3

4

5

C & C highly welcome.

 

[leprechaun67]

hey, Grey Squirrel, I like your efforts - shots 2 and 3 are nice with the more natural backdrop. I'm not so keen on shots with bird feeders and garden furniture in, but I know birds don't do what you want them to do.. Not sure, but perhaps I'd have gone for a faster shutter speed 1/300, wider aperture (f4 or f4.5 - obviously less if you've got it) and or perhaps perhaps slightly lower ISO? Could you crop out the water bath (?) in no.5? Numbers 2, 3 and 5 the best if you do this - have you done any pp in Photoshop Elements - a bit of lightening perhaps? Great first efforts. I have the 40D too. Keep it up!

 

[grey.squirrel]

hey, Grey Squirrel, I like your efforts - shots 2 and 3 are nice with the more natural backdrop. I'm not so keen on shots with bird feeders and garden furniture in, but I know birds don't do what you want them to do.. Not sure, but perhaps I'd have gone for a faster shutter speed 1/300, wider aperture (f4 or f4.5 - obviously less if you've got it) and or perhaps perhaps slightly lower ISO? Could you crop out the water bath (?) in no.5? Numbers 2, 3 and 5 the best if you do this - have you done any pp in Photoshop Elements - a bit of lightening perhaps? Great first efforts. I have the 40D too. Keep it up!

Thank you, the furniture is there just because it's my front lawn and the birds love it, but I take what your saying as without they look more natural and less just took from the front window. There has been a bit of editing in terms of contrast and saturation using the standard windows vista viewer (though I am learning how to use photoshop raw for this). The speed and ISO was to keep the shots a little brighter though in the photo below I upped it to 1/400 and much prefer the result.

Update - I finally got the shot I was after, still a lot to learn but from my front window trying to hide behind the curtains I'm really pleased .

 

[Effjay]

That last one is a corker, well done