Yesterday at Slimbridge

[Jannyfox]

Just a few from a visit to Slimbridge

A humble blue tit (on a post!) (edited)

Blue tit by Jannyfox, on Flickr

A humble black bird

Blackbird by Jannyfox, on Flickr

A moorhen. I like moorhens - I don't know why (well, someone has to)

Moorhen by Jannyfox, on Flickr

A shoveler. Lovely plumage

Shoveler by Jannyfox, on Flickr

Mrs pimtail getting spruced up for a night out (or in)

Pintail by Jannyfox, on Flickr

Pochard

Pochard by Jannyfox, on Flickr

And Mrs tuftie getting spruced up........

Tufted duck by Jannyfox, on Flickr

 

[BRASH]

1) While I like the composition, the whites are blown and the bird isn't the sharpest. It's a nice uncluttered bg but I'd clean up the lower left corner.

2) Looks like the harsh light has done for this one. The composition is ok but the front of the bird holds no detail at all. Good low pov.

3) Personally I wouldn't have bothered with this one. The high pov and the fact the subject is moving away make it one for the bin imo.

4) A decent shot tho it looks like a big crop due to the loss of finer detail, the whites are a tad blown and it needs slightly more space to the right but not a bad effort.

5) Is ok. Central composition works for me and even tho the bird is facing away the fact it's doing something with it's head gives interest.

6) Is also ok. Nice framing and exposure. Again looks like a bit of a crop but a very reasonable shot.

7) As per No 3. The high pov makes it a binner for me albeit the exposure ain't too bad.

It does seem the bright contrasty conditions have been a bit of a blight on you but that's something you have to put up with and learn to cope with. All in all, some good points and decent efforts and with the right combination of these I'm sure you'll produce some great pics. Keep at it.

 

[gramps]

Like the Shoveler and Pintail Jan, good feather detail in the Pintail

 

[Jannyfox]

1) While I like the composition, the whites are blown and the bird isn't the sharpest. It's a nice uncluttered bg but I'd clean up the lower left corner.

2) Looks like the harsh light has done for this one. The composition is ok but the front of the bird holds no detail at all. Good low pov.

3) Personally I wouldn't have bothered with this one. The high pov and the fact the subject is moving away make it one for the bin imo.

4) A decent shot tho it looks like a big crop due to the loss of finer detail, the whites are a tad blown and it needs slightly more space to the right but not a bad effort.

5) Is ok. Central composition works for me and even tho the bird is facing away the fact it's doing something with it's head gives interest.

6) Is also ok. Nice framing and exposure. Again looks like a bit of a crop but a very reasonable shot.

7) As per No 3. The high pov makes it a binner for me albeit the exposure ain't too bad.

It does seem the bright contrasty conditions have been a bit of a blight on you but that's something you have to put up with and learn to cope with. All in all, some good points and decent efforts and with the right combination of these I'm sure you'll produce some great pics. Keep at it.

I'd braced myself for a lot worse from you.....................!
Yes the conditions were quite difficult (for me) but I'm learning. Next time I'll think harder about how I'm going to deal with it, but yes, some of the whites did get blown. My fault.
The moorhen was always going to be love it or hate it.............
Good point about the bottom corner in the blue tit - I'd overlooked that
The shoveler I just framed too tight. It was moving around quite a lot so I was concentrating on getting a shot when it had its head out of the water
The high view point in the last isn't something I could change. The hide is what it is. Where I could I was getting down low - wet ground covered in goose poo...........lovely
If it was easy it wouldn't be fun

 

[BillN_33]

Morning Jan - well done at seeing such a selection
Quite a few basic things to considered as indicated in Brian's comments……. I hope that you do not mind me adding a few

I notice from Flickr that the shots were taken with at 300mm or 150mm which, unless you are quite near, is a little short for small bird photography… obviously the ducks swam up to the hide but the Blue Tit and Blackbird were taken at some distance….. if you can minimise "shooting down" on ducks it can help the composition.
Also the shots are at ISO800 and some at quite high fvalues…. looking at the light you could have used a lower ISO's and wider aperture settings which would still have given you high shutter speeds.

The Blue Tit - easy to blow whites, I do all the time… Blue Tits are difficult, such small birds and move a lot
even at high shutter speed you need to be as steady as possible - bean bag in hides - tripod when you can.
Settings in camera - spot focus on the eye - most of the time spot exposure or small zone
Look at the light - shadows and highlights always look different in reality - just changing your position slightly can improve the shot
Try to think about composition - left, right centre, head room and background
The Shoveler, Pintail and Pochard are the best of the bunch
Blackbirds are a good subject as they tend to look at you for some time before deciding what to do.
Duck also are very accommodating and it's possible to get some good clear shots ….. but the background is usually water so you need to get the quality of the image "spot on"

Keep posting - maybe just one or two shots with the EXIF settings, (I know that they are on Flickr), so your in camera settings can be discussed

 

[Jannyfox]

Hi Bill. I don't mind honest crit - it's what I want to help me improve. The length of my lens is something I'm stuck with at the moment (Tamron 70-300 on a crop body), bought because they're relatively inexpensive as an 'entry level' lens. A lump of glass twice as long and 3 times the price isn't going to help unless I've got the basics right first. I'm on a budget, you know...........!
Since getting home I've realised I made a few mistakes in the camera settings. I set iso800 and shutter priority - 1250 when I could and dropping it when the light levels were too low. Next time I'll go the other way, use aperture priority (f8?) and tweak the iso. Spot focus - yes (never use anything else). I use evaluative metering, but I need to look at manually overriding that in some settings. Bean bag - yes, tripod - no. The one I have is fine for landscape but would probably be more of a hindrance for wildlife.