This is my first share. I just bought a "real" camera last week and have kind of been working on the crash-course version of photography. This photo really upsets me, because the bird sat there for what seemed like forever, just letting me take pictures, as I was fumbling around with the new camera and trying to remember how to do this and that. Anyway, this is what came of it. I'm not really happy about the composition, among other things. But, I'll let you at it. :) Thanks!
Welcome to BPN! We all started at one point, and went through the fumbling stage, just the way it is. I would spend as much time shooting simple things, working on learning the camera, which way the buttons work, where the needed menu items are, etc. You might consider investing in one of the many good users guides available for most current cameras. It would help us a lot to critique your images if you included your camera model, lens, the various settings, and any post processing work done.
Your bird is sharp, and well exposed except for a few over exposed white areas on the throat (255 on the histogram). The perch is nicely scaled to the bird, and although simple, the little curve at top adds interest. The way the head is angled is effective.
From a composition standpoint, I feel this would work nicely as a vertically framed image as well. Composition is certainly the most subjective subject, and there are lots of viable options. After a while, you will start to see it in the camera and adjust your focus accordingly.
This should get you going. Be sure to ask questions. There is a great pool of knowledge here on BPN.
Good advice from Randy, all had the" fumbling stage," and still do sometimes ,there are some very nice things about your image, keep at it there is always help on this forum.
Hi Mike, welcome to BPN!! I remember all too well when I first started getting serious with bird photography. We've all had to start, but the growing is fun...and that growing still happens to this day. Pretty nest subject you present us. Pretty good perch for it. BG is OK for the most part, but becoming distracting with the bright areas above. Randy's covered many pints well so I will not repeat...just be careful with the processing, it can be easy to add to much contrast. Still a good start, and we are looking forward to more from you!
P.S. As Randy pointed out, please include the gear used and exif info, this helps a lot when critiquing.
Hello everyone! Thanks for your replies, words of encouragement, and the warm welcome! Thanks as well for the helpful tips. This is the kind of stuff I need to hear -- keywords and such that I can look up and find out more about to help me improve.
Ok, gear info (everything is straight from the exiftool utility): Camera is a Canon EOS 7D Mark II, lens is a Canon EF100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS II USM +1.4x III (extender). I was shooting in Aperture-priority mode, but made zero adjustments on the fly as I panicked. I was a birder who happened to be carrying a camera (point-and-shoot) before last week. Now, I'm looking to be a photographer who happens to be birding, so the mindset is a complete 180 (at least to me). Before I would snap a picture (especially if I didn't know the species to help with identification), and now I have to learn to sit on a bench or rock somewhere and wait out that perfect shot.
As to changes I made and with what software....the software....well....I run Linux and have for probably 20 years, and I can't bring myself to give it up to run Windows or Mac OS in order to run photoshop or what-have-you, so I have Canon's DPP on a Windows virtual machine which I used to batch-convert my RAW files to jpegs and then I just cropped the image in question with Shotwell on Linux. I had to use Windows Server 2012 running on a virtual machine which was slower than molasses because I don't have the system resources to run two operating systems simultaneously like that on this older laptop. I think the batch process took over 4 hours. Anyway, I've always had GIMP installed and now I have Digikam, which looks really good, so I'll try those out. As I don't even understand *what* needs to be done, I figured I'd focus on the tools I have right now as they should be more than enough to learn on. I can see myself keeping it basic for a while here, as far as processing goes :)
Randy: As soon as I walked away, I gave myself a figurative kick in the butt for not doing a vertical. And thanks for the terminology, too. I'll be googling "255 histogram" here shortly. I KNOW what a histogram is, but not what the values (in terms of numbers) represent, so thanks for giving me something to look up.
Keith: Thanks for the words of encouragement!
Daniel: Thank you as well. One thought that entered my mind about that background (I wasn't a big fan of it myself) was whether or not there was something I could do post-processing to darken that white area or blend it in with what's below it. Thanks!
Welcome to BPN! You have a great camera and lens, and the 1.4X works very well with it. If you include the shutter speed, aperture and focal length, and how much of a crop, it will help critique. Lots to be learned here.
The image is softer than I would expect from your gear, so an early point of concentration should be on accurate focus and adequate shutter speed for the focal length, especially important if hand holding.
I would never batch convert to JPEG. You are giving up a lot of the tonal information in the raw file.
Hi Diane, and thanks! I appreciate your comments and assistance!
The other information you've requested is:
Shutter speed: 1/640
Aperture: f/8.0 (exiftool reports that the max aperture is/was 7.7)
Focal length: 476.0 mm
Crop: 1.6
Let me know, please, if anything looks out of whack here. Also, is there a photography bible that you would recommend? There's so much out there, and it's hard to sort through with my lack of experience. As for accurate focus, yes, I am hand-holding until I get a good tripod. That will happen very soon, as I've already learned the cheap tripod lesson. And with the lens I was using, I only have (I believe) 5 AF points max, unlike the 65 I have using a shorter lens. Does that matter?
Finally, I agree with you on the batch convert! :) I only did so because I didn't (yet) have anything on Linux that would have allowed me to view all the raw images that I took that day, except viewing one at a time. Also, I knew I wasn't going to be post-processing them at all, as that's a whole 'nother bag of worms I've yet to open. Anyway, now I've found Digikam, and have no need to convert to jpeg as it allows me to view right there. It looks very much like Lightroom did in a video I watched recently.
Those look good, depending on how steady the hand-holding is. I try to get as much shutter speed as I can, but I prefer not to go above ISO 800. Image stabilization is wonderful but the old saw about needing the minimum SS to be the reciprocal of the focal length just isn't enough for long telephoto work, especially handheld. We have much better loupes now, with the 1:1 views we have in the computer, compared to film days.
With the 1.4 on you are limited to the center point and 4 surrounding. You can dial that back to just the center (which has 4 smaller invisible helpers) and a pointpoint focus spot. Even without the 1.4, I prefer to use a single point if I can, for hitting best focus on the head or whatever is most important in the image. You'll almost never be able to get a sufficient depth of field to cover the whole subject.
The softness I'm seeing might be from processing, too -- hard to say without seeing the raw file at 100%. Most people here will do a very subtle sharpening on the re-sized JPEG after it's ready for posting.
Wish I could cite a great guide to shooting -- maybe others here will have some good suggestions.
Look forward to following your progress in this adventure!
Thanks again, Diane! I really appreciate you taking the time to help me. I'll keep everything you said in mind for the next one. As a matter of fact, I think I'll take a walk through the restoration area where I saw the bird in this photo last time :) Take care, and I thank you again!
The exif info you've since provided looks good to me, the gear you have is quite hand holdable. Mike, if you are looking for a bird photography "bible" there are actually two of them from Artie. The Art of Bird Photography I, and II. You can click on the "Birds as Art" Banner at the top of the page. There is also the "Educational Resources" forum found right here at BPN - tons of great info to read:
P.S. I can relate to the 180 degree turn you have recently taken. I was a "birdwatcher" growing up (NOT a chaser or hard core lister), but always interested in photography too. Since I've switched mainly to bird photography it seems I've had much more fun, and I've learned so much more about bird behaviour by being patient and sticking around to photograph the subjects.
Dickcissel
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