A lunch time trip to the local Botanical Gardens. In this case the Saltwater Lake (they have a Freshwater one next to it). Got my work dress shoes rather muddy getting a better angle for this shot, but feel it was worth it ! :)
I like the low angle here Andy, and you got pretty good eye contact too. The lighting is a little uneven, creating a fair amount of shadow across the bird. Fill flash would have helped. And the BG is fairly prominent in the photo due to the lack of distance between the bird and what's behind it. Your images will be easier to critique if you take advantage of the 800 pixel limit and post the tech specs on your work. Thanks for posting!
I like the head angle, eye contact and details. The light looks a bit harsh and it would have been good to have the sun behind you. I would also give it more room top and bottom. Keep them coming!
Sorry, the exif : D300, 300 f4 AF-S + 1.7TC, 1/500s, f/8, ISO200, spot metered, hand held, manual focus, no flash.
Re: BG - I was using f8 as there was plenty of light and have been told to stop down the 300+TC for the lens sweet spot but I suppose that was for BIF shots. Should I have maybe gone for min. aperture or is max. ? lol. f/6.7 anyway with the TC on so maybe that wouldn't have helped enough. I'm happy for the mangroves to be part of the shot but agree some seperation/bokeh would have been better.
Re: fill flash - does that work for longer distances ? (don't have a better beamer and I don't carry my SB800 with me but maybe I should ?), and I still have no idea how to do fill flash. My understanding is that to use the Nikon iTTL for fill I must use matrix or centre weighted metering ? canI do it in Manual mode also or must I sue the flash in manual then? Does flash not freak the bird out ? particularly something like an Egret that is pretty nervous to start with ?
As you can tell, my knowledge of flash is restricted to macro - then it's either manual mode or iTTL and +/-EV !
Andy
Last edited by Andy MacDougall; 06-25-2008 at 06:23 PM.
Fill flash with a Beamer is key to good bird photography under many lighting situations. Not sure that your aperture setting would have helped in this photo because it appears that the bird was right up against the BG. Look for separation between subject and BG; then you can stop down to f/8 and still get a nice soft BG; just look at the technicals on many of the photos posted on this site.
Great Egret - Ardea Alba
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