Purple-throated Woodstar, Male

[Linda Robbins]

Canon 500mm f/4 IS lens and a Canon EOS-1D Mark II N mounted on a tripod.
ISO 400. Manual mode: 1/250 sec. at f/20. Six flash set-up. Guango Lodge, Ecuador.

Woodstars are very small hummingbirds. When they appear at your set-up, you need to add a teleconverter and/or extension tube, or take a few steps forward to get ¼ to ½ frame image sizes. They are relatively slow moving hummingbirds and will patiently hover while awaiting their turn at the feeder, so they are fairly easy to photograph.



Computer problems, several photo trips, and an illness have prevented me from participating in our wonderful site for the past couple of months, but I’m so happy to finally be back to BPN. I have missed seeing the beautiful images posted on BPN each day, as well as keeping up with my many friends here. My project, The Hummingbird Guide -How to Photograph Hummingbirds Using High Speed Multiple Flash, is finally finished and will be out on CD in about two weeks. I am so glad to be back!

_________________

Linda Robbins

[Arthur Morris]

Well catch me before I hit the ground! Good to see you back. Love this tiny species and love the different tones of green in the BKGR. The sharpness and technique are of course right on.

[Sabyasachi Patra]

Lovely image. Love the pose, lighting and sharpness.

[Juan Carlos Vindas]

Beautiful work Linda!
I am very glad to see you back!

[Fernando Cerra]

Linda, I´m glad you are healthy and back on the forum ! this image is great, only feel a tad more of light on the face is needed.

[Ramon M. Casares]

Fairly easy to pohotograph.... ha! Not with such quality!!! You did one great job here!! Big congratulations on this one!

[Tony Whitehead]

Wonderful image and wonderful to see you back. Sorry to hear about your trials - looking forward to the CD

[Glenda Simmons]

A few more posts like this will have the folks pushing and shoving in line for that CD...Beautiful image of a Beautiful bird!

[Raymond Barlow]

superb image, and welcome back!

[Manos Papadomanolakis]

Fantastic bg,details,eye contact and wing position!!!

[Leroy Laverman]

Lovely shot as usual.

I have a question about multiple flash use. How do you end up with only one catchlight? Are you cloning the others out or are the strobes placed in such a way as to avoid the direct reflections?

Might have to wait for the book...

[Linda Robbins]

Lovely shot as usual.

I have a question about multiple flash use. How do you end up with only one catchlight? Are you cloning the others out or are the strobes placed in such a way as to avoid the direct reflections?

Might have to wait for the book...

When using a high-speed multiple flash set-up you do end up with multiple eye highlights and it is necessary to clone out all but one for a more natural look to the image. Often, the multiple eye catchlights are small, and the single catchlight you leave must be enlarged a bit.

Best regards,

Linda

[Ondrej Prosicky]

Nice image, but nature light (or nature light with one flash) is better.
I like hummingbirds!

[Arthur Morris]

Nice image, but nature light (or nature light with one flash) is better.
I like hummingbirds!

Better for who and for what and why?

[Juan Aragonés]

Glad to see you back Linda. This is another fantastic example of High speed multiple flash technique. The action is too good to be true and the BG works fine to my taste. Afew minutes ago I commented on another of your images and said that the BG looed too unnatural to me but in this case I like a lot due to the gradation of the greens from the top right side to the left bottom side.

[Gus Cobos]

Lovely image and capture. I like the wing position. The colors and detais are superb...:cool:

[john jackson]

Hi Linda

Great image. I'm not always keen on the multi-flash setup style of hummer photography – my personal preference, as to me they tend to look more like studio images and do not always reflect what I see in the field – but this one works for me and has caught the character of the bird perfectly.

By the way, I think you have a White-bellied Woodstar here (Purple-throated is west slope).