Just back from Midway Island and the opportunity to practice my bird photography.....it's still very much in the learning stages.
This is a Laysan albatross feeding its chick
Canon 1D Mark III
300 mm f4
1/1000 at f6.3
Would appreciate all c & c - need to learn more how to improve things!
The whites on the head of the adult are blown out and have no detail and the eye area is a little dark - guessing the light was fairly harsh and probbaly not much you could do about that. Softer light or some fill flash would be the key.
Aspresented would lighten the eye area and add some sharpening to both eyes.
After have spent considerable time myself in the last few months trying to capture the feeeding behaviour of gannets I can say that this is the hardest thing to do - I have hundreds of photo's but none that I am happy with - cannot just seem to get the perfect head angles with both parents and chicks eyes visible, I think it comes down to spending a lot of time with them (And you are limited with your shooting angles) and having perfect coditions and being in the right place at the right time.
Thanks, even trying to isolate a pair without a busy background is a challenge. I might have better images from a technical aspect however, it was very difficult to actually document the transfer of food. My best shots don't show both birds' eyes which I personally feel is important for this type of photo to succeed. Am going to be trying gannets in the UK in June and am hoping that the critiques here will help me improve my success rate.
Hi Deborah - Gannets are great - thats what I have been doing - dont know if your gannets are any different, they certainly are a challenge as the chicks entire head nearly dissaperas down the parents throat.
And what makes it difficult is that the parents and the chicks heads are usually at different angles!
Great action shot Deborah. Hard to get a shot. Should have underexposed for the whites and then some fill flash. Great attempt. Sounds very difficult. Where is Midway Island???
I like the strong interaction and might even go tighter !!! Agree with suggestions, main point is exposure, do have to guard with white birds !!! Can't imagine being on Midway !!! Total Sensory Overload !!!
Thanks all, I found the exposure very hard even with an apparently perfect histogram! Part of the laysan albatross's feathers show no texture even when standing beside them which compounds the problem. Used fill flash for some evening shots with better exposure results.
And yes, Midway is sensory overload both visually and auditory!!!
Dinner time
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