Female purple martin

[Alfred Forns]

Female purple martin returning to nest. Fun shooting and all you need is the right wind/sun angle .. strong wing even better !!

Comments welcome and much appreciated

Canon 1DsMk2
400 f 5.6
f 7.1 1/1250
Manual exp +1 off sky
ISO 400

[Harshad Barve]

Excellent image Alfred , they are so fast and you have freezed this perfectly
TFS

[Oscar Vazquez-Ortiz]

Excellent capture. So...that's what they look like! I can't tell you how many
shots I have missed on this real fast flying bird! Congrats!

O

[Joe Brown]

Very well captured. Excellent detail and exposure. I might crop it with a bit more space below and the right.
I'm surprised there is any colour in the sky exposed at +1 off the sky.

Joe

[Troy Lim]

Very nice shot, love the wings spreading straight out like that.
I thought they were dark with purpleish? Maybe the female has a different color?

[Alfred Forns]

Hi Troy The females look different Male have the purpleish color !

Joe if you meter one over on the sky and slowly move the camera down and meter on green grass there will be one stop change, back to even. Can use just about anything as a reference point and sky is about the easiest. Ideally you would hall around an incident meter but it one piece of gear to take, just use the sky.

[Troy Lim]

Hi Troy The females look different Male have the purpleish color !

Joe if you meter one over on the sky and slowly move the camera down and meter on green grass there will be one stop change, back to even. Can use just about anything as a reference point and sky is about the easiest. Ideally you would hall around an incident meter but it one piece of gear to take, just use the sky.

I see, I must try to go get some shots then. There are some around this area.

[Lance Peters]

Excellent AL - great job on a small bird.

Wondering if a detailed explanation of how you set the manual exposure might be useful for folks??

[Dave Mills]

Hi Al, I like the crop,wing position,sky and detail. Well handled!

[Fernando Diez]

Hi Al, very nice image, i like pose and composition. Good sharpen.

[arash_hazeghi]

excellent Al, great pose and details.

[Julie Brown]

Nice catch! These are fast birds. Beautiful wingspread and tailfan. i just bought this lens-hope to get some results like this! :cool:

I like Lance's suggestion for a detailed explanation on metering in these situations.:)