Saturday my wife took the kids to Disney's latest leaving me with an expected free two hours. So I figured time to get some fresh air and some more practice with my latest toy, a sigma 150-500. Found a bird hide with, among other things, a good view of a common merganser putting on a preening show. Now this was around noon but I was at iso 1600 and struggling to keep my shutter speed above 1/200. I think because of the shutter speed and the high iso I ended up with shots that were, to say the least, somewhat less than spectacular.
Additionally, how do you expose properly for these birds? I either blow the highlights on the body or loose a lot of detail on the head.
I sympathise entirely with the grey European weather, which hasn't let up for months! I too have been forced to use iso up to 2000 in the middle of the day, wide open on a lens that is much better stopped down and with barely enough shutter speed anyway.
Push the highlights to just before clipping/blinking. This will make the dark head lighter, thereafter select the whites in post-production (Select > Color Range) and extract all the detail in highlights as much as possible. Note- on flat overcast days there will not be a lot of detail rendered in white areas (no shadows). NIK's Tonal Contrast filter is very good for revealing all the detail captured. You will be amazed!
Chas
Last edited by Charles Glatzer; 12-13-2010 at 01:33 PM.
winter weather driving me bonkers!
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