Bird Photography - distance from subject.

[Simon Wantling]

Hi, I hope this doesn't seem like to much of a strange question. I've seen some wonderful images on this website in the Avian section and most images seem to have very little cropping, so almost full frame. I'm using the 7D with a 100-400mm lens and wondered what distance do you guys typically shoot from between the camera and the subject? It's obviously a fine art getting close enough which I do seem to find difficult, but generally, what do you try and aim for, for the best results. Any tips would be great. For example, if I was to take an image of a blue tit from say 5 meters aways, the bird still looks small in the image so quite a large crop is still needed.

Any advice.

Thanks a lot.

Simon

[Randy Stout]

Simon:

This is a great question, with no easy answer. The simplest answer is, I get as close as I can and still be able to focus and frame the way I would like. This yields the best image quality, less problems with atmospheric issues, cropping related image degradation, etc.

How close I can get varies a lot between the species, location individual birds, etc.

Daniel Cadieux who uses the same combination you mentioned, is able to get remarkable images of even songbirds, by a combination of great field craft, patience, audio playback, a snack or two, and just plain lots of hard work.

In general I shoot larger birds, loons, ducks, large waders, so I don't need to get as close, but I still try to get in as tight as I can without causing stress on the bird. If you can work the same birds over an extended period of time, they often will allow you to get very close.

It takes discipline to not push the button when you get the bird framed, even if way too small in the frame to yield a worthwhile photo. I have a mental picture of the size I need in the viewfinder to yield acceptable image quality. It is very uncommon that I do anything with images smaller than that, just doesn't have enough IQ to satisfy me.

Hopefully some other folks will chime in. Just be assured that your combo can generate great images, you will just have to work a bit harder than those toting an 800!

Cheers

Randy

[Daniel Cadieux]

A whole chapter could be written on this As Randy mentions, I use the same gear as you do. Yes, we must get close to our subjects with such "short" focal lenght, especially with smaller songbirds, but it is quite doable. You are correct when you say that 5 meters (about 16 feet) is quite far for a bird such as a Blue Tit. When I photograph comparable birds size-wise (chickadees and nuthatches for example) I like them to be no more than 10-12 feet away...so that means finding ways to get closer, or get them to come closer (former=fieldcraft, latter=food and setups).

Feeder setups are perfect for common backyard birds, just get some nice perches, place them in front of a pleasing background (all the while taking light angle into account), and wait for the birds to land on your perches before hopping onto the feeder. If they are still too wary to approach your setup because of your presence then conceal yourself in a blind or other method of hiding. I like to frequent parks and local trails where birds are habituated to people, I just bring seeds and make myself some temporary setups in nearby woods. Same goes for ducks and geese in local duck ponds. As for shyer forest birds such as warblers I employ the use of audio in combination with a blind. Doesn't work all the time but when it does it works quite well.

Some birds such as shorebirds don't readily come for food handouts, at least not in my experience. I just concentrate on the tame young ones and place myself in a way that they will forage on the beach by passing directly in front of me. Once in a while I get adult shorebirds come very close too, but that is the exception.

Raptors can often be baited, but that is very controversial and not for everyone. Individual ethical dilemmas must be answered before going that route, and that is a whole other discussion.

There are some other ways in bridging the distance between you and the subject...some of them you will discover yourself, some others you may read about or learn from others.

I trained myself not to push the shutter button at every sight of a bird, instead just concentrating on the opportunities that will let me take photos that are either full-frame or just needing a crop to help the composition. Yes, sometimes I'm a bit envious when I hear the cameras with "big guns" going shutter crazy while I feel that I am still too far away, but hey...this has forced me to develop better strategies to get my images - strategies that will be helpful even in the future if and when I get longer lenses (that is still very far ahead I'm afraid!!).

By the way, there are times when having a bird small in the frame is advantageous - sometimes the habitat is very beautful and worth including, so keep an eye out on those opportunities too. Some other times you'll find yourself at minimum focussing distance (which is a very nifty 6 feet in with this lens) for great portraits of larger birds. Lots of fun, lots of opportunities (won and lost), and lots of experience and knowledge of the birds' behaviours gained along the way...

[Kaustubh Deshpande]

Simon, good suggestions above. When one has a shorter lens, one has to do things differently. I shoot with 400mm feel it is quite difficult to go go into the woods trying to get pictures of song birds with that. To photograph those birds with a short lens, one needs to apply tactics as Daniel mentioned...get the birds to you and make them perch in a nice spot....rather than trying to go close to them. Getting to within 15-20 feet of a song bird in a forest is quite hard. Its not that it can't be done but keeper rate is going to be very low....especially when you factor in light, background, foreground, shooting angle and other considerations.

The most important aspect about bird photography is choosing the spots. With shorter lenses, its quite critical. Its best to find spots where birds are tolerant of people. Parks, beaches, fishing piers are great places. Species-wise, that does put a limitation though. The other option is to travel to hot spots where birds come within your range without setting that up.

One thing I try and do is to include more habitat into the composition, photograph groups, pairs, silhouettes, flight. You can be a bit farther from the birds for those shots. I always find myself close to water bodies as I feel that is where success rate is higher with shorter lenses.

Hope this helps.

[Simon Wantling]

Thanks for all the great responses and some great tips for me. I guess my ultimate goal is the 600mm lens with tc but that's a little way off. I think patience is the answer here but at least I now know I'm nt doing drastically wrong. I may invest in a small one man hide as another method.

Thanks again

Simon

[Ian Cassell]

I've been following this thread with great interest (I use a 7D/400mm) and these were some great tips!

[Kaustubh Deshpande]

Simon, one other thing I do when I photograph close to water( or bird on ground) is go very very low. That way, even if the bird is far and small in frame, you get a smooth background with nice color layers. If the BG is close, you still get the separation. In the same situation, if one shoots at a higher angle, you get the snapshot look. The short and light lens actually helps me do that as I dont need a tripod. That allows me to photograph in a contorted ( laying down on a downward sloping bank and taking the lens to the water level) position. Hurts the neck but worth it IMO.

Most these things are important even with longer lenses, BTW :-) You can never have enough focal length for bird photography.

[Simon Wantling]

Thanks for all the great advice on this topic. I'm beginning to wonder whether there's something not quite right with my lens. Would you consider taking a songbird photo where the subject is 25 feet away to far for the 100-400mm lens? When I crop the photo back it just doesn't look in focus even though the 7d one shot setting said it was. Any thought or comments. I'm beginning to wish I'd gone for the 400mm prime lens.

Thanks

Simon

[Daniel Cadieux]

The 100-400 is a great lens, so don't despair!! An obvioulsy heavily cropped image can be void of fine detail but should still look properly focussed. When you say "doesn't look in focus" do you mean actually blurry? Or just soft on details? If you have an example to show us (inclusing exif) that would likely help us help you to determine if it is user error or not.

[Simon Wantling]

Thanks Daniel, I'll post an example up soon. Just getting a bit frustrated. Thanks for all your help as always.

[Simon Wantling]

OK, I've posted a non cropped JPG conversion of my RAW files. I haven't done any sharpening or other alterations. The focus was on the centre goldfinch and I would look to crop that image on that bird. When I do it just looks soft etc. I think there should be EXIF data in the JPG. Appologies if the file size is slightly bigger than normally allowed, but I didn't want to cause any change to the photo. If someone is willing to show a cropped image and processed using your experience then that would be superb !. It's not a keeper in terms of composition, I was just testing the focus of the camera and lens. Camera settings were:

Canon 7D, 100-400mm @ 400mm, f8, 1/500 sec, ISO 1000, evaluative metering. centre point focus, one shot focus

[Roger Clark]

If someone is willing to show a cropped image and processed using your experience then that would be superb !

Simon,
I advocate testing on the Moon. Here are some references to moon images (and note if an image is not at full resolution, there is usually a link in the caption to full resolution images). The advantage of the Moon is everyone anywhere in the world can use the same test target, thus leveling the playing field. The Moon is high contrast and with the dark sky easily reveals lens imperfections. The disadvantage is that one must wait for clear steady skies when the Moon is high in the sky. At 300 to 400 mm, most skies are steady enough. At longer focal lengths, turbulence in the sky becomes more of a factor. My skies are rarely good, so see if you can do better than these (these images were taken under typical marginal quality skies from my house in the city east of the Rocky Mountains were turbulent flow over the mountains destroys fine detail).

http://www.clarkvision.com/articles/telephoto_reach/

This page also shows a 100-400 versus 300 f/4:
http://www.clarkvision.com/articles/moon-test2/

Roger

[Kaustubh Deshpande]

Simon, hard to judge sharpness and critical focus from the small size....but that apart, I feel that the bird is too small in the frame to create a crop that will have bird large in the frame.

[Simon Wantling]

Thanks , yes agree the bird looks small in the frame. It was only 20-25 feet away. Guess with the 400mm focal length I have to get a lot closer. I posted the non cropped images to show its size in the frame. I can post a cropped version if need be. Thanks for the reply.