This morning's birding session was great...Imgs

[J Holmes]

With a little coaxing and a promise of taking the kids to Disney this evening I was able to wriggle my way out of the house this morning about 7:45. I hit the eastern banks of one our local lakes and took in what I could with the E300. I am fairly new to the world of birds and it is, well, fun. All shot with the E300 and 40-150, RAW processed in PSCS and resized for the web. Comments very welcome.

First shot of the morning:


Egret on a Cypress


Coot catching some rays


The next set are what I call being in the right place at the right time. I came around a corner on the bike path and there he was, a Grey Heron (I don't think it is a Great Blue) so I stopped and popped off a couple of typical shots. Right after the first one posted my CF read full so I had to change it, wouldn't you know a split second before I clicked the shutter he speared a mud fish (the back of the fish is visible in the lower left of the first shot). When I saw the size of the fish in comparison to size of this bird I about fell over. Hungry no more!!!

[ditto1958]

Not bad! Did you use a tripod for these? It's interesting to see in the first one the bird is "almost" over exposed and the green reeds are "almost" underexposed, but the E-300 still handled it. The "kit" lenses are not too bad at all, are they? Post some more!

[J Holmes]

I used a monopod actually and it worked quite well. The 40-150 is exceptional especially for the price point, and I think the new firmware upgrade made a difference with the metering. The hard part of the first shot was the sun hitting the bird directly but the reeds were just out of touch, being hit by the sun only minutes later.

[hartcons]

Well done. Mostly I get to photograph pond ducks eating bread and dragonflies although I did happen upon a nutria the other day.

What kind of shutter speeds were you using? The reason I ask is that some of the pictures don't seem quite as sharp as what I'm used to seeing from the 40-150. I know with the 50-200 out at 200 I definitely have to watch my shutter speed and sometimes have to increase ISO (I normally hand-hold), especially if I'm shooting something that moves.

[J Holmes]

Most were around 1/1250 which is pretty fast, although I was having a little trouble stabalizing with the monopod. They are great but are not a true sub for the tripod. Problem with the tri is lack of mobility, I suppose I could have bumped the iso to 200 and gone from there. Thanks for the honesty it is quite welcome.

[Raist3d]

Jeff, the first three shot are my favorites.. I found the others a bit "too crowded" in details.

I must say though, the very first shot OH MY GOD. That looks really really good.. I think maybe some composition (cropping) may help but I love the tonality and zen-like structure of leaves from the river and the weeds (weeds? is that the name for it) in front.

- Raist

[JDArt]

Just getting to this. Wonderful shots. I love productive birding sessions. They're all too rare.