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This page will act as a photographic journal. What I'm using, why I like various bits of kit, how I set up certain shots. Stuff that on the whole would act as a massive turn-off for anyone not interested in wildlife photography. Twite
April 01, 2013
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I've just spent a couple of days up on the Hebrides, specifically the Uists. Although the primary objective was seeing the vagrant Harlequin Duck, it was also an opportunity to catch up with species that are just not present down south. We came across a flock of perhaps 90 Twite and a dozen Snow Bunting on the west side of Berneray, a small island off the tip of North Uist. They were too difficult to approach whilst feeding on the ground, never really settled, but the following shots were made by rolling the car up to the fence line that they often retired too after flying around for a bit. These are all hand-held from the passenger seat, many thanks to Bradders for providing shoulder support - 700mm (500mm +1.4x) is never the easiest to get a sharp shot with. Although the perch isn't ideal, I suspect that they perch on man-made structures like fences more than they do on trees and bushes - mainly due to the fact that the far-flung Scottish islands tend to have a lot of the former and not much of the latter. I call it a sense of place!
Patch Gold!
March 27, 2013
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A real patch rarity turned up at the weekend, a pair of Golden Plover, and what's more they were on the deck - this is most unusual, normally we'll get a fly-over, and that's if we're lucky! I caught up with them late Saturday afternoon, and not wishing to push my luck, didn't approach too closely. Conditions were poor - light snow and pretty murky - IOO 400, 1/160th at f5.6, and this is the result with the hand-held 500mm f4 mkII, with the 1.4 mkIII converter in place - I managed to rest the lens on a grassy tussock, lying flat on the ground to take this photo:
Almost unbelievably, the birds were still on the patch the following morning, having relocated to what we call Police Scrape, a bit of rough ground that held the Met Police Olympic Muster Station last summer. It got really churned up and has yet to recover, and the pools that have accumulated during this winter are attracting quite a lot of birds, though up until this morning, nothing particularly good! The two Goldies had somehow managed to attract a third during the night, and seemed very settled. Knowing how they had reacted the previous evening, I decided I could probably get a lot closer - once again I descended onto my stomach and began crawling forwards. I reckon I got to within about ten metres, perhaps closer. With no tussock available, I rested the lens on my backpack. No converter this time, though perhaps I ought to have used it for some properly close-up shots, and the light at 8am was better than the previous afternoon. Shooting details were ISO 800, between 1/250th and 1/500th at f4.0. I'm much happier with the results, they have that bit more zing about them. I wish I'd had proper support, and that I'd gone even closer!
ass Larking about
March 22, 2013
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It's been a dire couple of weeks in this country - last weekend I didn't even get my camera out of its bag. I managed about an hour and a half on the patch, got cold and wet, and went home birdless. This week has been much the same, so instead of new material I've been going through my folders from Morocco to see if I can tease any more images out. As such, I've just about managed to cobble together a post about Larks, in this case Crested, Thekla, and Desert. They were actually relatively difficult to photograph as they never really stayed too still - definitely some species to try for again on a sunsequent visit. I'm satisfied with some of the Wheatear photos; that's where I devoted most time, but I can definitely improve significantly on the larks, especially in terms of backgrounds, which in the following images are mostly pretty messy. The first four images are Crested Lark, the next two Thekla Lark (as Crested really, but a much stubbier bill), and the final one a Desert Lark.
Crimson-winged Finch
March 16, 2013
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No time like the present, I'm keen to finish up with Morocco and move back on to UK birds. The following images were also all taken at Oukaimeden ski centre in the High Atlas mountains. A real speciality species, found hardly anywhere else, I was really pleased to get these and not only that, to get point blank views of them - you can see how they got their name. I took loads of these, but all of the same bird and in virtually the same pose!
Atlas Shorelark
March 16, 2013
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These birds are clearly different enough from the Shorelarks we see on the british coast to be worthy of a sub-species. In addition to their deeper tan colouration on the head and nape, shown best in the first photo, they live in snow at 2600m and above! I spent a fair bit of time with them at Oukaimeden ski centre in Morocco, and was pleased to get some nice images, though getting a decent background was always a challenge, and they preferred a busy car park. As you can see, they like bread, and can be encouraged to move to nicer spots by leaving a little trail..... The background of the two photos at the end of the sequence is actually a car, and the rock was placed on a wall with various bits of bread scattered around. Almost all the images preceding the ones with the blue-ish background were all leading up to it, I just couldn't resist pressing the shutter! If I learnt one thing in Morocco it's that planning goes a huge way to making images that much better. Plan the perch, plan the background, get the light behind you, set up, pre-focus, and WAIT! Click, and happy days! All these with the 1D Mark IV, the 800mm lens mounted on a tripod, and manual mode so as to control the massive amount of white going on.
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