Take Flight

[reiireii]

I am a complete newbie at photography and I was wondering what the professionals think of this shot? I'm proud of it but then again, I'm a noob at photography.

Tips, hints, advice would be really helpful! I want to get better with my photography!

Taken with a Nikon D3100.

To The image!: http://i1132.photobucket.com/albums/...-/DSC_0037.jpg

[tlonghenry]

I am hardly a pro but I do own the same camera as you do. It looks to me like your picture is over exposed a bit. When you look at the sky there is no detail or color there. I also noticed that the birds wings are a little blurry. I didn't see any info about the settings you were using when you shot this picture. That would help with giving you better feedback about your photo.

[windrider86]

It helps a great to post your photo here for us. Much much easier to critique if we arent having to flip from one page to another. Please and thank you

[Jinks]

If you like it that's the main thing but agree with the above that it is hugely over-exposed. I'm guessing (because you haven't published the exif) that you shot it on auto setting and that the camera exposed on the centre of the frame which resulted in the burning out of the area in sunshine.

There's a number of ways you can compensate for this but it's more difficult to do with a full auto setting. Have a look at some of the tutorials on this site, particularly around exposure and maybe - if I'm right about the setting? - experiment with some of the other modes like A or S which can give you more control over your camera and what it 'sees'. There is a 'for beginners' section under tips and tutorials on the main page of this site which gives a very good introduction and is well worth a read.

Most importantly, keep practicing and enjoy your hobby.

[mrteacherdude]

If I'm reading the EXIF data in your file correctly, then you did shoot in manual mode. If you are truly a complete noob at this stuff, then you might benefit from using one of the program modes for awhile. That is, use an aperture or shutter priority mode until you get used to adjusting things for what kind of effects you would like to achieve. I just noticed that Jinks also suggested this.

While to me it looks like your composition is pretty good, overall the photo is very overexposed and out of focus/blurry. The data in your file indicates that you shot at a focal length of 44mm (I'm guessing with an 18-55mm lens), ISO 100, f/5.6, and shutter speed 1/40. The ISO 100 is probably fine for this shot as there seems to be quite a bit of light. However, the shutter speed should be faster as it is too slow to stop the action of the moving wings of the birds. And even with VR, you may introduce motion blur from your your own movement while capturing the photo. The general rule of thumb is to use a shutter speed that is the inverse of the focal length of the lens, which would put you at 1/44s. Note that this shutter speed is not even an option so you would likely need to go to a minimum of 1/50s. VR can reduce this need (for faster shutter speed) significantly, but it is still a good guideline to follow until you develop good technique. Even if you wanted to show some motion blur in the wings, you would likely need to use a faster shutter speed to stop the motion of the bodies of the birds. Increasing the shutter speed would also decrease the amount of light hitting the sensor and thus help keeping your photo exposed properly.

The aperture could be shut down some, say to f/8, to also decrease the amount of light hitting the sensor. If you are using a kit lens, this aperture is likely to be at or close to the sweet spot (where the lens is at its sharpest) for the lens anyway. I'm not sure what the shutter speed would need to be at this aperture to get a well-exposed photo, but certainly less that 1/40. I think the pros could probably look at it and know what kind of settings would work. If you use the sunny 16 rule, than you could probably just set the camera at f/16 and 1/125s and get a good exposure for this scene.

I'm going to reiterate what I stated earlier though. If you are really new to this, then I think you would benefit greatly by using one of the program modes and spend some time learning the exposure triangle and how aperture, shutter speed, and ISO affect your photos.