Looking down on birds

[Michael Junge]

I get the opportunity to shoot down onto birds on occassion. One was nice enough to stay with my ship long enough to shoot a couple dozen pictures of...this was the best of the group, but I'm trying to figure out how to make the shots better next time - either framing, angle, sharpness, DOF, etc.

This was shot on a Rebel XT with Sigma 55-200 at 200, with ISO 100, exposure 1/1250 at f7.1.

[clockdoc]

Hi Michael and welcome to the group. I see that your posting has had several viewings but no comments thus far. It may be that is because you are using thumbnail links. I would encourage you to use flickr or similar posting site (see the sticky at the head of this forum) so that a viewable image is available within your posting. Thanks for your consideration.

[sukanta]

Originally Posted by Michael Junge

This was shot on a Rebel XT with Sigma 55-200 at 200, with ISO 100, exposure 1/1250 at f7.1.

All your EXIF data suggest a bright day light... how could you this picture.. Did you change the background in PP?? :O

[Michael Junge]

I would prefer to use Flickr, but it is a Yahoo company and the Navy has blocked it's use from government computers. I am currently midway through a 7 month deployment, so I will have to wait until May to be able use Flickr.

It was a bright light day, midday if I remember correctly. I was approximately 80ft above the water and metered off the bird - hence the lighter colored bird and extremely dark background. The bird was flying beside my ship, matched speed to us, so relatively stable to no movement in relation but the water was moving at approx 7 miles per hour.

Only post processing was in Lightroom for clarity and some other minor HSL adjustments.

[Anthony Mann]

You have a unique angle and great opportunity to shoot sea life, there are not a lot views like this of free-flying sea birds. I like your diagonal framing of the wingtips from corner to corner also, try more! Also experiment with slow speeds - blurred wings and such may be interesting with this view of the subject.

[Durbsfan]

I love the angle of the shot as well - with the 'absence' of background anything else would have looked 'postcardy'. I say give us more!

[snapdragon]

What a great shot , so different from the norm , thanks for sharing I look forward to seeing more . I see you can not use yahoo , flicker ,would you be able to use Google (picasa ) or are all banned .

[Mission]

Top angle mate. My opinion would be increase the DOF to attempt more detail if you were aiming to capture still life. Depending on what your trying to do.

I also agree with 'Anthony Mann' about a shot with blurred wings as a life shot.

Looking forward to more.

[Firemaine]

Here is a shot I took last week while on a Cruise to the Panama Cannel.

[Michael Junge]

Was able to get into Picasa...

http://picasaweb.google.com/Michael.x.Junge