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Photo Forum / Photo Technique / Nature Photography / August 2005Hummingbird Photography
I have posted a new section of my website showing examples of hummingbirds photographed with varying lighting setups and equipment at: http://www.dyesscreek.com/miscellaneous_pages/hummingbird_photography.html Eric Miller > I have posted a new section of my website showing examples of hummingbirds > photographed with varying lighting setups and equipment at: > > http://www.dyesscreek.com/miscellaneous_pages/hummingbird_photography.html > > Eric Miller Really fantastic imagery Eric, you have a blind I assume?  SignatureLF Website @ http://members.verizon.net/~gregoryblank "To announce that there must be no criticism of the President, or that we are to stand by the President, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public."--Theodore Roosevelt, May 7, 1918 > > I have posted a new section of my website showing examples of hummingbirds > > photographed with varying lighting setups and equipment at: http://www.dyesscreek.com/miscellaneous_pages/hummingbird_photography.html > > Eric Miller > > Really fantastic imagery Eric, you have a blind I assume? Yes, I have a portable blind and used it on many of the shots. However, I took many of the shots without any blind. I find that if I keep still, I can position myself very close to the hummingbirds without any trouble. In fact, the more hummingbirds competing for the feeder, the closer I can get. My lens' close focus limitations are a bigger problem. Eric Miller >Eric Miller writes ... > >I have posted a new section of my website showing examples of >hummingbirds photographed with varying lighting setups and equipment Thanks for the link, it's a very good resource. I especially liked the examples of different lighting setups, this was well done. Yesterday while traveling we found a place in New Mexico with hummingbird feeders and fired off a few rounds with the digital camera and the 500 f/4 + 1.4x ... these guys are hard to focus on in flight since they're always fighting and dive-bombing each other, but I got a couple of shots of them isolated in flight near a stucco wall. No flash, just sunlight, so the wings are blurred ... the one called 'broadtail' may be a black-chinned instead, I don't have a bird ID book with me ... enjoy ... http://members.aol.com/bhilton665/broadtail_1.jpg http://members.aol.com/bhilton665/rufous_19.jpg http://members.aol.com/bhilton665/rufous_75.jpg Bill > >Eric Miller writes ... > > [quoted text clipped - 17 lines] > > Bill Those are some excellent shots Bill. Eric Miller Great hummingbird photos, Eric. I have two feeders out this year but they have sure been scarce around here. Thanks for sharing them. Pat ***** http://photography-cafe.com Couple of other shots from Santa Fe, these first four from my wife ... http://members.aol.com/bhilton665/rufous_U8507.jpg http://members.aol.com/bhilton665/fem_8881.jpg http://members.aol.com/bhilton665/rufous_fem_8840.jpg http://members.aol.com/bhilton665/rufous_wasp_U8647.jpg ... and here are three more from me, with two different species (Black-chin male and a hard-to-get Calliope male) and one final rufous in good light ... enjoy. http://members.aol.com/bhilton665/blackchin_2042.jpg http://members.aol.com/bhilton665/calliope_2108.jpg http://members.aol.com/bhilton665/rufous_check_2050.jpg Bill > I have posted a new section of my website showing examples of hummingbirds > photographed with varying lighting setups and equipment at: > > http://www.dyesscreek.com/miscellaneous_pages/hummingbird_photography.html > > Eric Miller Hi, I am very new this stuff and have a question about freezing the bird's wings. How does flash help freeze the wings? I was reading that article you have on your site, it says flash has 1/20000 while shutters have 1/8000 at best. I can see how a shutter with 1/20000 would certainly help. I don't understand, to me you are flashing for 1/20000 of a second but you still need to capture the image so how do you do it with a much slower shutter speed. To me it seems after the bird is lit up by the flash the shutter opens but for much longer and so it captures that frame as well as more frames well after the flash has gone off and the result should still be a bird with blurred wings. But its not! so i'm confused. > I don't understand, to me you are flashing for 1/20000 of a second but > you still need to capture the image so how do you do it with a much [quoted text clipped - 3 lines] > result should still be a bird with blurred wings. But its not! so i'm > confused. I haven't done this but I would imagine that the flash is syncronized to the shutter in such a way that it doesn't fire until the shutter starts to close. This was one of the novelties of some Nikon cameras and is probably a standard feature on most better cameras today. SignatureJohn - www.puresilver.org > John writes ... > >I would imagine that the flash is syncronized to the shutter in >such a way that it doesn't fire until the shutter starts to close. This is called 'second curtain sync' (or similar, depending on your system) and it has nothing to do with freezing a hummingbird's wings in flight. My cameras are set to 2nd curtain sync because with slower shutter speeds you can get a blur or ghost image if a bird flinches when the flash goes off and you're flashing on the first shutter edge, but with 2nd curtain sync the flinch happens too late to be recorded by the ambient light. But this is of no consequence shooting birds in flight, especially hummers. Bill >> John writes ... >> [quoted text clipped - 9 lines] > the ambient light. But this is of no consequence shooting birds in > flight, especially hummers. Thanks for the reply. Second-curtain syncing offers an improvement in the capablility of balancing ambient and flash lighting when using high-speed strobes to freeze the action of a subject. If I were to use a strobe to photograph birds (and it's virtually mandatory with hummers) I'd use something like the Nikon's F6 with a SB800 Speedlight at 1/2000th of a second with some good 800 speed film. That way the bird isn't surrounded by a completely black field as indicated in the article your previous post referred to and also one needn't setup a artificial background and secondary strobe. Again, I haven't done any of this. Bird photography isn't one of my interests even though I did used to spend a lot of time at the Forsythe Wildlife Refuge in Egg Harbor, NJ. SignatureJohn - www.puresilver.org > >> John writes ... > >> [quoted text clipped - 24 lines] > interests even though I did used to spend a lot of time at the Forsythe > Wildlife Refuge in Egg Harbor, NJ. One of the ways to avoid the dark background is to photograph during the day with the bird in the shade and the background in the sunlight, such as in the following image: http://www.dyesscreek.com/lighting_ex/pages/2_open_strobes.htm But notice that there is still some ghosting of the wings. Eric Miller > John writes ... > [quoted text clipped - 3 lines] >birds ... I'd use something like the Nikon's F6 with a SB800 Speedlight >at 1/2000th "high speed sync" and "2nd curtain sync" are mutually exclusive though, you cannot use 2nd curtain with hi-sync. The reason is that in 'hi sync' mode the shutter curtain is narrowed so it doesn't cover the entire frame at once so the flash has to send out a series of pulses instead of just one (as it does with normal sync). Because there are a series of pulses there is no 2nd curtain, there are instead numerous 'curtains' or edges, with the faster shutter speeds having the most edges (or pulses). This is also why you have so much less flash power in hi speed sync, ie, the guide number goes down rapidly as the shutter speed increases. >If I were to use a strobe to photograph >birds (and it's virtually mandatory with hummers) I just gave 10 links to hummers shot with natural light, so "mandatory" is a bit strong :) You probably do have to have strobes to freeze wings (I can shoot up to 1/8,000th sec though so might be able to freeze some of them), but not everyone likes the "frozen wings with multiple white lights in the eye" look. Bill >"high speed sync" and "2nd curtain sync" are mutually exclusive though, >you cannot use 2nd curtain with hi-sync. The reason is that in 'hi [quoted text clipped - 6 lines] >in hi speed sync, ie, the guide number goes down rapidly as the shutter >speed increases. It's also true that the flash duration might actually be longer for a 1/500 high-speed-sync shot than for one at 1/60 with normal sync, if the subject is close and/or a high ISO is used. A subject moving perpendicular to the curtain movement can theoretically be sheared and staggered. Signature<>>< ><<> ><<> <>>< ><<> <>>< <>>< ><<> John P Sheehy <JPS@no.komm> ><<> <>>< <>>< ><<> <>>< ><<> ><<> <>>< >I am very new this stuff and have a question about freezing the >bird's wings. How does flash help freeze the wings? ... [quoted text clipped - 3 lines] >result should still be a bird with blurred wings. But its not! so i'm >confused. You would set the shutter speed and aperture so that the image is basically black with that exposure, then the flash is the only light. You're right when you say the wings will blur if the shutter speed is such that the ambient light has an effect on the overall exposure, but you avoid this and let the flash be the only light source. Here are a couple of good articles on using flash with hummers ... Paonessa really knows this stuff, he had a feature length article on photographing Costa Rica hummingbirds in one of the birding mags last spring with excellent shots ... http://www.rpphoto.com/howto/hummer/humguide1.htm http://www.photosafaris.com/Articles/PhotographingHummingbirds.asp Bill |
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