Your Call?
Which of today’s five, all very excellent images is your absolute favorite? By participating, you will actually learn a lot. If you do leave a comment, please let us know why you made your choice. If anything in any of the images bugs you, let us know that too.
What’s Up?
The first morning of the first 2023 Homer Bald Eagle IPT got off to a very good start. Keep reading to learn of our good fortune.
In yesterday’s blog post, Image #2, for me, was the worst of the lot by far. Even though I eliminated a lot of clutter during image clean-up, the image was still messy. (Not Lionel). My favorite was the crane in the tickseed blossoms. The main reason that I went to manual focus was as follows: when the crane lowered its head to feed, AF had no chance. Using Focus Peeking with a total depth of field of more than two meters on the relatively distant subject, I knew that I would have no problem getting the crane sharp. Some folks were in the vicinity of the correct answer to the “Why manual focus? question.”
Today is Tuesday 21 February 2023. We will be meeting our captain and mate at the dock at 8:15am. The forecast is for partly cloudy skies Turning completely cloudy early with a barely perceptible breeze from the northeast. The temps will be in the low 20s F, a bit warmer than yesterday.
If you have some cold weather gear, are free from about 23 or 24 February through March 3 or 4, and would like to join the second Homer IPT, please get in touch via e-mail ASAP as I am practically giving that one away for free.
This blog post took about three hours to prepare (still on Florida time, I get up very early!) including the time spent on the five image optimizations and makes three hundred twenty-eight days in a row with a new educational post written just for you. Wherever you are and whatever you are doing, I hope that you too have a great day.
Please, please, pretty please remember to use m B&H or Bedford’s affiliate programs for all your new gear purchases. If you use B&H, please be sure to click on any B&H link in the blog to start your search. Or simply start with this link. There is always the option of e-mailing me for gear advice and for the correct links.
The plan is to continue to post every day until the streak reaches one year and one day and then begin posting every other day.
Please remember to use the B&H and Amazon links that are found on most blog pages and to use the BIRDSASART discount code at checkout when purchasing your new gear from Bedfords to get 3% back on your credit card and enjoy free second-day air FedEx. Please, also, consider joining a BAA IPT. You will be amazed at how much you will learn!
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This image was created on 20 February 2023 on an Instructional Photo-Tour at Kachemak Bay, Homer, AK. I used the hand held Sony FE 70-200mm f/2.8 GM OSS II lens with the Sony FE 1.4x Teleconverter (at 186mm) and The One, the Sony Alpha 1 Mirrorless Digital Camera.. The exposure was determined via Zebras. ISO 800: 1/3200 sec. at f/4 (wide open) in Manual mode. AWB at 9:22:05am on a sunny morning. Tracking: Expand Spot AF/C with Bird-Eye/Face Detection performed perfectly. Click on the image to enjoy a high-res version. Image #1: Bald Eagle adult turning left in flight |
A Sunny Morning!
Sunny days are a rare commodity in Homer in winter. With the clear skies, we left the harbor early on Monday. The breeze was from the northwest but was very slight. So, some birds slightly away from us while other flew right at us. The group was totally amazed as we had as many as three dozen eagles in the air at once, with many dozen more taking a break on the beach at low tide. After our long working brunch, we had time only for a short rest before heading for what we had hoped would be a sunset silhouette session. When we exited Land’s End we were smacked by a strong northwest wind and the temps had seemingly dropped by 20°. My cell rang; it was Captain Gabe. Our afternoon session was cancelled because of high winds with 8-foot waves. We retired to the bar and did a lengthy image review session. The group is really into learning to get better as they asked about a zillion questions during our knockabout meeting.
With Image #1, I took full advantage of the single, large dark cloud just to the south of us (and urged the group to do that same).
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This image was also created on 20 February 2023 on an Instructional Photo-Tour at Kachemak Bay, Homer, AK. Again I used the hand held Sony FE 70-200mm f/2.8 GM OSS II lens with the Sony FE 1.4x Teleconverter (this time at 197mm) and The One, the Sony Alpha 1 Mirrorless Digital Camera.. The exposure was determined via Zebras. ISO 1000: 1/3200 sec. at f/4 (wide open) in Manual mode. AWB at 27:47:05am on a sunny morning. Tracking: Zone AF/C with Bird-Eye/Face Detection performed perfectly. Click on the image to enjoy a high-res version. Image #2: Bald Eagle adult banking |
Improving Your Flight Photography
After studying and understanding the principles of flight photography, the next step to success is practice, practice, and practice. On extended flight photography trips folks — including me — cannot help but to see their panning and framing skills improving day by day. During our image review I said this often: Universal advice for becoming a better flight photographer: pan faster! We came across many otherwise perfect images where the bird was simply too far forward in the frame. Pan faster!
Everyone got some great images. Newbie Vasili Chernishof led the league by firing off more than 10,000 frames with his Canon EOS 1D-X Mark III. That despite my repeated cautions advising him to quit shooting once the bird was flying away from him. Vasili will be joining the group in the Galapagos this summer.
Image #2 was created from a horizontal original.
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This image was also created on 20 February 2023 on an Instructional Photo-Tour at Kachemak Bay, Homer, AK. I used the handheld Sony FE 200-600mm f/5.6-6.3 G OSS lens (at 600mm) and The One, the Sony Alpha 1 Mirrorless digital camera. ) The exposure was determined using Zebra technology with ISO on the Thumb Dial. ISO 1000. 1/2500 second at f/8 (stopped down 2/3-stop) in Manual Mode. AWB at 10:20:37am on a mostly sunny morning. RawDigger showed the exposure to be perfect. Tracking: Expand Spot/AF-C with Bird Face/Eye Detection performed perfectly. Be sure to click on the image to enjoy a high-res version. Image #3: Bald Eagle adult — pure face shot against snow
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2-6 MFD!
The Sony 200-600mm G lens features an excellent Minimum Focusing Distance of 7.87 feet. Compare that with the MFD of the 600mm f/4 GM lens at 14.8 feet and you see another factor in the 2-6’s incredible versatility. For this one, I must have been at 7.88 feet! I love the images with the fresh, undisturbed snow backgrounds.
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This image was also created on 20 February 2023 on an Instructional Photo-Tour at Kachemak Bay, Homer, AK. I used the handheld Sony FE 200-600mm f/5.6-6.3 G OSS lens (at 600mm) and The One, the Sony Alpha 1 Mirrorless digital camera. ) The exposure was determined using Zebra technology with ISO on the Thumb Dial. ISO 800. 1/2000 second at f/8 (stopped down 2/3-stop) in Manual Mode. AWB at 10:30:15am on a mostly sunny morning. RawDigger showed the exposure to be perfect. Tracking: Expand Spot/AF-C with Bird Face/Eye Detection performed perfectly. Be sure to click on the image to enjoy a high-res version. Image #4: Bald Eagle adult — regal eagle
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Backgrounds On the Beach
With everyone barely able to lift their lenses, I had declared our morning flight photograph session over just before 10:00am. We grabbed longer, handhold-able zoom lenses, landed and walked up the steep beach to do some head shooting. Again, all were amazed, this time by how tame the birds were. We began working with pure snow backgrounds (as above) and then graduated to out-of-focus black backdrops.
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This image was also created on 20 February 2023 on an Instructional Photo-Tour at Kachemak Bay, Homer, AK. I used the handheld Sony FE 200-600mm f/5.6-6.3 G OSS lens (at 600mm) and The One, the Sony Alpha 1 Mirrorless digital camera. ) The exposure was determined using Zebra technology with ISO on the Thumb Dial. ISO 800. 1/2000 second at f/7.1 (stopped down 1/3-stop) in Manual Mode. AWB at 10:37:49am on a mostly sunny morning. RawDigger showed the exposure to be perfect. Tracking: Expand Spot/AF-C with Bird Face/Eye Detection performed perfectly. Be sure to click on the image to enjoy a high-res version. Image #5: Bald Eagle adult female with dried blood on forehead
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Big Momma!
The huge eagles with the blocky, almost square heads are the females.
Typos
With all blog posts, feel free to e-mail or to leave a comment regarding any typos or errors.
I’m going with #5. Very seldom are head-on bird portraits worth pressing the button. This one nails it.
Thanks, Lorvey!
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ALL ARE FANTASTIC BUT I LIKE NO 3 THE BEST AS A BIRD PORTRAIT.
Image 2 by far, for the reasons already mentioned plus the two-toned sky–having one wingtip against darker sky and the other against lighter seems to magnify the intensity of an already intense image.
Awesome set of Eagle images today, Art! Love them all.
Image #2 is fantastic and my fave!
The dynamic locked on pose makes it look like it’s diving for a fish and those splayed feathers at the wing tips are simply fabulous. If I could have only one Bald Eagle image, #2 would be an easy choice!!!
I gravitate to #2 as my favorite. There’s a great sense of purpose in the flight position and the determined look in the bird’s face.
All five images Bald Eagle adult are interesting and cute and well made. Image #3 pure face shot against snow is just a little different and image #5 Bald Eagle adult female with dried blood on forehead is funny!!
can’t choose love them all
they are so beautiful
you are so lucky to be able to experience that magnificent bird
stay warm and safe
love your sister ilene
Nice lot! I prefer #2, banking. The curved primaries and the diagonal pose is wonderful.
Truly, all the images are beautiful. Today, my favorite is Image #4: Bald Eagle adult — regal eagle, because I prefer the dark background in this case, I love the color of the eagles eye, but mostly, I love the feather detail.