Sunbirds

[gooseberry]

Since my camera is out of action - it's given me some time this weekend to prcoess some shots I had taken a while ago of some sunbirds.

Hope you like them.

#1 Looking out over the domain


#2 Who's behind you ?


#3 You've got something on your lip


#4 OK, where's my next drink ?


#5 Hah, spotted you!

[Geoff]

Beautiful shots there gooseberry!! What lens were u using? Lovely depth of field, these are the sort of images you see on cards!! I really enjoyed looking at them...thanks

Some EXIF data would be great to see how you did so well!

Geoff.

[gooseberry]

Beautiful shots there gooseberry!! What lens were u using? Lovely depth of field, these are the sort of images you see on cards!! I really enjoyed looking at them...thanks

Some EXIF data would be great to see how you did so well!

Geoff.

Hi Geoff,

Thanks for the kind words - glad you liked them.

For the first 3 shots, I used to 70-200VR + TC17. The last two I used the Sigma 70-300 APO Super Macro II.

I'll try and dig up the exif info for you.

[Marvin]

Wow! I agree. These really catch my eye, particularly the first 2. Are these fast birds? Did you have to crop much?

[tsanglabs]

These shots have convinced me that I should get the TC-17 for my 70-200, fantastic.

[sirhc55]

Stunning

Chris

[pippin88]

Great shots.

Every macro photo makes me want a decent macro lense more.

[Killakoala]

Bueatiful examples of the Yellow-Bellied Sunbird. Nectorinia Jugularis. We have these in Australia too, but live in the tropics of Nth Queensland as far south as Gladstone.

The first one with the blue breast is the male, the one with the yellow chest is female and the other is probably a juvenile.


Your photos look even better than the ones in my bird book. Well done.

I love bird photos. I hope you have more

[phillipb]

I completely agree, great shots, in particular I like No.3, the composition is very pleasing to the eye.
They're all good shots, but you can definetly see a difference between the first three and the last two, not better or worse, just different.

[mudder]

Wow, #1 and #3 are absolutely stunning...

I went to the Serendip wildlife sanctuary today and I don't think any of mine came up as good as these....

Thanks for posting (I think! )

Cheers,
Mudder

[Onyx]

Amazing fine feather details in the first three shots, and then it's like all of a sudden the details got smeared in the last two. I was gonna ask why, but then I read that they were taken with a not just different but dare I say inferior lens....

The bright red and yellow flower bits contrast well with the green. The purists might claim the colours to be too strong, but I'm a sucker for saturation.

[dperrett]

wow! nice pictures gooseberry. the first one particularly. i love the colours that you've got there.

what kind of shutter speed did you need for the photos?

[gooseberry]

Hi Everybody,

Thanks for all the comments - glad you liked them. Hoping to get more shots soon.

Geoff,
Exif info as follows - all shots were handheld, need to get myself a good tripod or monopod

#1 ISO 400 1/200s f/4.8 340mm
#2 ISO 400 1/250s f/5.6 340mm
#3 ISO 400 1/500s f/5.6 340mm
#4 ISO 400 1/800s f/5.6 300mm
#5 ISO 400 1/1000s f/5.6 300mm

Marvin,
Yep, these are really fast little buggers, you have to sneak up on them and take a shot quickly as they are flighty. The first three I only cropped a little bit here and there, the last two I cropped almost half the frame.

Onyx,
Yup, there is a difference in feather detail - but it may be due to me being actually physically closer in the first three pics, and the VR helped in keeping sharpness as these were all handheld with my shaky hands.

dperrett,
see above answer to Geoff.

[pippin88]

I doubt shaky hands would lose you detail in shot #5, when you are using 1/1000s. That's just too short a shutter time for shake to come in - or so I would think.

I'm interested in why you used ISO 400? Arn't your shutter speeds high enough that you could drop ISO (and consequently shutter speed) to improve image quality? Or does a really high shutter speed produce a sharper image?

[Matt. K]

Beautiful images. Damned fine photography. And boy...does Killa know his birds! The birdman of Woolomooloo!

[gooseberry]

Thanks for the compliments Matt.

Hi pippin88,
ISO 400 on the D70 is quite good - the lighting conditions were varying a little and with ISO 200 I was finding that the shutter speed, when I was shooting with the Sigma at 300mm, varying around 1/250 to 1/400 mostly even wide open at f/5.6, and some of the shots were coming out a little blurry - so I increased it to ISO 400 to try and keep the shutter up above 1/500.

For the VR shots, the light was a bit darker, and even with VR I wanted to keep the shutter around 1/200 or so when shooting at 340mm.

These birds are quite fast and don't stay in one place for very long, so you don't have much time to fiddle with settings, and with the varying lighting conditions (in and out of shade) - thus a sharp image at ISO 400 is much better than a slightly blurry pic at ISO 200.