How would you shoot this shot?

jwbryson1 · Nov 20, 2012

My daughter's school has 100's (maybe 1,000's) of bats that fly directly over the school most nights when the sun is going down. It's a pretty amazing spectacle...

I'm not sure it would make for a good photograph, but how would one take a shot of this nature?

I suspect you would need to guess the distance and manually focus, then shoot with a speedlight on high power and hope for the best?

Thoughts?

Big Mike · Nov 20, 2012

Tricky. Maybe try to shoot them against whatever brightness is left in the sky and go for a silhouette.

If you are going to try to light them up with flash, you may want to look at something like the 'Better Beamer' Visual Echoes FX3 Better Beamer Flash Extender for Use FX3 B&H

Underdeveloped · Nov 20, 2012

Silhouettes were my first thought too. I would also see if speedlights placed up towards the camera could give you a rim light effect, instead of just lighting them from the front. Mike would know better if the speedlites would be strong enough.

Underdeveloped · Nov 20, 2012

i look forward to pics, btw

2WheelPhoto · Nov 20, 2012

I'd use pocketwizards and rigged OCF covering the scene

Robin_Usagani · Nov 20, 2012

a lot of lights, slow shutter, motion blur + flash freeze motion

amolitor · Nov 20, 2012

Focus is gonna be near enough to infinity to play hyperfocal distance games.

This same issue is going to make lighting them directly pretty difficult. They *feel* like they're right there, but they're 30 feet or 100 feet away.

jwbryson1 · Nov 20, 2012

amolitor said:
Focus is gonna be near enough to infinity to play hyperfocal distance games.

Exactly. You'd need to get a good guesstimate to how close they are and then try to back into your HFD so you get a clear in-focus shot.

amolitor · Nov 20, 2012

Estimating is gonna be tough, but I would bet that they're further away than you think. So guess and set that guess up as the near limit of the hyperfocal dance, and you should be good to go!

jwbryson1 · Nov 20, 2012

I'm hoping they are still out this time of year and that is hasn't gotten too cold. Last time I was at her school in the evening was about 6 weeks ago.

kathyt · Nov 20, 2012

I would most likely use a gun and not a bow. It sounds like I have a pretty good chance of hitting one. What do you think j-dubs? This is your new nickname jwbryson1. It has a nice ring to it.