Will I ever get the hang of this "Bird in Flight" business?

Dubaiian · Apr 18, 2012

Hello all,

Following on from my previous less than successful attempts, I have tried again. This time is concentrated on the shutter speed. All photos taken on a 7D with a 100-400 IS. They are all at ISO 200 with shutter speeds of 1/1600 or 1/2000. The main thing that concerns me is the noise in the sky and the birds are still not that sharp. Pictures taken between 5-530pm here which is the last hour of sunlight and I must admit its a bit hazy and dusty today.

anyways, please let me know what you think and where I can improve further.

Thanks in advance.

Austin Greene · Apr 18, 2012

These are all underexposed, though that may have been from the time of day you were shooting. As for the noise, I'm wondering how in the world your picking up so much at only ISO200? Looks more like 3200 to me. If you want sharper photos, you'll want to shoot with better light, and really work on tracking the subject with your AF point. I usually set my middle point on the bird, and then just hold down AF with it in AF Servo. As long as I can keep the subject reasonably close to the center of the frame, it remains in focus. I personally think a 1/2000 shutter speed is adequate for your average bird swooping around, but it might not hurt to try shooting a little faster.

Dubaiian · Apr 18, 2012

Thanks for the feedback Togalive. I am also amazed at the noise. These pictures are heavily cropped but that still does not explain it. Do you think there could be a fault with my camera? In terms of the focus, I had it set on Manual Select Single Point AF with AI Servo running.

Joel_W · Apr 18, 2012

After seeing all that nose, I wondered just how much cropping you did. Lack of sharpness could very well be from what your camera AF was actually focusing on. In the 1st picture the building ledge actually looks sharper then the Pigeon. All pictures are under exposed as well. Birds flying at you are really tough to keep in focus.

Forkie · Apr 18, 2012

I suspect the noise just comes from the underexposure and brightening in post. 1/2000 sounds a bit optimistic at ISO200 even on a sunny day and your "heavy" cropping would reduce the overall quality significantly.

When shooting birds in flight, I whack the ISO up to anywhere between 400 and 1600 to get the faster shutter speeds. You just can't get up to 1/2000 at ISO200 unless you have a fast lens wide open and I suspect you used your 55-250 for these which at f/4.5, just won't cut it at that shutter speed.

Don't be afraid to bump up your ISO for birds in flight, especially if you have a plain background like a bright blue sky, they should be perfectly usable.

This one of mine was shot at ISO800, f/6.3, 1/1000:

Gear down by Forkie, on Flickr

Even at 1/1000 the highlights are a bit blown, so I had plenty more shutter speed to play with (as it happens, I like it as it is!).

Dubaiian · Apr 18, 2012

Joel_W said:
After seeing all that nose, I wondered just how much cropping you did. Lack of sharpness could very well be from what your camera AF was actually focusing on. In the 1st picture the building ledge actually looks sharper then the Pigeon. All pictures are under exposed as well. Birds flying at you are really tough to keep in focus.

Thanks for the feedback Joel. When I looked at the RAW files, it seemed that the camera picked up the house rather than the bird which is down to my skill of tracking it rather than anything else. Not sure how you measure cropping, but my crude maths would say that Pictures 1&2 are likely less than 20% of the whole surface area of the shot. Could this be why I see so much noise??

Really appreciate your help guys; every time I post on here I get better

SCraig · Apr 18, 2012

A lot of the noise is caused by the underexposure. When the entire image is underexposed all of the data is compressed into the darker tones of the image which is where most of the noise also resides. Read This Page about exposing to the right of the histogram and I think it will provide some insight into your issues.

Dubaiian · Apr 18, 2012

Forkie said:
I suspect the noise just comes from the underexposure and brightening in post. 1/2000 sounds a bit optimistic at ISO200 even on a sunny day and your "heavy" cropping would reduce the overall quality significantly.

When shooting birds in flight, I whack the ISO up to anywhere between 400 and 1600 to get the faster shutter speeds. You just can't get up to 1/2000 at ISO200 unless you have a fast lens wide open and I suspect you used your 55-250 for these which at f/4.5, just won't cut it at that shutter speed.

Don't be afraid to bump up your ISO for birds in flight, especially if you have a plain background like a bright blue sky, they should be perfectly usable.

This one of mine was shot at ISO800, f/6.3, 1/1000:

Gear down by Forkie, on Flickr

Even at 1/1000 the highlights are a bit blown, so I had plenty more shutter speed to play with (as it happens, I like it as it is!).

As I mentioned in the OP, I was using my 100-400 and (having just checked) they were all taken at f5 which certainly justifies your point. These birds have nested on the top of my house so I should get plenty of time to experiment at many different settings. I learnt today that the ideal aperture for this lens should be f8-11 so that's my next setting to try. Hopefully the weather will also be brighter at the weekend so I can drop the aperture and keep the speed up.

Many thanks for your help and I love the duck. It looks terrific!!

Dubaiian · Apr 18, 2012

SCraig said:
A lot of the noise is caused by the underexposure. When the entire image is underexposed all of the data is compressed into the darker tones of the image which is where most of the noise also resides. Read This Page about exposing to the right of the histogram and I think it will provide some insight into your issues.

Thansk very much SCraig, having read the article (and looked at my histograms) it makes all the sense in the world

. I think that because I did not zoom in enough with the lens and the fact that I was using evaluative metering, the camera was actually exposing for the house and the sky, rather than the bird. I have learnt a lot today!!!

Joel_W · Apr 18, 2012

Dubaiian said:
Joel_W said:

After seeing all that nose, I wondered just how much cropping you did. Lack of sharpness could very well be from what your camera AF was actually focusing on. In the 1st picture the building ledge actually looks sharper then the Pigeon. All pictures are under exposed as well. Birds flying at you are really tough to keep in focus.

Click to expand...

Thanks for the feedback Joel. When I looked at the RAW files, it seemed that the camera picked up the house rather than the bird which is down to my skill of tracking it rather than anything else. Not sure how you measure cropping, but my crude maths would say that Pictures 1&2 are likely less than 20% of the whole surface area of the shot. Could this be why I see so much noise??

Really appreciate your help guys; every time I post on here I get better

Yes, it's certainly a major factor. From what you're saying you cropped out 80% of your original images. Your working ratio should be the opposite at most. It's one thing to max out your zoom lens focal length, then need to crop to go the rest of the way. But in your case, you shot at 55mm FC, with the lens wide open, and a too slow ISO. You need to get ready to shoot before you start off looking for birds or whatever. Pre-set all exposure settings in manual.

Forkie · Apr 18, 2012

Dubaiian said:
Forkie said:

I suspect the noise just comes from the underexposure and brightening in post. 1/2000 sounds a bit optimistic at ISO200 even on a sunny day and your "heavy" cropping would reduce the overall quality significantly.

When shooting birds in flight, I whack the ISO up to anywhere between 400 and 1600 to get the faster shutter speeds. You just can't get up to 1/2000 at ISO200 unless you have a fast lens wide open and I suspect you used your 55-250 for these which at f/4.5, just won't cut it at that shutter speed.

Don't be afraid to bump up your ISO for birds in flight, especially if you have a plain background like a bright blue sky, they should be perfectly usable.

This one of mine was shot at ISO800, f/6.3, 1/1000:

Gear down by Forkie, on Flickr

Even at 1/1000 the highlights are a bit blown, so I had plenty more shutter speed to play with (as it happens, I like it as it is!).

Click to expand...

As I mentioned in the OP, I was using my 100-400 and (having just checked) they were all taken at f5 which certainly justifies your point. These birds have nested on the top of my house so I should get plenty of time to experiment at many different settings. I learnt today that the ideal aperture for this lens should be f8-11 so that's my next setting to try. Hopefully the weather will also be brighter at the weekend so I can drop the aperture and keep the speed up.

Many thanks for your help and I love the duck. It looks terrific!!

If shooting at f/8-f/11, you'll definitely need to bump your ISO up. But as Joel says, it's best to set the camera up including your focal length before the bird takes off, then you won't need to zoom or adjust anything whilst the bird is in the air otherwise, you'll never get a shot! Fire a few test shots first.

Some non-camera advice:

Sit and watch the birds for a while. See how often they take off and where from. If they're going back and forth to a nest, chances are they'll take the same route to and from the nest each time. Also, pay attention to the wind direction. Birds will often take off and land into the wind; you can point your camera at the nest and just fire shots off as the bird approaches/departs from the same spot.

Landings usually make more dramatic photos than take offs because they spread their tail feathers and beat their wings forwards to slow down. Good luck and be sure to come back and show off your results!

Dubaiian · Apr 18, 2012

This is a learning experience for me Forkie and I am not someone who gives up! I really want to get a lot better at this technique so I will try everything learnt this evening over the coming days. You can be sure i'll be back with more shots hopefully using all of the advice received. Thanks again guys.

Dubaiian · Apr 20, 2012

Thanks for all of the help so far. I have tried to utilise a lot of the advice that people have given and managed to capture this bird this afternoon. I know its not the nicest subject but the objective was to get the clarity that I have been having so much trouble with. The major thing I started with was upping the ISO (800) and trying to get closer to the bird so that I did not have to crop so much.

Any better??