birds in Flight

[bob1938]

I have recently bought a EOS 400D Digital what should I set my camera on to take a phoho af a bird in Flight i.e. Bluetits I took one but it turned out bullerd.

I am a new boy to using a camera

[gjl711]

What lens are you using?

[bob1938]

Hello John
The Lens I am using is
Canon Zoom EF 75-300mm 1:4-5.6.

I also have EFS 18-55mm

[jmik26]

I use AV mode along with AI Servo.

[photobitz]

I think it will be quite difficult with that lens. Using AF at least. It isn't known for it's focusing speed.

You could just manually focus... I'd stop down to about f/8 if possible (the 75-300 is a bit fuzzy at f/5.6 at the 300mm end) and go for as fast a shutter as you can. If there isn't a lot of light you may need to set your ISO to 400 or higher.

[scrumpy]

Hi Bob, Welcome to POTN.
Don't think you could pick a more difficult little bird to begin with. Why not try a bigger bird such as a slow old crow? Even then it isn't easy.
Good luck, if you get a result post it in the "Birds" section, love to see it.

[Larry Weinman]

I agree with scrumpy. Both your lens and your cameras servo are not the fastest focusing around. When I started doing BIF i concentrated on larger bids that don't go that fast and give the camera something large to grab focus on. Birds like Trumpeter Swans, Canada Geese, Great Blue Heron would be good to start with and even these are not easy. Also don't forget to adjust your exposre compensation as your meter will be reading allot of sky and underexposing the bird. A good place to start on a medium colored bird would be +2/3 of a stop.

[photobitz]

Pelicans are good too. :D

[bob1938]

I hope this work hrer are two photos I took using tripod so I did not get camara shakes

[Adamora]

That my friend, is called a low shutter speed.

[tekkie]

for sure, you need to up your ISO thats way to slow a shutter speed

[Adamora]

for sure, you need to up your ISO thats way to slow a shutter speed

From the looks of it, his Iso is about 800

[Madweasel]

If you can't get much higher ISO, then you have only two choices because the problem is not enough light. Either wait for a brighter day (looks overcast here), or use a flashgun.

[tdodd]

Blue tits are such nervous little creatures they barely stay still long enough to get a blur free photo even when feeding. You're probably going to need a shutter speed of at least 1/1000 and perhaps faster. If the bird is lit well by bright sunlight then you should be able to go for settings somewhere round 1/1600 at f/5.6 and 200 ISO. You may even be better off at 1/3200, f/5.6 and 400 ISO.

If you don't have enough natural light you will need to use off camera flash close to your subject - no more than 1m away - with a diffuser. Use exposure settings to subdue ambient light - say 1/250, f/11 and 100 ISO and rely on the flash to give you a short duration burst to freeze your subject

Here's one of mine at 1/250. He was perched and still as blurry as anything.

The second one was shot using the technique I suggested in dimmer lighting. Note that the background is quite dark but the bird is well illuminated by flash. The reactions of these little guys are amazing. He has been prompted to raise his wings by the ETTL-2 pre-flash. The focus is a fraction off, but there is little motion blur. I used f/5.6 and 400 ISO here because it was quite dark - 20:04 in the evening so I did not have to take much in the way of steps to kill the ambient - nature was doing that for me.

[TooManyShots]

I think it is a daunting task given with the equipment you have. Try something that flies slower, and bigger. I have gotten couple of "in flight" shots of small song birds but they were all luck. :) Or by accident. I shot with a 1dmarkII and a 400L F5.6. To freeze the movement, your best chance would be using an external flash. The flash can give you more, a lot more, margin of errors.