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kkapple
4th of July 2005 (Mon), 14:52
Went to Austin and San Antonio this weekend.
These bats fly out from under the bridge down town every night.
http://xzodus.com/nature/bats/bats4.jpg
kkapple
4th of July 2005 (Mon), 14:53
http://xzodus.com/nature/bats/bats3.jpg

http://xzodus.com/nature/bats/bats1.jpg
Michaelmjc
4th of July 2005 (Mon), 15:41
thats awesome! those things scare the hell out of me, they are blind as hell... and always make weird noises... there's a lot there eh.
Mary Wenzel
4th of July 2005 (Mon), 17:29
ilikelegs--can you share more about how you got those shots? Some beginner questions: I assume that was with flash? What lens did you use? How fast was the shutter? I am particularly interested in bat photography and just started with the forum. Amazed to see a bat picture right off! Thanks for all info.

--Mary
Mary Wenzel
4th of July 2005 (Mon), 17:34
Oops--forgot to put this in my first note. Not one of the 1100+ species of bats worldwide are blind. It's just another one of the many myths about these highly beneficial creatures. The bats in the Congress Avenue Bridge in Austin are Mexican free-tailed bats--always very sweet in person.
kkapple
4th of July 2005 (Mon), 22:41
ilikelegs--can you share more about how you got those shots? Some beginner questions: I assume that was with flash? What lens did you use? How fast was the shutter? I am particularly interested in bat photography and just started with the forum. Amazed to see a bat picture right off! Thanks for all info.

--Mary

I had the camera in manual mode.
Shutter speed was set at 150 f/5.6 using the Speedlite 580EX as a strobe.
I used the Canon 28-135 f/3.5 lens for these shots.
I could have bumped up the shutter speed a bit if I wanted to but these came
out alright I guess.
Also should add that I set the focus manually and continued shooting just holding
down the shutter button. I had a lot of worthless shots but thats how I was able
to get some of those good close ups.
Then I just deleted the images I didn't want and started shooting again.
Ballen Photo
5th of July 2005 (Tue), 15:24
Nice catches of these Bats. :D Where the heck did you find all these Bats together like this? :shock:
Mary, WELCOME to the forum, and thanks for the info on Bats. ;)
-Bruce
ngannet
5th of July 2005 (Tue), 15:30
Wow, how awesome!!! I love bats and I always imagined it would be very difficult shooting them. Nice job! The other night when I was watching fireworks, the bats were flying right overhead. It was so atmospheric.
Bald Eagle
5th of July 2005 (Tue), 18:47
Bats are great for photos, I like the second the best, the shadow and the detail really make the photo. "luckily" we have a bats nest in our huge Oak tree in the front yard. someday i hope to get great shots like yours of them in motion.
kkapple
6th of July 2005 (Wed), 11:27
Nice catches of these Bats. :D Where the heck did you find all these Bats together like this? :shock:
Mary, WELCOME to the forum, and thanks for the info on Bats. ;)
-Bruce

Thanks for the welcome.
The bats are in downtown Austin Texas under the Congress Avenue Bridge.
They go out every night around sunset.

Here is a link about them.

http://www.batcon.org/discover/congress.html