barn swallow.

here is one of the only decent barn swallow pictures i got really hard to get good pictures of those fast little buggers this was taken with a 7D & sigma 70-200 aperture f/4, shutter speed 1/6400, iso 400 at 180mm severely cropped

1.

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these are better than I can do

Thank you rick! They are fast & small

Maybe someone might have some advice on catching the smaller birds in flight with the 70-200 to get some better shots.

1D MKIV could be the answer. Or newest AF from 1DX/5D III

Maybe someday in the future I'm dreaming but ive got a lot to learn with my current gear and about photography in general before I can justify investing in a better body! Although a canon 400mm 5.6 will hopefully be in my future!

get some food fairly close to you.
get a few perches just above the food
wait for them

thats your best bet.

Thanks for the info Jeremy! I'm planning to set something like that up soon I hope.

Getting a really nice SIF is very tough. I agree with Jeremy, or just wait near their nests. When they come in to land, they usually hover and and little bit slow so your chance might be a little higher. This doesn't mean I have nice SIF pics though

jodelak just means we gotta get on the shutter button more with the pray and spray in hopes of eventually getting some good ones, i don't really think these ones are that good but they are two of the better ones i ended up with after a few hundred snaps.

and the harder part is these swallows are hanging out in the intersections of my town right near the street lights and traffic so that makes it even a tad more tricky.