Cloudy days?

We have had a lot of gray weekends lately, which is driving me crazy since I have new camera to play with. How do you go about getting a good picture of a bird with such a blah background. Yes, I realize that is a pretty open questions, but I guess I'm really just want to get fewer backlit images. Anything I take that is an upward shot means the bird is a silhouette. Oh, and these are small birds so it is very hard to expose for the darker area, which is what I think I need to be doing. Maybe just add a stop or two of compensation?

This is not everyone's cup of tea but if I'm desperate and go out on a blah day I usually convert a few on my shots to B/W.

There is a lot of excellent bird photography to be done on cloudy days. Certain conditions lend themselves to certain types of images, and part of being a good bird photographer involves knowing when to not try to do certain things.

On cloudy days, I would concentrate my efforts on shooting songbirds at feeder set-ups, or on other perched situations in which you are able to control the background by re-positioning yourself. Another type of opportunity that can yield great images in overcast conditions would be shooting waterfowl on the water (as opposed to in flight). Or, if able to do some BIF work, try to do that with birds that are flying at eye level, and not aiming your camera at an upward angle. Shooting ducks as they flush from the water's surface would be an example of this.

Some bird photography actually requires complete cloud cover. For example, my Ruffed Grouse drumming log set-ups last spring; they could only be shot effectively if there was a complete overcast. This was because they were being shot in a forest under the deciduous canopy. Sunlight would cause there to be a lot of very hard shadows and a lot of very bright areas with nasty glare off of the foliage. The cloud cover acted as a huge diffuser, which evened out the light and made it possible to obtain excellent images.

As Tom says, focus on finding situations where you can exclude the sky from the frame. The ISO performance of modern sensors compared to to the days of film means that the problem of lower light is less of an issue than it was. So while you'll have to bump the ISO, the light itself on an overcast day can be really nice and even.

The most recent day I spent photographing in such conditions was at the seaside:

IMAGE LINK: https://flic.kr/p/qFmY​aZ

Thanks, one thing I did was switch to spot metering so I'm getting less sky influence. Was working from home today and hear some jays at the feeder outside. So I opened the window and was able to shoot with a downward and also almost level angle. that cut down on the gray sky effect. Did kind of cool off my home office though...

Well, patience is always key. I out waited the clouds and we finally got some sun.

IMAGE LINK: http://woodbutcher.smu​gmug.com/Animals/Birds​/i-fr8JSgM/A

Love your Ruffed Grouse Tom, thats a beautiful shot.

Heya,

Cloudy days are often my favorite. Full sun exposure is bleaching and makes exposing for a bird very difficult, without blowing highlights to an unrecoverable level. Sure, the backdrop isn't going to be a pretty blue, but at least you can expose a bird and not blow highlights fast. It will take more ISO use to keep that shutter up, and that in itself also takes away from color and detail I find, so the two together can be unfavorable to some, but I often prefer it. More even light.

On a cloudy day, I just like to avoid sky shots, and instead, focus on getting context to tie the bird in with the environment, or just straight up isolate them so that it doesn't matter. You can actually get some blue back on cloudy days, it's there, it's not strictly B/W and grey.

Sometimes, it's impossible not to get some "grey" sky in there. You just live with that. Or you try to get something else with some color or context to help you forget that the sky isn't blue and pretty.

And again, going to ISO 1600 or ISO 3200 is not a problem, even for an APS-C that is at least kind of modern, let alone more recent nicer things.

I also do feeder stations to bring birds in to me while I hang out in my hide. Then I can shoot even if it's raining and ugly outside (common here in Florida!). So if I can't travel, or the weather isn't favorable to larger birds at the coast where I go, I will just focus on perches near my feeder and go with song birds.

Some examples recently of over-cast cloudy days:

IMAGE LINK: https://flic.kr/p/rhEW​gR

IMAGE LINK: https://flic.kr/p/rjpY​YJ

IMAGE LINK: https://flic.kr/p/rATJ​dc

IMAGE LINK: https://flic.kr/p/qEda​PP

IMAGE LINK: https://flic.kr/p/rjq6​aG

IMAGE LINK: https://flic.kr/p/rjr2​cm

IMAGE LINK: https://flic.kr/p/rATH​4u

IMAGE LINK: https://flic.kr/p/rg8B​Ab

Very nice photographs, all.

I was mostly shooting on clear days, either early in the morning or late in the afternoon. I adopted this strategy because of books I'd read and from general advice here on POTN.

Then I bought a very fine book by Michael Freeman: Capturing light. He opened my eyes to other possibilities. That, along with Jeff Manser's photographs (Pondrader on POTN) has me looking for opportunities on less than stellar days. I'm still very early in this process but am excited none the less.

http://www.amazon.com …ael-Freeman/dp/0415843332

The photographs on this thread confirmed this approach. Thank you all for taking the time to post them.