First attempt at flying birds

Tried to get some pictures of flying gulls today on the Lake Michigan shoreline. Next time I have to remember to use a faster shutter speed to freeze the wings and not shoot at high noon on a really sunny day. Comments and advice welcome.

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Those are great. My attempts have been horrible.

These are really nice in-flight captures for a first attempt, BIG congrats.

Good first attempt at in flights. When shooting gulls, set the EC (exposure compensation) to minus1/3 or 2/3 to underexpose the whites, and as you know a higher shutter speed would help. But nice job on your first try. Another hint, try to follow through when you press the shutter release, dont stop as you take the picture, the bird never stops . if you are already doing this, just ignore me.

Looks like you keep them in the focus area pretty well, Your fundmental problem is you are shooting ISO 100. You would get more from In-Flight at ISO 400 keeping you shutter speed up. 1/250 shutter speed on a 400mm lens is just to slow for most motion shots. I like to keep shutter speed at least 1/800 and higher with a 400mm. Your exposure on the whites should run from 50% to 75% of scale on histogram.

This is not meant to be critical only help.

Thank you for the compliments and the great advice! Next time I'll get those shutter speeds up and adjust the EC. Nice catch on the follow through, it is improving slowly. I'm used to following through shooting at airshows but I'm recovering from having a disc removed from my neck and a CV fusion so I don't quite have full range of motion yet. Trying to track some of the birds had me kind of twisted around til my head wouldn't turn anymore

I'm going to try to get to the lakeshore a little later in the day next time too (instead of at noon), it should make great natural lighting shooting towards the East like most of these were.