Dorset, UK: Blackbirds & Wagtail.

EDIT: Unfortunately all my original image links are now broken. My photographs are now hosted at Flickr and on my website. Links to both of these sites are in my signature section.

Apologies for any broken image links that are now showing in any of my threads or posts.

Thanks,

Mike

Very nice shots. But mike, you are not limited to shooting over 1/250 to get a decent shot. Turn that 20D down to ISO 400 and shoot in AV mode and burst mode. Set it at 5fps if it will do it and go ahead and shoot, even down to 1/25th of a second. Higher is preferable, but you can get a 60% keeper rate down that slow if you shoot in burst mode. And of course, shoot in RAW and use exposure compensation and a tripod.

EDIT: Unfortunately all my original image links are now broken. My photographs are now hosted at Flickr and on my website. Links to both of these sites are in my signature section.

Apologies for any broken image links that are now showing in any of my threads or posts.

Thanks,

Mike

A brace will work, as long as it's fairly steady. A tripod is definately better though. But I found out about the slow shutter speed by accident. But when you think about it, it makes sense. 1/25th or 1/50th of a second is still pretty fast, and birds are not always moving like little bullets. They move, then they stop, then move some more, in jerks too fast for our eyes to see, but that's how they move. So on high speed burst modes, the odds are in your favor that your going to get some good clear shots and some blurred ones. In my own test, 6 out of 10 turned out good.

Now, nobody would be crazy enough to do this in the film days and that's why nobody thinks to do it with digital, but hey, digital is free, just bin the blurred shots, no harm no fowl. Well, unless your shooting ducks.

EDIT: Unfortunately all my original image links are now broken. My photographs are now hosted at Flickr and on my website. Links to both of these sites are in my signature section.

Apologies for any broken image links that are now showing in any of my threads or posts.

Thanks,

Mike

Check out some of these test shots with no post processing to sharpen them.

Slow shutter test.

Yes, definitely some good results there!

Mike