This BIF stuff is harder than it looks...

[Wink Jones]

I have Steve's books, have been studying BIF as my next challenge and took my Nikon D500 with 55-300 4.5-5.6 lens out to a local park for some close up ducks action. I got a nice swimming woodie, but OMG, the noise was awful. I bought the noise course and salvaged the wood duck picture. I also got a surprise visit from a beautiful doe in this downtown Boise park. She is lovely and I got several nice exposures of her.

So, yesterday, after more hours of study and rearranging my settings, again, I took my setup with me to the duck blind for opening day. Hey, the ducks come close, should be a piece of cake, right?

Wrong.

After going through the early dawn hunt time and getting a few birds for dinner, I decided it was now time to switch to shooting with my camera. I even took a series of shots of the background to make sure the manual exposure settings were correct, which was good, as they needed some corrections.

My hunting companion was okay with this and promptly called in a nice flight of mallards. I brought my camera to my eye, pressed the back button and held down the shutter button to create my first series of great looking incoming mallard photos.

Sigh. I forgot to turn on the camera and by the time I took the camera from my eye to figure out what the heck was going on, the birds were gone and the dogs were out fetching the ducks that had landed permanently.

Shortly thereafter a teal buzzed over my head and landed in the pond in front of me. I turned the camera on, lifted it to my eye and the teal jumped off the water and I got a great shot of the slash from the pond, the teal, and the reflection of the teal, it could have been a contender at next year's fair. If only...

If only I had remembered to press the back focus button. No wonder I was having such a problem making sure I had the teal in the focus group.

I put the camera away. The only keeper quality photos were the still shots I took to adjust my settings. Very boring. Not one BIF was usable, unless you needed a how not to shot.

So, today, I will go back to the park to try again. Next week, I will go hunting to try again. By the end of the season my goal is to have at least one wall hanger BIF, but it is not nearly as easy as I thought it would be.

Wink

 

[RichardN]

With slight possible variations, we've all been there! Good luck!

 

[Ralph]

I have Steve's books, have been studying BIF as my next challenge and took my Nikon D500 with 55-300 4.5-5.6 lens out to a local park for some close up ducks action. I got a nice swimming woodie, but OMG, the noise was awful. I bought the noise course and salvaged the wood duck picture. I also got a surprise visit from a beautiful doe in this downtown Boise park. She is lovely and I got several nice exposures of her.

So, yesterday, after more hours of study and rearranging my settings, again, I took my setup with me to the duck blind for opening day. Hey, the ducks come close, should be a piece of cake, right?

Wrong.

After going through the early dawn hunt time and getting a few birds for dinner, I decided it was now time to switch to shooting with my camera. I even took a series of shots of the background to make sure the manual exposure settings were correct, which was good, as they needed some corrections.

My hunting companion was okay with this and promptly called in a nice flight of mallards. I brought my camera to my eye, pressed the back button and held down the shutter button to create my first series of great looking incoming mallard photos.

Sigh. I forgot to turn on the camera and by the time I took the camera from my eye to figure out what the heck was going on, the birds were gone and the dogs were out fetching the ducks that had landed permanently.

Shortly thereafter a teal buzzed over my head and landed in the pond in front of me. I turned the camera on, lifted it to my eye and the teal jumped off the water and I got a great shot of the slash from the pond, the teal, and the reflection of the teal, it could have been a contender at next year's fair. If only...

If only I had remembered to press the back focus button. No wonder I was having such a problem making sure I had the teal in the focus group.

I put the camera away. The only keeper quality photos were the still shots I took to adjust my settings. Very boring. Not one BIF was usable, unless you needed a how not to shot.

So, today, I will go back to the park to try again. Next week, I will go hunting to try again. By the end of the season my goal is to have at least one wall hanger BIF, but it is not nearly as easy as I thought it would be.

Wink

Wink, Welcome to the learning process-Failure. We learn more from our failures than from our successes. As Richard said, we’ve all been there. Just be persistent and things will come together. Part muscle memory, part planning and part luck. One of my issues even after two years with the D500 is that I have a bad habit of removing my eye from the viewfinder and looking at the LCD to view setting. I actually just came to that realization after missing a shot the other day. I didn’t even realize I was doing that until that moment.

 

[Whiskeyman]

Wink, birds-in-flight photography is one of the most challenging types of photography to successfully engage in. Others aren't easy, but B-I-F is way out there on the hardness scale, like next to diamond hard. It can get easier with education, observation, experience and effort, but it never really gets easy. Good luck with your journey to success.

 

[tclune]

Wink, welcome to my world. Let me make one small suggestion, though. Leave your camera turned on. The stand-by mode doesn't really drain the battery much. I would also recommend using the EN-EL 15c batteries. The D500 is fully compatible with them and they have a lot more life in them than the previous versions of EN-EL 15 batteries. FWIW

 

[DRwyoming]

So, today, I will go back to the park to try again. Next week, I will go hunting to try again. By the end of the season my goal is to have at least one wall hanger BIF, but it is not nearly as easy as I thought it would be.

Yeah, it's not easy but that's also what makes it worthwhile. If all you had to do was be there to get stunning BIF shots they wouldn't be very special but even if you have the most advanced gear and can nail exposure and focus every time you still have good light vs bad light, great backgrounds vs mediocre backgrounds, composition to deal with and finding the best and most interesting subjects to shoot. It's an ongoing challenge but it does get easier with practice.

I would say that if you're struggling with things like turning the camera on or activating focus you might get real comfortable with the camera controls shooting less active subjects first and then take that comfort with the camera and its controls to BIF scenarios. Also for what it's worth I rarely if ever turn my cameras off when out in the field on a shooting day, they will go into standby mode if there's no action for a while but a simple half press on the shutter release will wake them back up so they're ready to shoot. Battery life on modern cameras, even mirrorless cameras is good enough that I rarely actually turn them off if a lens is mounted up and I'm out in the field looking for wildlife.

 

[Wink Jones]

I want to thank all of you have. replied today. I have had some great successes with shooting diamond jewelry for my business, so I particularly liked the comment from @Whiskeyman about BIF being next to diamond hard...

I also liked the comments about leaving the camera on. I have two batteries with me at all times and I do not remember ever wearing one out in a single session, so obviously, I shall try leaving the camera on and ready.

What I treasure most, however, is the universal encouragement. from the people here. You all make me feel welcome and share your successes and your failures. I knew I would enjoy sharing my fumbling start with BIF and learn some good things in the process.

I will share just a couple of pictures from the club in the past, just for the fun of sharing the early morning in a quiet place where magic often happens...

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Those were done with my phone.

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Now I see I need to redo this one to remove the noise. Man, I LOVE this stuff!

Thank you all again for the joy of reading your helpful and encouraging replies.

Wink

 

[Andy Work]

Man, I LOVE this stuff!

That's what it's all about! Don't worry, you'll get there sooner than you think.

 

[geoawelch]

Wink,

As I’m sure you found in shooting/hunting, there’s nothing more important than learning good technique and putting in the time. Enjoy the process.

Cheers,

George

 

[Steve W]

Practice on the larger, slower birds first, pelicans, herons etc then seagulls and even pigeons....work on the technique.

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[NorthernFocus]

I transitioned from hunting to photography. As you have already discovered shooting critters with a camera is a lot harder. But the season never closes and there are no bag limits.

The most difficult thing for me when I was starting to shoot BIF was simply finding and keeping the bird in the VF. As a former hunter what worked for me was mounting the camera on a rifle stock so the motion was familiar. First I made my own out of a stock for a bb gun. Later bought a camera stock. Like Shooting a shotgun I keep both eyes open until I see the target in the VF. I no longer use a stock but not sure I'd have ever gotten started without it.

Like anything it takes practice. Find yourself somewhere that seagulls hang out and fire away. They're a little easier to hit than ducks.

 

[Wink Jones]

We have a shortage of pelicans and herons around here, but I get the point. I know where some doves hang out on our duck club, I may go for some of them though.

@Steve W, what is the beautiful bird with the red on its wings in your second picture?

Wink

 

[Steve W]

We have a shortage of pelicans and herons around here, but I get the point. I know where some doves hang out on our duck club, I may go for some of them though.

@Steve W, what is the beautiful bird with the red on its wings in your second picture?

Wink

Hi Wink,
It’s an Australian white ibis. The red under the wings is especially vivid during mating / nesting season. We also have Straw neck and Glossy ibis also.

What?! We have three different types of ibis in Australia?

In the past 30 years, there have been significant declines in populations of all of our waterbirds, including the Australian ibis species. Australian scientists are hard at work studying these groups and attempting to identify the cause of the declining numbers in certain habitats. In the case of ib

riversofcarbon.org.au

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[Wink Jones]

Great photos @Steve W. Thank you for sharing them,

 

[Steve W]

Great photos @Steve W. Thank you for sharing them,

No problem. We have lost two ibis nesting seasons in a row now due to COVID lockdowns.... looking forward to next year

 

[Larry Shuman]

Send me an email and I'll send you the PDF on bird photography that I have just updated with birds in flight.

 

[TXSnap1]

I have Steve's books, have been studying BIF as my next challenge and took my Nikon D500 with 55-300 4.5-5.6 lens out to a local park for some close up ducks action. I got a nice swimming woodie, but OMG, the noise was awful. I bought the noise course and salvaged the wood duck picture. I also got a surprise visit from a beautiful doe in this downtown Boise park. She is lovely and I got several nice exposures of her.

So, yesterday, after more hours of study and rearranging my settings, again, I took my setup with me to the duck blind for opening day. Hey, the ducks come close, should be a piece of cake, right?

Wrong.

After going through the early dawn hunt time and getting a few birds for dinner, I decided it was now time to switch to shooting with my camera. I even took a series of shots of the background to make sure the manual exposure settings were correct, which was good, as they needed some corrections.

My hunting companion was okay with this and promptly called in a nice flight of mallards. I brought my camera to my eye, pressed the back button and held down the shutter button to create my first series of great looking incoming mallard photos.

Sigh. I forgot to turn on the camera and by the time I took the camera from my eye to figure out what the heck was going on, the birds were gone and the dogs were out fetching the ducks that had landed permanently.

Shortly thereafter a teal buzzed over my head and landed in the pond in front of me. I turned the camera on, lifted it to my eye and the teal jumped off the water and I got a great shot of the slash from the pond, the teal, and the reflection of the teal, it could have been a contender at next year's fair. If only...

If only I had remembered to press the back focus button. No wonder I was having such a problem making sure I had the teal in the focus group.

I put the camera away. The only keeper quality photos were the still shots I took to adjust my settings. Very boring. Not one BIF was usable, unless you needed a how not to shot.

So, today, I will go back to the park to try again. Next week, I will go hunting to try again. By the end of the season my goal is to have at least one wall hanger BIF, but it is not nearly as easy as I thought it would be.

Wink

Great story. Thanks for sharing. Boy do I empathize with you!

 

[Calson]

A f/5.6 lens provides half as much light as a f/4 lens and this taxes the autofocus system of the camera that depends on areas of contrast to function. In addition much of the wildlife lacks sharp areas of light and dark which also defeats the AF system.

When I started doing wildlife photograph photographing birds in flight was something done by the pro photographers who would devote days to getting a single image. Now we expect to buy a camera and a lens, any camera and any lens, and get result. In terms of degrees of difficult there is nothing more difficult to photograph than a small bird in flight. Easier to start with something like brown pelicans.

 

[Ken Miracle]

I have Steve's books, have been studying BIF as my next challenge and took my Nikon D500 with 55-300 4.5-5.6 lens out to a local park for some close up ducks action. I got a nice swimming woodie, but OMG, the noise was awful. I bought the noise course and salvaged the wood duck picture. I also got a surprise visit from a beautiful doe in this downtown Boise park. She is lovely and I got several nice exposures of her.

So, yesterday, after more hours of study and rearranging my settings, again, I took my setup with me to the duck blind for opening day. Hey, the ducks come close, should be a piece of cake, right?

Wrong.

After going through the early dawn hunt time and getting a few birds for dinner, I decided it was now time to switch to shooting with my camera. I even took a series of shots of the background to make sure the manual exposure settings were correct, which was good, as they needed some corrections.

My hunting companion was okay with this and promptly called in a nice flight of mallards. I brought my camera to my eye, pressed the back button and held down the shutter button to create my first series of great looking incoming mallard photos.

Sigh. I forgot to turn on the camera and by the time I took the camera from my eye to figure out what the heck was going on, the birds were gone and the dogs were out fetching the ducks that had landed permanently.

Shortly thereafter a teal buzzed over my head and landed in the pond in front of me. I turned the camera on, lifted it to my eye and the teal jumped off the water and I got a great shot of the slash from the pond, the teal, and the reflection of the teal, it could have been a contender at next year's fair. If only...

If only I had remembered to press the back focus button. No wonder I was having such a problem making sure I had the teal in the focus group.

I put the camera away. The only keeper quality photos were the still shots I took to adjust my settings. Very boring. Not one BIF was usable, unless you needed a how not to shot.

So, today, I will go back to the park to try again. Next week, I will go hunting to try again. By the end of the season my goal is to have at least one wall hanger BIF, but it is not nearly as easy as I thought it would be.

Wink

Welcome aboard ... and reading Steve's Books is a great way to learn a lot. I am also from Boise ... I am a retired gun hunter and now hunt strictly with my camera. I used back button for over a year but for me I prefer to have my thumb free to do other things. So I long since went back to AFC and using the half press on the shutter. I have shot a lot of birds in flight and being a birder I shoot first for ID an then for a printer photograph second. It does take practice but applying shotgunning techniques helps. My FB page is public and I just finished as the Artist of the Month for Sept. on the St. Als Art Wall. This BIF shot recently went up on the wall at the Secretary of States office suite so you can see it there. It was taken with a D500 and Tamron 150-600 G2 below Lucky Peak Dam. I primarily shoot manual with auto ISO and shutter speed from 1,1250 to 8,000 for BIF. I used to do a bird and BIF class at Idaho Camera from time to time until they closed but would be happy to answer questions along the way.

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[sinewsworn]

Steve's books are a true help but time in the field/behind the camera is important, too. Try larger, slower birds like gulls at first. Work out where the bird might go and work that angle, too.

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[jeffnles1]

I want to thank all of you have. replied today. I have had some great successes with shooting diamond jewelry for my business, so I particularly liked the comment from @Whiskeyman about BIF being next to diamond hard...

I also liked the comments about leaving the camera on. I have two batteries with me at all times and I do not remember ever wearing one out in a single session, so obviously, I shall try leaving the camera on and ready.

What I treasure most, however, is the universal encouragement. from the people here. You all make me feel welcome and share your successes and your failures. I knew I would enjoy sharing my fumbling start with BIF and learn some good things in the process.

I will share just a couple of pictures from the club in the past, just for the fun of sharing the early morning in a quiet place where magic often happens...

View attachment 26174

View attachment 26175

Those were done with my phone. View attachment 26176

Now I see I need to redo this one to remove the noise. Man, I LOVE this stuff!

Thank you all again for the joy of reading your helpful and encouraging replies.

Wink

nice shots. Hunting with over under or side by sides seems to be nearly a lost art these days. well done.

 

[Wink Jones]

LOL, I had to go see where I had mentioned an over under, and finally saw it in one of my "shots". In my youth, I shot a pump 20 gauge. Many years later I switched to an over under 20 gauge, and when my father died I inherited his 12 Baretta. What a sweet gun it is. Many times I have been chided for actually hunting with it and told I am ruining its resale value.

To me, the gun is priceless and will be mine so long as I live...