
Originally Posted by
Peter Ryan
Thanks Mike and Liz for your kind comments.
I did have a great time. My partner say I am always happy on the 'red dirt' of Central Australia. The bird life was wonderful following a couple of years of good rains in the desert.
I use a 70 - 300 mm Tamron VR lens. My setup is: -
Aperture Priority with the aperture wide open. I am not interested in the background detail and this gives me the fastest shutter.
ISO 200 or 400 but I have been known to shoot at 1200 or 1600 in rainforests.
I normally do not use VR on the lens for birds in flight but do so for stationary birds.
I will crop as necessary but always allowing room for the bird the 'breath' in the shot. Sometimes I think people crop too tight wit bird shots.
I definitely use single point focus and sometimes continuous focus mode but more often than not just single servo. I did experiment with multi-point focus for birds in flight where there was nohing but sky in the background and it worked well but forgot to change it for a Black Kyte sitting in a tree and the camera reverted back to 'closest-to-the-camera-subject-priortiy' and I got some really sharp branches but the bird was blurred. A great missed opportunity but another learning experience.
I hope this helps Liz.