They make it look so easy

[robski]

When you see a perfect wildlife shot of a bird, a Butterfly or a Dragonfly it all looks so easy.

Those of us who practice in the art know it adds quite a challenge to your photography. Attached is my one and only dragon shot from this evening.

In a meadow close to my home if the weather is good your normally see a few dragons buzzing around during the summer months. This evening was no exception. Most showed no sign of settling but I spotted one go down about 40 feet away. I slowly made my way through the 2 foot long grass to the area it landed in. As I got near it took flight again and landed 15 feet away. This time I had a better idea where it was. Again it took flight but this time I could see it land in the long grass. I Slowly creped up to within a few feet and setup the tripod. Managed the shot below. Then thinking not bad just need to move two bits of grass.

Just then Friday 13th sort of luck kicked in. Something flew over, caught the dragons attention and it took flight. Up Vertically towards the sun I was blinded and lost track of it. I am sure they do that on purpose

Oh well - try the next field and see if there are any butterflies

Do you have any thoughts or experiences you would like to share ?

[Snowyowl]

Oh boy! Can I relate to that story. I went through a similar experience yesterday trying to get pictures of a Gray Partridge. It just kept moving off ahead of me and finally flew, landing somewhere close by but out of sight.

[Roy C]

I reckon birds even know the focal length of my lens. With the 17-40 on they will come quite close but out of range for the landscape lens of course , stick on the 70-200 and they will move back to just out of range and when I have the 400mm on board they retreat to around 20 metres, again out of range.
If I am out without my camera they will almost fly into me

[Christine]

Roy,don't you often find that when you are using the 400,you suddenly spot a bird quite close by,seems to have appeared out of nowhere,grab the cam,point and focus only to find you are too close,so start to very quietly move backwards,but all to no avail,you have missed the spontaneous shot of a lifetime!!!.Also you can be watching a bird for ages,you are standing directly in front of it,not really sure whether it is going to move ,so should you try for a shot?.No matter how long you have been watching the bird,as soon as you reach for the cam,off it goes.

[blackmarlin]

The magic words are set up the tripod, this takes time. have you ever thought about handholding! Yes this is far from perfect but remember these creatures are not to be found in a studio. As for my own experiences and those of some of the macro experts on here a hand held shot can be more preferable to no shot at all especially when it all comes together. In the field a tripod can become just another encumberance and personally I find it more advantageous to hand hold, then it just becomes a question of stealth and having some faith in the cameras AF system. I have had quite a lot of success even down to 1:1. All it takes is patience and an awful lot of practice.

Alan

[Roy C]

Originally Posted by blackmarlin

The magic words are set up the tripod, this takes time. have you ever thought about handholding! Yes this is far from perfect but remember these creatures are not to be found in a studio. As for my own experiences and those of some of the macro experts on here a hand held shot can be more preferable to no shot at all especially when it all comes together. In the field a tripod can become just another encumberance and personally I find it more advantageous to hand hold, then it just becomes a question of stealth and having some faith in the cameras AF system. I have had quite a lot of success even down to 1:1. All it takes is patience and an awful lot of practice.

Alan

I hand hold my 400mm f5.6 95% of the time - use a monopod the rest of the time.

[Roy C]

Originally Posted by Christine

Roy,don't you often find that when you are using the 400,you suddenly spot a bird quite close by,seems to have appeared out of nowhere,grab the cam,point and focus only to find you are too close,so start to very quietly move backwards,but all to no avail,you have missed the spontaneous shot of a lifetime!!!.Also you can be watching a bird for ages,you are standing directly in front of it,not really sure whether it is going to move ,so should you try for a shot?.No matter how long you have been watching the bird,as soon as you reach for the cam,off it goes.

Yep- certainly been there Christine, that's the nature of bird photography I guess

[Christine]

All my shots are handheld,esp the birding shots.The only time I would use a tripod ,is for digiscoping(obviously),and on the rare occasions I would use a 2x converter.To take the chance birding shot,a tripod really is a no go area.By the time one has set everything in place,the bird will have seen you and flown off.
I must admit,for landscape shots etc,perhaps one really should use a tripod,but I always forget to take it with me.

[Leif]

I don't doubt the benefit of hand holding when taking bird shots, but for macro I would not dream of hand holding. More often than not the exposure is about 1/10" so a tripod is the only option. And as for focussing and framing without a tripod, I could not do it. That's not to say that others can't succeed.

A Dutch photographer takes all of his macros, which are typically twice life size, without a tripod, though he uses flash to freeze the action. The fact that his images are amazing is proof that it can be done. I've tried and failed.

One point though. IS and VR do not work well, in the close up range, and lose most of their effectiveness. I think it is because they work by detecting and counteracting pitch and yaw, whereas for close ups the problem is more to do with vertical and horizontal shifts.

I guess you have to find a modus operandi that suits your temperament.

[Fixer]

Don't know what it is i only took photography up again last year after a very long time say about 40 years i must be getting old and them critters think i will be to slow for them but the thing is they come to me i don't have to chase them now my camera has no AF so when i have the macro lens on and only 4 inches away from the bugs i still have to focus with my hand but they just carry on with what they are doing, was in the garden the other day just looking around as you do and a Ren landed on a fence about 5 foot away and just looked at me as if to say its only him he won't harm me and went then it came back so i got the camera out and stood in the same place could only get one picture as the rain started again but will get a better one soon.

I have already uploaded it to my site so will just post a link, it was dull so i upped the speed to 400

Ren

Jim