tmehrkam Loc: Houston,Tx

I am wondering if a circular polarizer would bring out the sky.

Digital1022 Loc: Holland, PA

Crazydadio
Does your 600mm have vibration reduction. I have used a Nikon 200-500 hand held to shoot pelicans in flight and as long as I had the shutter speed at 1/500 they were always tack sharp My ISO for those types of shots is generally 400 for morning light with average sun. I just don't understand why you would have to use a 1600 and such a high ISO unless you were in a very low light situation. I never had much success in shooting birds in flight from a tripod with any kind of head. I guess I am just not quick enough. If you have some form of vibration reduction, you might want to have the lens checked out. Just does not seem right. I would be curious to hear what you find.

Digital1022

SLSphotoart

With dark birds and light background I'd shoot manual shutter and aperture with ISO auto and up the EV plus one at least. Teleconveters lower resolution, 600mm is good enough.

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

Nice! You did a good job of handling the back lighting.

bluezzzzz Loc: Stamping Ground, KY

Blue herons are one of my favorite birds also, and I never get tired of photographing them. Here in central Kentucky they are fairly common and not too hard to find. Shakertown in Harrodsburg has a small riverboat cruise in May that travels past a rookery in the Palisades of the Kentucky river.

For anyone wondering, that is a sycamore tree and the balls are seed pods. Herons favor them for their rookery sites. Must be something about the branch structure.

Keep up the good work!

AuntieM Loc: Eastern NC

I really like your second shot.

crazydaddio Loc: Toronto Ontario Canada

I will check into that. It does have OS (Sigmas VR/IS). Could be just practice since I dont shoot with it that much...at 150 no problem...500ss is fine. At 600mm, results are generally poor below 1200 and variable to 1600.

(And I rarely use a tripod unless its a stationary subject with long exposure. :-)

robertjerl Loc: Corona, California

Was it an overcast or hazy sky that would account for the white/light gray? If not and it was blue then the solution is to bring up the blue in PP. You indicate you have PS, if it is the CC version you have LR and in Develop there is a set of controls HSL/Color/B&W in either HSL or Color you can change Hue, Saturation or Luminance. I used to favor Color but now almost always use the HSL.

Someone mentioned not being able to follow BIF with any kind of tripod/head combination.
I find the Gimbal head and a sturdy-tall tripod it is just like using a machine gun off a pedestal mount. It swings left/right, up/down and rotates as the birds go by, be careful not to trip on the tripod legs. For birds overhead having the tripod set so the camera is a bit above eye level works, for lower than eye level and if the birds are skimming the water etc below your camera level then you have to set the tripod short or aim the camera down.

Although the tripod adds to what I carry and has to be set up I find that my tracking of BIF is steadier than when I hand hold. Using a pistol grip on the tripod collar of the lens helps but doesn't steady things as much as the tripod does.

Ben's nana Loc: Chesterland, Ohio

I'm going to look into the gimbal head. It will undoubtably be an improvement over my shaky hands and striggling with the tripod ballhead

Thanks

Fran

Ben's nana Loc: Chesterland, Ohio

John

I tried your lightroom recommendations on other bird shots...what an inprovement. Thank you for the tip

Fran

Ben's nana Loc: Chesterland, Ohio

Thanks. I am happy with them! I have to say that I took all the suggestions I got from other UHH members and tried them out. I would still be struggling otherwise. So, thanks to all of you!

Fran

redfordl Loc: Carver,Ma.

wow great series of shots!! Try a circular polarizing filter which will give you more saturation of sky ie. if blue. Also switch your metering from spot to evaluative> And use cloudy white balance. Good luck and keep up the good work!! I just received a new tamron 150-600 mm g2 lens and am looking forward to taking a lot of bird shots with it. Unfortunatly, I do not have the selection of(big) birds to shoot that you have in Ohio.

Djedi

REALLY nice, thanks for sharing!

Ben's nana Loc: Chesterland, Ohio

You'll love the lens!

Ben's nana Loc: Chesterland, Ohio

Thank you

Fran