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Barn Owl
Tyto alba
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My friend "hearman" aka Don, has frequent talks across the fence with a family of barn owls in his neighborhood. Bring a flash and a 200 says Don. I did. I'm happy :->
p.s. A few people have asked how? Focal length: 175 mm fStop: 5.6 ISO: 1600 Shutter Speed: 1/800 sec. Flash - ETTL, HiSpeed Sync, +3 compensation. The bird was about 20 feet above me, and the image is a crop (from landscape to square of original full-frame image ).
I'm still learning how to use flash. My basic method is to set up a preferred shutter speed, and default ISO. (Manual exposure all the way thru) and then dial flash compensation up or down on a bunch of test shots for the distance I'm seeking. In the daytime, fill flash is at -2 to -3. In the nighttime, fill flash is all I have, so plus 2 to plus 3. I use the 580Ex, and the Better Beamer w/flash zoom at 50mm.
One thing I'm practicing is to shoot with both eyes open (I learned this trick from tinyfishy on flickr). I keep one eye on the view screen, and one eye focused in the real world at a distance. Yes this sounds wonky. But it works. When I'm shooting with a telephoto lens, anything that expands my field-of-view allows me to more quickly/accurately track the bird. The trick has made a huge difference in being faster at the draw. That's how I got on a bird flying that fast in my field-of-view. To be useful to me though, it only works when I'm comfortable with tracking a flying bird using the screen center point focus without a second thought.
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Focal length: 175 mm
fStop: 5.6
ISO: 1600
Shutter Speed: 1/800 sec.
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Roseville, CA
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Aug 15, 2009
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