Gorgeous kitty sisters!
How did you get the bird to pose for you in mid-flight ?
Beautiful! Our local hummers are too skittish to pose.
I’ve been trying to capture our’s; they’ve been going crazy all day, but I can’t get the shutter speeds right. What settings do you use? I have a Canon EOS REBEL T7 DSLR and I’m trying to teach myself.
I was staked in my kitchen this afternoon with the window open trying to capture them. I think they’re too smart for me We have 4 different species, so cool.
Wow—gorgeous photos. Don’t believe we gave any hummingbirds in our state. Always loved seeing them in SF.
Pic friend’s wife took on land 2 weekends ago:
Pic I took about the same time on a sailboat with said friend:
About 10 mins after pics were taken, rain started. About 15 mins after that we had flipped the boat twice (second time turtle) and couldn’t right it. Was friend’s third time on this type of boat (VX) and my first. Race commitee boat stayed with us and another group who were sailing in our fleet (who had a ton more experience with this kind of boat) took their boats in and came back out in a power boat to provide assistance. Looking forward to sailing the boat again. Learned a lot that day.
We have a quid pro quo relationship developed over the years, i.e., I provide them nectar and they pose for me in return.
Lucky you @Tigerwife92 , all we have is the ruby-throated hummingbird.
I shoot hummers in two ways. One, using multiple off-camera flashes, in which case my shutter flash sync speed is 1/250sec. When I’m shooting without flashes, then my shutter speed can be anywhere from 1/500sec to over 1/2500sec, all depending on how much wing blur I like to see in the resulting images. Camera bodies aren’t as important as the lens. My camera is Canon R5 with the Eye-tracking, but I’ve shot as successfully with any other older model camera bodies. The lens I typically use with the R5 is the RF 100-500 with the 1.4 extender, so I have up to 700mm at my disposal.
Hummers tend to drink, pull back, drink, pull back, so one of the techniques I use is to simply time my shutter to when a hummer pulls back and hover. For this reason, hummers don’t really require a very fast shutter speed. Since they’re “on plane” with the nectar source, I pre-focus my camera at the source to begin with, so the camera focusing system doesn’t go bonkers. If you have a nice light when shooting hummers, using a narrower depth of field, say at least f/9, and shutter speed of 1/2500sec, you should be able to capture them successfully.
Having a camera with very fast AF can really help for capturing any moving subject, but for something like this, I didn’t focus on the moving subject but rather on the flower itself, which isn’t a moving subject and therefore a whole lot easier to obtain the focus. Since both the flower and the hummer are on plane, the camera setting of f/9 nails both in clear focus.
Can you repeat that in English? Jk,I may need pictographs I’m currently using a 75-300. I’ve been prefocusing and waiting, but my hands/arms shake so bad. I definitely need a tripod. My pics are clearer than above, but my Canon app was glitching when I tried to download, so I had to screenshot. Thanks for the tips!! This is the first time we’ve ever had a “real” camera, so we’re just learning
Those butterfly shots are lovely.
Rats. Our hummers ate gallons of nectar but still refuse to pose for us. Seattle freeze, maybe?
This beauty didn’t come to visit this morning for some sweet nectar. My next door neighbor started raising chickens and rabbits in their backyard, and this Red-tailed hawk’s appetite peaked…
I just sat there for 30 minutes trying to get a shot!! Ugghh, they’re so freakin’ fast. The only thing I was able to get was this hummingbird moth and it wasn’t clear
My worst nightmare, turtling a sailboat!
Glad to hear that your fellow sailers turned out to help!
I hadn’t sailed a boat under 30’ in 25 years. And hadn’t raced in 30 years. We were flying a spinnaker when we flipped. Should have gotten it down when we righted the first time but having that much sail area up we flipped again in less than 20 seconds. And turned turtle 30 seconds later. Learned a lot and wouldn’t happen again in those circumstances.
They always say that with big boats, you find out you made a mistake 3 minutes later (and sometimes never). With small boats its 3 seconds. Great for learning.
Was never a doubt that the fellow sailors would turn out to help. Just what you do. Extremly grateful they did in any event.
Found out later that wife of the guy who owned the boat we were in was on one of the committtee boats. 2 minutes before we tipped, we heard her radio to other commitee boat to keep an eye on us because we were new to the boat. Last thing we heard on that radio because we lost it in the process.
VX is a fun boat to sail.
@TiggerDad - absolutely gorgeous photos. Would love to learn how to take these pictures!