First duck in flight attempt
MuleyMadness
12/29/06 9:48pm
Okay CoopersDesign got me wanted to try this...
Here is my first attempt, best shot I got. What a pain. :)
My question is how do you get enough light in? All my pics are dark because the shutter speed is so fast?
Anyway it was fun trying, but got some work to do for sure.
Here is my first attempt, best shot I got. What a pain. :)
My question is how do you get enough light in? All my pics are dark because the shutter speed is so fast?
Anyway it was fun trying, but got some work to do for sure.
9,363
In the photo of the two flying away, they are past the middle of the frame and leaving the picture. Put in in some photo program you have you can crop with and put them toward the side of the frame their leaving. Nice picture, you just let them get to far thru the frame on you.
To get more light get the sun in abetter position. If their to dark, increase the ISO setting and open the aperature all the way.
Your picture cropped:
Now I will go to my room!
1. I shoot with a 100-400mm lens.
2. You are going to have a very hard time jumping ducks and getting a good shot of them, because they will always flying away from you. Set up where ducks fly close 40 yards or less. Know where they are going to fly. A good rule for light is: Set up so the sun will light up their eyes as you are photographing them.
3. You should not be getting dark photos, because you're shooting at a higher shutter speed. That tells me that you are shooting the wrong exposure.
A. shoot with a 400+Iso, I never shoot less then that, today I shot 1000iso, because of low light.
B. Shoot in the Av mode and set your aperture as large as your lens will let you. This will give you the nice blurred backgrounds. Your lens should tell you what this is, 5.6 etc. This way, your camera will set your speed for you. However, even this dosen't always work. I like to use a gray card, and manual mode. This keeps me from washing out the highlights in the ducks colorings. You can get a gray card at any camera store, they are cheap.
All in all, that's the basics. If you want more information about the gray card, let me know, and I'll go a little more in depth.
I'll be editing this post later to add a few pics with the settings attached.
Harlan
I have been told that lacking a gray card you could take a light reading off your hand and/or green grass. Have you tried that? And durning the day, do you have to re-shoot the gray card? Have you got it set up away from you where you spot meter it?
I've never tried my hand, that would be great. If all the light is the same "no clouds", then I start with a gray card and get my reading. Set the reading in manual mode, then I pan around to see what in the area gives me the same readings. I will go back to that subject and check everytime I think the conditions may have changed. Your camera has different metering modes. If you are using evaluative metering, your camera takes everything into your frame and averages it, so if you only have the gray card in the center of your frame, then you could get the wrong reading. It is better to make sure your gray card or subjuct that gives you 18% gray, is full frame and you wont have this problem. I'm sure that the color on one's hand changes with the seasons, along with the color of the grass, for example, so you may not be getting reliable readings with that approach.
Hope the helps!
Harlan
p.s. If you have had problems shooting in the snow, a gray card will fix this.
One thing is appearent, one of the biggest differences between your's and our's is attention to details and patience. I am so guilty of knowing what I should do and getting in a hurry and not doing it. You didn't mention framing either. That I got pretty good at, someone with a big hammer standing behind me sure helped!
Shooting in the snow I usually just add 2 stops, when I think of it in time.