Canon EOS50d, EF 100-400mm L 1000 @ f5.6 ISO 400
Canon EOS 50d, 100-400mm L, 400 @ f5.6 ISO 400I went for a sit by the Thornton this afternoon, there's often a good collection of fairly common birds hanging about in the water by the car park, hoping for tit-bits from the visitors. At first I couldn't see many, last time I was there it was full of Canada Geese but they all seem to have flown. There was only one Canada and the resident Barnacle goose along wit a few coot and a couple of mallard. But as I got out of the car a couple of children started to throw bread to them and suddenly the area was full of Gulls, Mallard and Coots with a female swan and five juveniles from a late brood.
The light was a bit awkward, there is only one place, by the car park, to get down near to water level and that was in shade from the large trees that surround the area. I was only there for about an hour and took over a hundred shots (couldn't afford that in the old film days). Back home I immediately deleted about 40 of them and in the second cull there will probably be a lot more to get rid of. I'm particular about what I keep from a shoot, plus I try shots that sometimes don't work. On an exceptionally good day I might keep ten percent of the pictures I take. This is quite high some wildlife photographers recon on about one percent.
I was using my 50d with the 100-400 L mounted on my Benbo tripod, but instead of using a tripod head I have made a flat support from a cheap plastic chopping board cut down, drilled and tapped. That screws on to the top of the tripod and I rest my beanbag on top with the camera and lens on top of that. As the camera isn't actually fixed to the tripod, this gives me steady support for the camera, while still having the ability to react to anything going on around me, like birds flying overhead (I'm indebted to Paul (http://www.alulawildlifephotos.yolasite.com/) for this idea and I know he won't mind my sharing it).
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