Pine Siskin

Wonderful clarity and sharpness and immaculately presented as usual. The object on which it is standing looks unusual, is it just a smooth stone?   I have been mening to ask, do you use a tripod? Or do you use the vibration reduction feature on the lens?

I have just been taking a few shots of garden birds with my new Sigma 70 - 200 mm and although they are sharp enough I can't seem to get close enough, I might have to invest in a tele-converter.

Excellent usual high standard of work Richard!

Best Regards

Alf

Alf,

Thanks for the nice comment.

This bird is perched on a decorative bird bath.  I did not use a tripod for this shot, but I do often use a tripod in my back yard when I'm taking images of small birds.

I use a Nikkor 80-400 mm VR zoom on my D300, simply because it was not as expensive as the 200-400 mm f4 zoom, or the 500 or 600mm f4 prime telephotos.  The glass in my lens is sharp, but the AF system is the old screw type which uses the in-camera motor, so it is slow.  However, if you pre-focus on the spot where the bird will be, the short travel to focus is pretty quick.

Getting close is essential for detail.  You can attract birds to your area with feeders and then set up your camera on a tripod with you in a "blind" or some hidden spot so the birds get used to you and aren't frightened away.

They will perch on anything available around the feeder...limbs, weeds and other natural structure.

Practice focusing and shooting with them on the feeder and get your settings down so that you have the best iso, best aperture and fastest shutter speed you can get under the available light.

I use a single center focus point with the camera set on aperture priority.  My lens is sharpest at f8, but I can get good images down to f6.3.  

Take a lot of pictures and pay attention to all of the details.  You'll find that you'll want a longer lens, but if you get close your Sigma should yield some good results.

Have fun with it!

Dick

Thank you, Grigoriy!

Really crisp picture, perfectly neutral background. Best regards, Alessandro.

very nice portrait of this little bird , very good the sharpness and the background, ciao Giangiorgio