Photographing a Tennessee Warbler

Out of all the warblers that visit our yard during migration, the Tennessee Warbler is our most frequent visitor. Somewhat drab, this species is best identified by the markings on its face; a thin yellowish line over the eyes and a dark line running through the eyes. Like most warblers, it  breeds in the northern states and Canada and winters in South American countries like Columbia, Venezuela, and Ecuador.

Tripod Steady

The Tennessee Warblers pictured here were both methodical and swift as  they probed the branches and limp leaves for insects. For this shoot, I was lucky to have a relatively bright day in our yard. I took advantage of the light by using a faster shutter speed, one where the advantages of image stabilization on a tripod would probably not be needed. As always, the weight of the lens alone is enough for me to keep my equipment mounted steadfastly on the tripod.

Tripod Based Movement

Most of the time, the light is low in our heavily wooded yard, forcing me to resort to shutter speeds below 1/100 second. Stabilization is essential. (Frustrating NOTE: In Michigan, there’s a 29% sunshine rate…the percent of non-cloudy sunshine hours during the winter months.- See this link.)

Tripod steady is not always enough to capture sharp images at low shutter speeds. Even the most stable of tripods can not keep the camera and lens completely still. There will always be some tripod based vibration due to shutter mirror slap, or just because I am moving about on the floor, twirling the camera and lens this way and that, and pressing the shutter button in a continuous effort to capture a pose. Also, the longer the lens I have mounted on the tripod, the more this minute vibration is magnified.

NOTE: Remote shutter releases do help stabilize cameras on tripods, but I don’t often use mine when photographing birds because I feel less in control; bird action just happens too fast.

Enter MODE III – IS and Tripod Use

With previous IS Canon lenses I have owned, I had to remember to manually turn off the image stabilization function when I used a tripod, otherwise it would pick up the tripod’s inherent vibrations and erratically try to correct. It was not uncommon to end up with more blurriness on the images instead of less.

Since low shutter speeds are pretty essential to increase the amount of light available for exposure, tripod movement was a problem. Clever engineers at Canon’s R&D helped to minimize those obstacles by creating a secondary image stabilizing mode…. one made specifically for tripod use.

Canon IS lenses with Mode III functionality are engineered to sense when the lens is on a tripod. The purpose is not to disable the IS feature, but to identify and compensate for those slight tripod movements when the shutter is set between 1/30 second and 1 minute  – the settings at which the camera is very vulnerable to producing blurry photos. NOTE: Image Stabilization on the tripod is automatically disabled if the shutter speed is set for 1 second or longer.

Remember, birds are constantly moving – and IS will not compensate on that end. 

To read more about Image Stabilization, press this link.

It is easy to mistake the Tennessee Warbler for another drabbish warbler…. the Orange Crowned Warbler. To see this bird in action, press this link.

It has been my observation that accuracy, consistency, logic and convention do not appear to matter when naming birds. Read more about this here.

Photographing the Yellow Rumped Warbler

In my yard and in most of the Eastern US, it’s the hardy white throated Yellow Rumped Warbler of the Myrtle subspecies who lingers in the cold long after other species of warblers have gone south. Feasting on bay berries to survive, it’s not uncommon to see them here in November and December.

In the western U.S., the yellow throated Yellow Rumped Warbler of the Audubon subspecies thrives. Both have the trademark “butter butt” – a bright yellow patch of feathers above the tail.  NOTE: I hope to photograph this western variety on my next trip to California. Update:  My first day in San Diego and the Yellow Rumped Audubon subspecies showed up in front of my camera. See last photo below.

Yellow Rumped Warbler from
the Myrtle Subspecies.
ISO1600; f/5; 1/500 Second

Finding the Right Perch

In my yard we have a few optimal bird perching spots with lush and colorful backgrounds that receive a good amount of the morning light. They are ideal little niches with no unsightly and chaotic debris to interfere with the len’s ability to lock focus. Most importantly, I know warblers perch there.

The Focus Preset Function of the Lens

These perching spots offer an opportune time to practice a function on my telephoto lens that is never urgently needed but fun to play with. It’s called FOCUS PRESET. I don’t use this function much because it’s unnecessary for the most part… modern auto focus lenses are so fast to focus.  But, since I paid a whole lot of money for my 300mm and 500mm L II lenses, I think I might as well better understand the precision electronic data-transfer controls that make them so expensive.

Focus Preset allows the photographer to save a predetermined distance to the len’s memory and then automatically recall it.

To Set Focus Preset:

1) Turn the focus preset switch to On or On with Sound. (NOTE: The On w Sound setting simply means that you will hear a beep to confirm that focus preset is initiated. On w/o sound  = no beep.)

2) Using auto or manual focus, focus the lens on the spot that you want the lens to memorize.

3) Press the SET button

Your desired distance is now saved, and will be saved in the lens until you turn the focus preset switch to the “off” position.

To Engage Focus Preset

The auto focus function on your lens works as it normally does until you recall the Focus Preset.

Just give a little twist (either to the right or left) on the thin serrated metal focus preset ring (located right in front of the manual focus ring on the lens) to instantaneously recall the lens to focus on the spot previously saved to memory.

Kind of fun once you get the hang of it.

Subspecies or Hybrid

NOTE: In my many bird photography adventures, I have photographed several subspecies, but I have never photographed a bird that would be considered a hybrid. A subspecies is a variety of the same species….a population (usually geographically isolated) that has a slightly different appearance than others of its own species. A hybrid is born when two different and closely related species successfully breed..

An excellent article about hybridized warblers can be found at this link.

To see photos of Palm Warbler Subspecies, press this link.