Photographing a Black and White Warbler

It’s always an exciting challenge to follow a fast moving target with the lens. Like most warblers, this little guy was busily on the move. Even though the Gimbal head performed flawlessly, I had trouble tracking him.

In the image below, the warbler was quickly making his way out of the frame. He was heading up… in the direction of his gaze..and moving so fast toward his probable exit point that I could not keep up with the lens. As I pressed the shutter, I knew the image would be tightly cropped and consequently create a sense that there was no place for the bird to go. No clipped body parts, thankfully, but still inadequate space for the top of the frame, and no room to creatively crop.

Compositional Challenges

My camera is often set at one shot auto focus simply because little birds far away tend to conceal themselves behind brush and in hidey holes. If I need to tunnel into these places with the lens, having a single autofocus point with which to direct the lens and lock focus is helpful. Plus, the flash is more likely to be able to keep up in single shot mode.

Focusing challenges change dramatically If the bird is out in the open. For this shoot, it was more advantageous to track the warbler with a small cluster of autofocus points in Al Servo mode.

NOTE: There’s a lot more on your focusing plate than just keeping up with a tiny, fast, zigzagging bird…ie focus limiter, back button focusing, image stabilizer, bursting speed, continual refocusing and shooting, enough megapixels for zooming.

Artful Compositions

Most birds are all curves. Lots of curves can make for an elegant and artful composition. They add energy, movement, and balance to the photo. If you crop too abruptly close to the edge of a frame, you can mess up the composition.

When the frame of an image is inadequate, photographers often try to creatively zoom and cut. A “cut off” is a deliberate attempt in post processing to include only a portion of the shot to create a compelling image. You zoom in and fill the frame artistically (or as tight as you like) and leave the rest to the viewer’s imagination.

I’ve tried this technique, and have to admit that the results do not appeal to me in my line of bird photography. Overall, I like the visual flow of a complete image that includes the context… and consistently try to “back off” a bit more in my zooming. Unfortunately, giving the image plenty of room in the frame is often not an option.

Photographing Black Throated Blue Warblers

A pair of Black Throated Blue Warblers arrived together at the fountain this Fall just before we shut it down for the winter. The male hopped around on the stones near the base of the streaming water, making for a colorful image. The female alighted on the nearby perches near the fountain. I was at the right place at the right time with the right equipment. Minutes later, this pair disappeared.

Sexual Dimorphism

The male and female Black Throated Blue Warblers have very different coloration- so much so that they do not appear to be the same species. The male sports lustrous blue plumage atop his head and on his back and tail feathers. A black face mask extends down his throat to meet a bright white underbelly. He keeps this striking plumage year round. The female has none of the prominent black or blue colors of her mate. Her plumage is a soft olive brown contrasting with wisps of yellow on the breast. If you look closely at the contour of the pale stripes above the female’s eyes, you can see an outline of the male’s facial pattern. Both the male and female have small white spots on the edge of their folded wings.

NOTE: Any time you see blue feathers on a bird, it’s a trick of light. If you are interested in reading more about blue colors in nature, I recommend this article: Why Most Animals are Not True Blue by conservation biologist, Steven D. Faccio. It can be found at this LINK.

Lenses v Digiscopes

The birding list-serve that I subscribe to recently reported a Barrow’s Golden Eye Duck associating with the more frequently seen Common Goldeneye flocks out on Lake Michigan. This news brought out a half dozen birders –all peering through their long spotting scopes, eagerly searching for this unusual bird.

Most of the birders I saw had digiscopes…a manually focused digital spotting scope paired with a dSLR camera and secured on the scope by a mounting bracket near the scope’s eye piece. (Some high quality digiscope-cameras have auto exposure and autofocus capabilities.) Along with their scopes, these birders packed sturdy tripods and tripod heads for optimal image steadiness and smooth maneuverability. They also had high powered long range binoculars hanging at the ready around their necks. I could see no one in this party using a dSLR camera and long lens.

(NOTE: Some of these scopes reach the equivalent of a 1250-4000mm lens…a size that’s only a dream in the world of weighty, magnification challenged, and very expensive dSLR telephoto lenses.)

Different Priorities

Even though birders and bird photographers both tend to love birds, be abundantly patient and haul around similar equipment, they have different priorities when out in the field.  Birders with digiscopes are more interested in using their scopes to record distant images of birds and to use that image to document a sighting. Like bird photographers, they devote time, serious study and money to their endeavors in an effort to capture high quality images or videos of distant birds.

In terms of image quality, a good lens will outshine a digiscope any day- the closer the proximity, the better.  In terms of capturing birds at a distance, especially a distance not possible with a camera lens, a digiscope is the tool of choice.

Photographing a Tennessee Warbler

I still can not ID a Tennessee Warbler quickly. A dark line through the eyes accented with long white eyebrows are most often used as the determining factors. My bird books refer to this species as “dull”, most likely because nothing really stands out color or pattern wise on the plumage – especially compared to other warblers.

I don’t think so.

These warblers are so individually distinct! Different gradations of yellow, gray, black and olive green are entwined throughout the plumage. The first image shows an individual with delicately understated colors…olive gray feathers on the head streaming down into the plumage on his back. The second image captures a very different pose and package, with a burst of daffodil yellow on the breast. No doubt the flash made those flaxen colors pop. Different birds, both captured in the Autumn of 2017.

Creative Anticipation

So…. what to take in when photographing birds? Do I want a tack sharp close-up where the image is so crisp that I can almost touch the playful plumage patterns and textures and count the feathers? Or should I expand the boundaries and create a sense of space, take in more of the mood of the landscape, the intensity and hue of colors, and the expressive lines and curves?

Photographers can create meaning and tell a story through their work. However, in bird photography, it is not often possible to follow through on pre-visualization routines… to capture the image exactly as you imagine it.

Pre-Visualize or Crop

No doubt some artsy photographers might think that the only way to do photography right is to start with compositional building blocks, to thoughtfully pre visualize and then frame in-camera. Zooming and cropping afterwards, (or any post production process for that matter) would be “cheating”.

I tend to operate in the reverse. Given the realities of the fast and frantic world of bird photography, I’d say that I end up cropping at least 90% of my images… and possibly more.

The Power of Framing

The more I look at a digital image of a bird, the more I know what to do. The power of framing through post processing helps me be less sloppy, snip away at the discordant parts, break away from standard aspect ratios. I push and pull the Lightroom crop tool every which way… trying to determine what looks best and to get rid of distractions. Post production is just another set of tools I use to create the look I want.

Bottom Line:  The photographer should decide what looks best, whether it be fanciful or faithful to the scene and subject, and not let other elevated egos decide for her.

NOTE: Pre-visualizing is a more time consuming endeavor when photographing with a long lens. Most often, my binocular vision is not engaged while peering through my 500mm monster lens.  I try to avoid the disorientation that comes with overlapping fields of view that consist of one eye seeing a magnified limited field of vision and the other eye looking without magnification at a much wider field of view.