Thursday was a big improvement on the first day of the year with plenty of sunshine and not too windy. We decided on an afternoon at RSPB Old Moor. So too did lots of others making it a busy day at the reserve.
Neither of us are proper “birders” as we aren't able to sit for hours patiently waiting for the perfect photo opportunity or rare bird to arrive. We have been a little bit disappointed with our photo opportunities on our last couple of visits to the reserve.
I had my usual problem whilst trying to photographs ducks. I get my camera zoomed in and focused and just as I press the shutter the duck dives under the water and I photograph ripples. Still if it was easy I don’t suppose there would be in any challenge would there?
I was a little more successful with this female tufted duck as she was a little more cooperative just gently bobbing about on the water in the late afternoon sun. I would have preferred to have captured her in the middle of the frame but didn't quite manage that.
There wasn’t a lot of activity on the water so I tried my hand at capturing a few birds in flight. This moves tricky up to a new level. The first problem is to even find the birds in the viewfinder. If anything appears in the viewfinder then it’s a case of pressing the shutter and hoping for the best. Above is the best shot I managed. For most of the images it was a case of hitting the delete key.
I'm guessing we’ll be back on another nice sunny day to see what’s around to photograph at the reserve.
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I love your diving duck picture - you've captured the splashes and ripples beautifully! I find it hard enough to get and keep a flying bird in the view of some binoculars - let alone keeping it in focus long enough to get a photo, I definitely appreciate the challenge!
ReplyDeletePity about the duck though.
DeleteThe duck picture is lovely, and I'm really impressed with the flying one too. I've deleted many as well! Hopefully we'll make a trip to Slimbridge on Sunday. The eldest has been complaining bitterly that we've only been there once over Christmas!
ReplyDeleteHope the weather's good for your trip on Sunday.
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