Birding and Bird Photography: A Perfect Pair

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Birding and bird photography continues gaining traction across the world with recent events. Birding by its very nature offers us peace, enjoyment and calm. What’s not to love when you see and hear feathered beauties bursting cheerful songs?

Migration season makes many of us very, very happy.

Since it’s migration time, I felt the need to blog about birds. But who needs an excuse to talk about birds? Let’s grab a cup of coffee and chat. Or in this case, read a bit.

Bird photography for amateur and advanced photographers offers the ultimate challenge. How to capture their beauty, details and environment? And, for bird photographers, what defines a good photograph?

Before I photographed birds, I watched birds through binoculars for years. Knowing about birds, their habits and habitat pays off when looking for birds to photograph. It starts with successful birding techniques!

Successful Birding Techniques & Tips

As a long term birder well before photography, spring migration represents one of the year’s highlights. Traveling to birding hotspots, migration stops keeps birders hopping while on the lookout for seasonal favorites.

Migration hones birding knowledge and identification skills.

Successful birding requires patience, research, a really good bird book or app and more patience. While birding occurs in hotspots, it also happens in your very own back yard. Add bird feeders, bird baths, native plants and you’ll have flying friends year round.

One tip for successful and enjoyable birding: Don’t Assume!

When we see that ‘little yellow bird’ on a branch, it’s easy to assume that it’s our normal visitor. But, wait. Get those binoculars (binocs) out and look. Really look. Then pull out the bird book or app.

What to look for in bird identification?

When diving in to your bird book or app to ID the bird, here’s several tips to speed the process from “what bird is that” to “that’s a (fill in the blank) bird.”

• Size – is it the size of a chickadee, robin, jay, crow or larger?
• Bill – long, short, skinny, thick, conical, curved, straight, one color or bi-color?
• Wings – are there stripes (aka wing bars) on the wings? How many? What color?
• Breast – what patterns or colors do you see? Solid, colored, streaked, patterned or somewhere in between?
• Tail – is the tail long or short, one color or are there flashes of color?
• Eye – what color is the eye? Is there a ring around the eye? If yes, is it a full circle or partial ring?
• Behavior – what is it eating, how is it flying, where is it hanging in the trees? Different birds have different actions and places to perch.
• Song – if it’s singing, what do you hear? Raspy, clear, vibrant, repetitive or a series?

Yes, each of those are tell-tale signs of a bird species. Start with one or two of the signs and then you’ll quickly refine your own ID process. If you still can’t ID a bird? Ask a birder! Those details will help them help you – even if they’re not looking at your bird.

The bird above? Small size, short black bill, white eye, light wing patch, very active. Plus, I was in Florida in the winter. These all pointed to the White-eyed Vireo.

Suggested Bird Books and Apps:

• The Warbler Guide – Warblers are tricky, this app is my husband’s go-to for warbler ID’s when needed.
• eBird -Vast online resource for finding birding hotspots, recording sitings and viewing bird activity. If you see a bird and document it, it adds to a vast data base of scientific trends used for understanding what’s happening environmentally.
• Merlin – terrific app developed by Cornell Lab of Ornithology, it’s on my smartphone. User friendly interface.
• Audubon – With the name of Audubon, you know it’s a great one. A great resource with excellent video snippets.
• Sibley Bird Guide – very comprehensive with lovely artwork used in their 2nd edition published book.
• Kenn Kaufman Guide to Birds of North America – available on Amazon, this book has been with me over 15 years. Perfect for the car when you don’t have cell access or your smartphone nearby.

Recently, I wrote about birding locations with Bird Migration: Strutting their Stuff. With bird feeders, habitat and food sources that birds love, turn your back yard into a birding hotspot. With eBird, you may find local locations for birds are around the corner.

Bird Photography

With bird photography, capturing the bird is easy. Getting a good, tack sharp image requires practice, patience and knowledge. Since we covered knowledge with ‘birding’, and patience is up to you, we’ll hit a few steps to get rocking when you’re with the birds. Birding and bird photography go hand in hand.

Technical:

• Shooting Settings – A good place to start is your aperture set to f/9 to get the bird in focus, a shutter speed of 1/500 as they’re active and an ISO of 250 if you have good light. I shoot in Aperture Priority first, followed by Manual Mode. I like controlling my depth of field first along with shutter speed. For more info on shooting modes: 4 Shooting Modes, Which One is Right for You?
• Camera Settings – My standard camera settings include: Auto White Balance, Single Point Focus (small birds) or birds with distracting backgrounds, Group Focus (birds in flight, multiple birds together), Continuous Shooting and always in raw format. With RAW files, you’ll have all the detail. With todays cameras and post processing software, we have more power with lifting shadows and other elements of our images. Raw keeps everything!
• Shooting technique and shutter speed – If you’re carrying a lightweight lens and shooting handheld, a good rule of thumb is to have your shutter speed be equivalent to your focal distance. For example 300mm should be 1/300 sec. 500 mm at 1/500 sec. If you’re using a tripod, there’s more flexibility due to camera stability.
• Stick with your subject – No, no pun intended. This is different than a bird on a stick. Seriously, if a bird is posing for you or moving in and out of branches in photographic range – stay with it. It takes a lot of images in most cases to get the one or two you really like. The Cape May above stayed with me for over an hour. 500 shots later, choices and post processing fun!

Artistry

What is a good bird photograph? So many articles (including mine) will share technical traits that make up a good image. You determine first, if it’s a good photograph. If you love it, that’s what matters. The artistry tips below are for consideration as you’re planning and shooting birds.

• Watch your backgrounds – No matter how adorable the bird, or how tack sharp the eye is, an ugly background will ruin the best of shots. Sure, you can do a lot in post processing. But, if you’re wanting clean images, backgrounds make and break images. Wait for your subject to move into an area with color, colorful grasses, backlighting, a pretty sky. A bird sitting in the middle of a bunch of drab branches, well, you get the picture. You’ll hit delete in post on many birds in a mire of distracting branches and thickets.
• Bird on a stick – There’s quite a bit of fodder on ‘the bird on a stick.’ A clean shot of a bird perched that’s sharp, great background provides a great ID image. Particularly if it’s a rare or migratory visitor. Birds on a stick are beautiful!
• Emotion wins your heart -If you’re looking for a connection, it takes a bit more than a tack sharp bird image. Eye contact, positioning, special (natural!) light, bird behavior, birds interacting pull viewers in. When you show off what makes the bird special, it’s a winner.

Birding and Bird Photography

Birding and Bird Photography inspires year round, not just in the spring. When you observe birds or photograph and share images, others enjoy. In many cases, our work inspires others to look outside and enjoy nature.

Different birds arrive across all four seasons. Enjoy each seasons’ arrivals.

In a time where we’re closer to home, the simple joys of nature in our backyards or neighborhoods offer a haven we didn’t observe before. Now that we know it’s there, we just may spend more time taking in our local sights in our new world order.