This is a Black Phoebe, a common year-round bird in So California. It has the endearing (for a photographer) of “hawking”; it flies from a perch to catch insects and then returns to the same perch repetitively. This makes it an easy bird to photograph as it often gives you multiple chances. This should have been the case here, but I was rusty from sitting around the house too much and not working with my camera. As a consequence, the sharpest, best exposed picture I got from a sequence was poorly composed. I should have moved my spot focus point up in the frame to give more canvas on the bottom. Would have been quick and easy to do, but I just forgot. Adding canvas in Photoshop during post processing is an option but the post/perch makes that option a little trickier.
Lesson here is to be familiar with your camera’s controls so you can make changes without removing your eye from the eyepiece and “Be quick, but don’t hurry” as the legendary basketball coach of UCLA, John Wooden, famously stated.
- Created Timestamp03/28/2020 12:18:18
- CameraCanon EOS 7D Mark II
- Aperture14
- CreditJim Babbitt
- Copyrightall rights reserved
- Focal Length560
- Iso800
- Shutter Speed1/800
I understand what you are saying. However the size of the bird appears to be proportionate to the size of the post. by showing more canvas at the bottom of the frame would mean that you would be showing more of the post. At some point the size of the post distracts you from the bird. All strictly hypothetical because we won’t know, but that’s my guess.
You make a good point. Not much, photogenically speaking, to see with a wooden post. I will work with cropping more; normally I don’t like to throw away pixels, but this is one shot that just shouts-Crop me!
My thoughts too. I end up cropping almost every shot. In fact sometimes I’ll zoom out so I can have more latitude to crop I understand losing pixels but the overall composition is perhaps more important.