All quiet on the western front - PM 2023

[pedro maia]

BIF36 Black-winged kite (Elanus caeruleus)

 

[PeterHG]

I am really enjoying your personal BIF challenge! Good shots! We may even have a go atb that together later in the year. We have (tentative) plans to drive south to Portugal this autumn again. We'll be in Lisbon also the weekend of 14th July, but we're only travelling with hand-luggage, so no camera with me then. As it looks like we're going to have a Portuguese daughter-in-law, I imagine we're going to visit your beautiful country more often in the future. My son already bought a house there.... (with some spare bedrooms, fortunately ;))

[pedro maia]

Last Saturday I took some nice shots of Swifts, it was windy in the Leziria and the wind can help with Swifts, so ot´s time for some duplicates:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[pedro maia]

25 minutes ago, PeterHG said:

I am really enjoying your personal BIF challenge! Good shots! We may even have a go atb that together later in the year. We have (tentative) plans to drive south to Portugal this autumn again. We'll be in Lisbon also the weekend of 14th July, but we're only travelling with hand-luggage, so no camera with me then. As it looks like we're going to have a Portuguese daughter-in-law, I imagine we're going to visit your beautiful country more often in the future. My son already bought a house there.... (with some spare bedrooms, fortunately ;))

 

Great news Peter, I hope we can do some birding when you came here.

 

The weekend of the 14th of July let me know if you want to go to the Leziria, or looking for nightjars and owls, I´ll lend you a camera, it will only be good enough for record shots but I´m sure you´ll be able to do your magic.

[Peter Connan]

Your practice is paying off Pedro!

Great Swifts and Swallows!

[xelas]

Your BIF photo skill is improving by each shot! Congratulations.

[PeterHG]

18 hours ago, pedro maia said:

m sure you´ll be able to do your magic.

I think the magic is in your Swift shots !

[pedro maia]

Thanks guys.

 

@PeterHG, I was pretty happy with my swifts shots but then I decided to take a look at the Common swift picture in your thread... Let´s just say that I shouldn´t have done that.

[pedro maia]

BIF37 Common house martin (Delichon urbicum)

[Soukous]

20 hours ago, pedro maia said:

we're only travelling with hand-luggage, so no camera with me then

?? The camera IS the hand luggage. Everything else is superfluous 

[Galana]

31 minutes ago, Soukous said:

Everything else is superfluous 

Absolutely.  1. Passport and tix. 2. Camera. 3 Bins. 4 Shaving gear if room. 5 onwards Lady G.

[michael-ibk]

A fun idea for a Big Year Pedro! And you are doing great, many of these are excellent, Bravo! 

[shazdwn]

Just caught up. Great Namibian birds and BIFs.

 

When I first got my R5 it took a while to adjust to mirrorless, but now I would not go back so stick with it. I love the silent shutter as it doesn’t disturb the wildlife. I have had instances in the past where you can only get a couple of shots in before the shutter noise disturbs the bird - not an issue anymore 

[Kitsafari]

great BIFs of the swifts, especially given how incredibly swift (pun intended) they are. 

[TonyQ]

A great idea for your Big Year @pedro maia

You are getting really good photos already, I am very impressed.

The Swifts are great, and I really like the Black winged kite.

 

I am still learning with the R7. It can be difficult to get focus on a small bird in an empty sky. I have found it helpful sometimes to quickly focus on a distant object before aiming at the bird in the sky. If it is even a similar distance it seems to help it grab focus on the bird (But not always!)

[pedro maia]

On 7/6/2023 at 7:08 PM, michael-ibk said:

A fun idea for a Big Year Pedro! And you are doing great, many of these are excellent, Bravo! 

 

Quite an addictive idea.

[pedro maia]

On 7/6/2023 at 10:17 PM, shazdwn said:

Just caught up. Great Namibian birds and BIFs.

 

When I first got my R5 it took a while to adjust to mirrorless, but now I would not go back so stick with it. I love the silent shutter as it doesn’t disturb the wildlife. I have had instances in the past where you can only get a couple of shots in before the shutter noise disturbs the bird - not an issue anymore 

 

Although the electronic shutter has advantages, so far I think I´m still getting better results with the mechanical shutter.

[pedro maia]

On 7/7/2023 at 8:27 AM, Kitsafari said:

great BIFs of the swifts, especially given how incredibly swift (pun intended) they are. 

 

The wind was quite helpfull for the swifts.

[pedro maia]

1 hour ago, TonyQ said:

A great idea for your Big Year @pedro maia

You are getting really good photos already, I am very impressed.

The Swifts are great, and I really like the Black winged kite.

 

I am still learning with the R7. It can be difficult to get focus on a small bird in an empty sky. I have found it helpful sometimes to quickly focus on a distant object before aiming at the bird in the sky. If it is even a similar distance it seems to help it grab focus on the bird (But not always!)

 

Thanks Tony, I´m know I´m progressing but I still take too many crappy pictures.

 

Small birds are a nightmare to focus, and for the momment my initial reaction is still very slow.

[pedro maia]

Tlaking about small birds, it´s definitelly very hard to photograph them in flight, best chance is to have them on the ground, or perched, and try to anticipate the momment they take off, which is not simple at all, either because it takes too much patiente to wait for that whith the bird focused with the finger on the shutter button or because the bird takes off when you don´t expect and the reaction is too slow, ending with a blank or with aburredr photo, just like some of my efforts (I´ll try to take better pictures of these small birds along the way.

 

BIF38 Common blackbird (Turdus merula)

My tricks aren´t working with these guys...

[pedro maia]

BIF39 Common linnet (Linaria cannabina)

[pedro maia]

BIF40 Black redstart (Phoenicurus ochruros)

[pedro maia]

BIF41 House sparrow (Passer domesticus)

[pedro maia]

BIF42 European goldfinch (Carduelis carduelis)

 

A bit better with the juveniles

[pedro maia]

BIF43 Woodchat shrike (Lanius senator)

 

 

Take-off in the wrong direction, another problem...