Monday, April 14, 2014

As Cute As It Gets



In the middle of all the fast and furious shooting of wild songbirds last week, a few chipmunks took advantage of the abundant food supply. This one spent quite a while gorging himself on seeds and grains, and posed nicely for the camera.

As he brought the food to his mouth, his little hands took on a prayerful position. I guess he was thankful for the abundance of food that had come his way.

If you go out in search of a particular subject or species, always stay alert and be aware of other opportunities that might present themselves. As you have read many times in this blog, it is important to be an opportunist and be prepared to photograph subjects in addition to your main ones.

Keep your eyes and ears open for anything that might prove to be photogenic.

As you can see below, this was shot at 800mm. Even at that, some cropping was needed to eliminate part of the extraneous background. If you do not have access to long lenses, you can often still get what you want by cropping. Most cameras and lenses today are sharp enough with good resolution that will allow for a high degree of cropping. Often extreme crops will hold up well for electronic transfer (for email, web postings, etc.) but will lose quality if blown up too much for a print.

TECHNICAL DATA
Shutter Speed 1/160 sec.  Aperture f/16.  ISO 1600.  Lens: Canon 200-400mm f/4L IS with 2x extender for an effective focal length of 800mm.  Camera: Canon 5D Mark III.  Gitzo tripod with Really Right Stuff ballhead and Wimberley Sidekick.

TODAY’S QUOTE: “Let us not look back in anger, nor forward in fear, but around in awareness.”  --James Thurber

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