iBirder Photography's photostream  

Took a trip today over to chester zoo with my girlfriend. We seen lots of Great animals almost everything was putting on a good show even if the weather didn't at times. We even seen the quite famous Wild leucistic Jackdaw that is completely White, although that was at distance.
The Highlight however had to be the two Tiger Cubs though. Such adorable Big ( but small) cats.

*tech bit* The trip allowed me to try out my lens at F/2.8 something I rarely have to do with british Wildlife and I must say I was impressed, although this shot is at F/3.5 It's shot through wet glass (poor quality glass too) and cropped a little. I think I've done a good job of rescuing it from the low contrast Raw image (which I'll post below), and I must say I think this lens it's well suited for Zoo photography when the light is bad. Having the ability to zoom and having a fast F/2.8 Aperture is just a joy to have, the only negative being the weight of the lens, I really should have took it easier today, my shoulders will pay for that tomorrow!

Canon 7D | Sigma 120-300mm F2.8 OS @ 235mm | iso 800 | Shot through Glass and Cropped | Monopod supported.

I thought I'd use this image as an example of how you can recover something from nothing with Raw Files. I often forget that some photographers are just starting out and don't fully understand what can be achieved with the right tools. Being interested about Raw from the start helped me realise pretty quick that jpeg just wasn't really an option on SLR's unless you want casual snaps. There's really no other option with wildlife than Raw in my opinion the flexibility it gives you is amazing. Sadly a lot of people get the raw processing wrong and stretch it beyond it's ability or use the wrong method to stretch it and often ruin the image in the process. I feel I'm finally getting what I want out of my processing and thats somewhere I've not been for a while.

Anyway below In the comments I'll post the original Raw File, as I said before this image was nearly written off for being very much under exposed, witch totally killed the shadow detail. I don't often recover from an image so badly under exposed but I thought I'd give it a go and Im really quite pleased. It's also proved to me that my new method of processing isn't throwing in loads of noise like I've done in the past when sharpening or brightening shadows. I'll leave you to judge for yourself.

Canon 7D | Sigma 120-300mm F2.8 OS & 1.4x TC @ 354mm | iso 800 | tripod

I deliberated on this shot, if I had moved round to where my friend Simon was when I took this shot I would have had a clear framing of the bird but I didn't want to scare it off as we were already very close with the bird not bothered about flying but with an incoming dog walker it was ready to go at a moments notice and go it did. I've decided that it was too tricky to edit out the surrounding birds without making a mess of the shot, I did do some cloning but hopefully thats not noticeable to you. I could have not bothered to post this shot but I still really like the pose of the cormorant and I don't think the other birds in the background go as far as ruining the shot. Just realised waterbirds are a constant theme this year so far in terms of useable shots. Must do something to alter that soon.

Canon 7D | Sigma 120-300mm F2.8 OS & 1.4x TC @ 420mm | iso 800 | Tripod

my mum suggested taking the dog for a walk earlier and with it being such a clear bright day I thought why not do what I've wanted for a while and test my lens with some running shots of him. It Proved easier with my mum there as he tends to listen more to her and was darting back and forward very obligingly. This is a fair crop down to 8.4Mpx but doing this has taught me a valuable lesson about DOF and just how shallow F2.8 is on a 300mm lens.. lets just say very!

Canon 7D | Sigma 120-300mm F2.8 OS @252mm | iso 800 | F5.6 | handheld

Didn't get round to posting this shot from a few weeks ago while out with a friend at a large welsh lake. The Herring Gull's took up positions on the wall almost like Guards I thought. I must have took this while a little light broke through.

Canon 7D | Sigma 120-300mm F2.8 OS & 1.4x TC Canon | iso 800 | Tripod