[Recovered Thread: 30569]

[Normcar]

Got lotsa different ones today. Please correct any incorrect idents, thanks.

American Goldfinch (first time photo of this bird, if indeed it is a correct ident)



Another view from the side



Rock Wren Roll...no, just Rock Wren (caught this one while driving down a country road)



Female Blackbird (I personallyliked the background color and overall exposurein thisphotoso decided to add it to the list)



Chickadee in a slightly different environment than I've had before



Eating the morsel found (cute birds)



Sparrow finding a "huge" worm (disgusting!)



The worm fights back, wrapping itself around the beak



Slime green splattered all over the facedemos the final impact



Anyone getting hungry?

[Eric CAN]

Norm, hope you don't mind some critics here. First of all the first one is a male Goldfinch, they are not too affraid of people, as long as you stay at the same place.

You slightly overexposed the little cutie here. I can see right away the sun was shinning on it. Can you tell me the setting on that one ? ISO, M mode, AV ?

The Wren is exposed correctly, only the background doesn't help you here. Grey sky it was ?

Female Red-winged blackbird is perfect, don't touch it ! Very nice pose too

Chikedees, this is where I had to give you a critic, setting again please ? Then I'll try to help you correcting the situation next time.

And the Sparrow is just slightly overexposed. What you could do is layer the background with some serious negative EC. Same could apply to the Wren btw.

Let me know the settings please. And I presume it was grey sky for these ? Apart the Goldfinch.

Cheers

[Normcar]

Thanks for the comment Eric. I agree with you on all of the above, too. I understand that these are not the best photos and that some are underexposed and some are overexposed. I was happy to have even captured that little yellow wonder today, it was cool to see it for the first time. The sparrow with the worm was, I agree, terribly overexposed, and my intention was to show the "huge" worm or whatever in it's mouth. It was hilarious, but that bird did a great job of chomping it down. As for the Exif data on the photos, I don't know if that's necessary with these ones as I clearly agree that they are not technically wonderful. What about the Wren, did I identify that one correctly? Thanks, as always!

[Eric CAN]

Np Norm, I'll have to find in my book what type of Wren it is. Just a little trick about Chikedee. I don't what mode you shoot in, if you use A/V (I use M all the time), then do a slight negative compensation of 1/3, aim at the white part of the bird, use Spot Metering and you'll nail the exposure. Was these taken under sunlight or was it grey outside ?

[Normcar]

Thanks Eric, I do exactly the same, but with this guy I probably didn't go down on exposure because I was a bit excited at seeing it. I as well always shoot in full "M" mode and find that one stop of underexposure is best. Unfortunately, my hands and my mind sometimes don't work as quickly as my understanding is. With the Blackbird I had time to position myself and set controls properly; with the sparrow and worm I had absolutely no time and was facing the sun on a slightly overcast day, but the sun still hit the lens badly; with the finch I just got too excited, the sun was behind me and I was on monopod, but the chance happened quickly...oh well, that's the way it goes.

With the Chickadees, no excuses, I just wasn't looking at my exposure control and was focusing too much on sharpness. :roll:

[Eric CAN]

Ok understand now Norm. Everything makes sense now. As for the Goldfinch, they are hard to expose correctly with the sun shinning on them. Best advise is, go low ISO and underexpose them. So you could do some layers and make correction to bring the best of the bird.

Reason why I mentioned -1/3 EC on the metering of the 300D using spot metering comes from the fact that the white feathers are not totally white. And the camera meters 18% grey, so we're close to that figure.

Cheers

[geoffs]

You identified it as a wren - that was good! But, you didn't get the correct wren. :-) This particular wren is a House Wren. Note that it has no well defined white stripe over the eye. Note that it does not have streaking to speak of on the breast or belly. The Rock Wren has both of those characteristics. You were close, just missed.

Goldfinches are great, aren't they? I love it when a male goldfinch decides to alight somewhere where I can take it in. They are very common around my house but of course they won't cooperate and come close enough to where I can get a decent picture.

I'm trying to figure out the sparrow right now...

[eric s]

Interesting set of shots. Down where I am, you can get American Goldfinches at a feeder without too much trouble. But that doesn't have to be the same up where you are. Of course, I don't have the right type of feeder, so I don't get them... but my parents do. They are nice, aren't they?

I don't believe that is a Rock Wren. I've never seen one before, though, so I could be wrong. The exposure doesn't help (I'm way to firmilar with exposures like that.) They always seem to happen with birds you can't ID.

You're up in Canada, right? Are you to the west? They don't go over the border very far, and only to the far west (the bottom of the west three provences, but not to the coast. Note the maps in the book are a bit old.) But for plumage reasons, there should be a white stripe just above the eye that runs almost the length of the head. Also, the wing pattern is more spotted, but this one is more striped.

Unfortunately, I can't tell you what it is, though. Maybe Geoffs will swing by, he's lived more places and is a better ID'er than me.

That female RWBB is interesting. If you recall, I posted one recently myself, and its coloration was different. Considering how far apart we are, I wonder if its a regional thing. Either way, its a great shot. You are right, the background and simplicity are wonderful. I always love it when I get shots like that. You probably want to put a bit more space on the right... but I'm not positive. It just struck me as a bit tight (something I do too often myself.)

Eric

[Normcar]

Thanks eric, I appreciate your input as always. Hopefully someone will be able to nail the ident on that "Wren" for me.

[geoffs]

Hey, Eric and Eric, help me out here! You would think that that sparrow was perhaps a song sparrow but there are some things about it that bug me:

1. Gray ear patch
2. Gray on the back of the neck
3. Notched tail

It just doesn't seem right but I can't make a match for it to anything else either except perhaps the northern form of the Savannah Sparrow.

Help?

For a reference to Savannah Sparrow, look at these (poor) pictures I posted the other day:

http://www.stevesforums.com/forums/v...mp;forum_id=11