This month we will be discussing flight photography. Traditionally, it has been a very challenging area of photography due to the high speed of the subject. Modern autofocus cameras however, have reduced the difficulty of capturing these images considerably. We will discuss a few techniques that will apply equally well to those with autofocus or manual focus systems. As usual we will go over some technical information first.

Telephoto lenses in the range of 300mmf4 - 400mmf5.6 are ideal lenses for flight photography due to their lightweight and power. Generally, shorter lenses than 300mm will not be powerful enough and those longer than 400mm, will either be too heavy or difficult to aim due to their field of view. A motor drive is essential as flight photography will have a high "trash bin" percentage and likely only a few frames will be worth keeping. Firing a series of shots will increase your odds of getting a few keepers as not only must you get sharp photos, but also wing position will have a bearing on esthetics.

If your camera system is manual focus, you will need a lot of practice to gain the skill necessary to capture birds in flight. Generally, there are two schools of thought on using manual focus for flight photography. The first involves pre-focussing the lens at the distance you want to take the photo. This distance is decided by following the subject a few times to determine the best image size and distance. About 1/3 of the frame will give a pleasing image. For this technique to be successful, the subjects flight path must be fairly predictable. Once the bird begins flying, you follow it with the lens out of focus, and once the bird just begins to come into focus, you fire the motor drive. The idea being, that by the time the shutter is released, the bird will have flown into the plane of focus. Obviously, this is a bit of a crapshoot!

The second method is to try and keep the subject in focus continuously as it approaches, and fire at will. This is difficult to do, but practicing on fast moving cars, etc. will help in gaining the skill.

The last technical item is that of shutter speeds. For a typical large bird such as a heron or gull, to freeze the motion you will need at least 1/250 of a second shutter speed. (Wing tips may still be blurred) Higher shutter speeds are required for a couple of reasons. The first is simply to stop the motion of the bird, and the second is to stop the erratic movements of you, the photographer.

Since our subject is moving and we are also moving, getting a sharp image can be a problem. One way to deal with this is to minimize erratic movements by the photographer. There are a few ways of doing this. When releasing the shutter it is important to continue panning and not to stop once the shutter has been released. This follow through will make the process smoother and produce sharper images than if you stop panning once the shutter button has been pressed.

Tuck your elbows snugly against your body with the camera pressed firmly against your face and swivel from the waist.

Shoulder or gunstocks are special mounts that rest against your shoulder to simulate holding a rifle. They help with aiming and steadying your equipment.

Even the with autofocus cameras, the aforementioned techniques are still necessary for optimum results. Autofocus cameras will however, do the focussing for you and give a higher percentage of acceptable photographs. Some autofocus lenses have a useful feature called "Limiter" switches. These will decrease focus searching by confining the focus to a pre-determined range. For example, if you know the subject will be too small beyond 10 meters, you could limit the range to this distance or less. Therefore the camera will not waste time trying to acquire focus beyond this range.

Image stabilized lenses now exist that will iron out some of the erratic camera movements and produce better results than non-stabilized lenses. Currently, only Canon and Nikon have such technology.

In summary, flight photography is a challenging and exciting area of bird photography to explore. Remember to stabilize your equipment, follow through and try to be as smooth with your movements as possible. Next month we will discuss photography ethics.

Northern Gannet, Bonaventure Island, Quebec. Manually focused using a Nikon F90, 300mmf4 plus 1.4x (420mmf5.6). In this photograph, the photographer waited until the bird was perpendicular to him. By doing this the distance is changing the least and therefore easier to focus and shoot as you are not having to make large adjustments quickly.

Black-crowned Night Heron, Venice, Florida. Autofocused using a Nikon F5, 600mmf4 plus 1.4x.(840mmf5.6) This photograph demonstrates two things. The first is the importance of taking several frames when doing flight photography. Here the wings are nicely extended at the top of their stroke. The photographs preceding and afterwards do not have as pleasing a position. The second is subject placement using the Rule of Thirds from Tips#12.

Great Blue Heron, Venice , Florida. Autofocused using a Nikon F5, 600mmf4 plus 1.4x. (840mmf5.6) Once again the benefits of autofocus are demonstrated here. The bird was tracked as it approached its nest and a series of frames taken as it landed. Modern autofocus cameras have "Predictive focus" which will calculate where the subject will be when the shutter opens. Once you release the shutter, the camera will continue to autofocus the lens so that perfectly focussed photographs are possible even though a subject is changing distance rapidly.