A new take on BIF
- Thread starter Chisox2335
- Start date
ahab1372 said:
The one I was trying to get was flying so erratically it was very difficult to even get this picture. I suppose a 400mm f2.8 on a 1dx might do the trick.
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If you can't keep them in the viewfinder, a 1DX won't help eitherChisox2335 said:
One way to get them into a more predictable flight pattern is (sometimes) to throw a small stone high up in the air when they are near. If they pick up the echo of the stone, they might follow the stone as it falls back to the ground. You still gotta be quick though
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Hi Chisox.
Interesting idea for a thread, but I think I'll stick to birds for a while, at least until I can get a nice picture of a bird!
Cheers Graham.
Interesting idea for a thread, but I think I'll stick to birds for a while, at least until I can get a nice picture of a bird!
Cheers Graham.
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Congrats on getting the shot. Couldn't have been easy. I've seen Bat in Flight shots in video before, but usually they are well lit with artificial lighting.
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Another good place to get pictures of bats is by water. Bats skim long ponds to drink, If you have such a pond (natural or artificial) in your area that allows good bat access, that might be a good place to wait.
You guys are lucky to have bats in your area. Sadly, in my area bats are becoming a rairity. :'(
You guys are lucky to have bats in your area. Sadly, in my area bats are becoming a rairity. :'(
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Hillsilly said:
Hmm. Forgive me...because my analytical mind just has to make sure here...but...why does the bat have a close, dark, sharply refined "drop" shadow? Isn't it the sky behind it...at....a very, very, very great distance that wouldn't actually allow a sharply defined shadow so close to the creature.......if it allowed a shadow to show up at all..................?
...I just hate to say it....but...without a VERY good explanation of the shadow....I'm calling bull! :
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It was shot at 1/160s with rear shutter curtain synch. The rear drop shadow is the movement of the flying fox before the flash kicked in. But that's the sort of problems I'm trying to work around. If I shoot at faster speeds, I can avoid this, but then I lose detail in the sky and if I shoot faster that 1/250s then I'm also stuck with HSS, and the bats are too far away for this to work effectively with the gear that I have. To counter that, I can increase ISO and decrease flash power, but increasing ISO results in more noise. Its hard to get the balance right.
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Hillsilly said:
Hmm. I guess that's a plausible explanation. Based on the actual offset of the shadow, it was moving at a vector of about 120° then...as the shadow is not directly behind, it's offset to a about a -35° angle. That seems a little odd...but, eh.
I think you could crank the ISO up more. The 1Ds II isn't that bad...it's certainly better than the 7D, despite being older, and the 7D is pretty good up to ISO 800. Also, that is indeed how clear and sharp the bats are after the flash, then that means they are easy to mask. With masking, you could clean the background noise right up! You might even want to look into PixInsight, which has some of the most advanced multi-scale noise reduction tools around, but Photoshop or LR could certainly do it as well, I mean you could completely obliterate the noise once you have the bat masked. If that's the real problem, and that shadow really is caused by flash lag with rear-curtain, then I think you could crank ISO by at least a stop, if not two, and use two stops faster shutter speed.
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