Out For Some Practice Photographing Local Wildlife

All the subjects photographed in this post were so far away, I had to crop the the images to 100%. (click to enlarge)
Overall, for 100% crops, I think they held up very well, quality-wise—both APS-C and M4/3 formats..
Fujifilm X-T3, 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6 lens @ 400mm + the 1.4x tele-converter for an effective field of view of 840mm.
1/1000th sec. @ f/10; ISO 800
My camera was set for Manual Exposure, Auto ISO, AF-C, 9 Point Zone, 11 FPS, and I used the Electronic Shutter 

The other day I grabbed my Fujifilm X-T3, 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6 lens and 1.4x tele-converter and headed out the door to practice some bird photography.  I'm a big believer in practice, practice, practice.  Think of the great musicians, athletes, actors, etc. and one thing (of many) they have in common is continuous and lengthy practice sessions in their chosen field.

Since purchasing my X-T3 in October after I returned from my western U.S. road trip, I have had almost no opportunity to take it out and put it through its “wildlife” paces.  Yes, I was able to take it out several times but that was just to become more familiar with it and to test out it’s improved features.  The focus tracking is  better in the X-T3 than the X-T2 and I wanted to see if I could Increase my “hit” rate over what I was getting with the X-T2 as well as to better know the camera's capabilities for fast moving subjects.

I drove over to a nearby pond intending to see what birds were present, hoping to be able to try to make some successful images of birds in flight.  When I first arrived, there were only a couple of Great Blue Herons, Great White Egrets and various species of duck in sight.  Nothing of particular interest as all were just sitting or swimming.  I was keeping my eye on this heron (at the top of the post) hoping it would eventually fly, when I noticed it starting to turn and crouch, as they do before they take flight.  As it did, I locked onto it and tracked it across the water until it landed in the distance.  This image was one of several I made.  I liked the extended neck, wings in the full "up" position and the legs hanging free.  Kind of different from a typical shot.  All of the images I made of the heron flying were in focus. Way to go X-T3!

I've posted some other images from that morning.  Along with static birds, such as the Great Blue Heron and the Great White Egret, I saw several species of ducks, gulls, crows, and raptors.  My main problem was the fowl were so far away that I needed to use the tele-converter on all of my images (840mm full frame equivalent field of view) and still had to crop in significantly.  There were no birds as close as I would have liked if this were a real photo outing and not a practice session.

Fujifilm X-T3, 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6 lens @ 400mm + the 1.4x tele-converter for an effective FF field of view of 840mm.
1/1000th sec. @ f/10; ISO 640

Fujifilm X-T3, 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6 lens @ 400mm + the 1.4x tele-converter for an effective FF field of view of 840mm.
1/1000th sec. @ f/10; ISO 1600 (click to enlarge)

Also, I tried out and used the "Pre-Shot" function in the X-T3 which, upon half-press of the shutter, buffers about 9-10 images in-camera, then writes them onto the memory card when the shutter is fully pressed.  The beauty of this feature is that as you are waiting for peak action, say the instant a bird takes flight or the instant a bat hits a ball, you keep you finger half-pressed on the shutter before the peak action, then fully press the shutter when the peak action occurs.  You will have about one second worth of images before the peak action and will also have captured that peak moment as the bird is just spreading its wings and flying or as the bat touches the ball.  Those images have already been buffered in-camera and you can capture peak action even if your reflexes are slow.  My E-M1 Mark II also has this feature and I have found it very nice to use.  If my reflexes and patience were that of a young man, I may not need it, but with age comes slower reflexes and missed peak action.  Thanks, Fujifilm.  However, I would now ask you to give us a bit more flexibility and configurability with this feature as has Olympus in their implementation of it.

As I was watching the various birds perched on branches, out of the corner of my eye came this majestic raptor! (below)  This male Bald Eagle was flying left to right about 400 ft. above the pond, flew past me pretty quickly, circled around and made one more pass before leaving.  I instinctively pointed the camera up at the eagle, (try finding something in the viewfinder quickly with a FOV of 840mm!) put the 9 focusing spots on the bird the best I could, panned with it and shot a number of images.  These, too, shown here are 100% crops.  1/1000th sec. @ f/8; ISO 160.  The shutter speed is slower than I would normally set it for flying birds (1/1600th to 1/2000th sec. is what I normally use), but there was no time to change it.  About half the eagle images were sharp.  I'm surprised, as fast as the bird was moving, that I was able to capture any well.

When looking at the original images at 200%, I identified this a being a male as the mouth terminates at the front of the eye and the eye has a small black ring around it.  Female Bald Eagles' mouths terminate at the back of the eye and don't have the black ring.  They are also about 1/3 larger than males.

My plan was to go back the next day but that day brought rain and wind.  Two days later, after the rain and wind cleared out, I went back to the same spot.  This time I took my Olympus E-M1 Mark II and attached the Olympus 300mm f/4 PRO lens and the 1.4x tele-converter.  Same 840mm full frame field of view.  Again, I practiced with stationary as well as flying waterfowl.  Here are a few images from that day.  Sadly, no Bald Eagle!

These last four images are also a 100% crop using my Olympus E-M1 Mark II with the
300mm f/4 PRO lens + 1.4x tele-converter;  Manual exposure, Auto ISO, 11 FPS, C-AF, 9 zone
focusing; 1/800th sec. @ f/8; ISO 800 (click to enlarge)

1/1600th sec. @ f/8; ISO 400 (click to enlarge)

1/250th sec. @ f/8; ISO 250 (click to enlarge)

1/1000th sec. @ f/8; ISO 800 (click to enlarge)

None of these images are anything but ordinary, but I need the practice and I enjoy photography of all sorts.  It feels good just to get out with a camera in hand.  Luckily, I live near a lot of water, wetlands, rivers, ponds, etc. and there are a wide variety of birds on which to practice.  Last spring, I saw eight ospreys feeding in the same small area!  I'm hoping they will be back this spring.

I'm not ready yet to compare one of these systems against the other.  I have to use them more in similar situations to get a better feel which is better for this type of photography.  These two outings when I used both of these camera systems were really not long enough or demanding enough to give me a feeling as to which does better and which I prefer.  If things work out, I'm hoping to get over to Virginia's Eastern Shore to photograph some wildlife sometime this month as I missed my annual outing in November.

One last thing.  With certain settings, there is no viewfinder blackout with the X-T3 so tracking a moving bird or other object is very easy now.  In previous cameras, tracking was more difficult as the viewfinder blackout always kept you seeing what just happened and not what was happening now.

I'm happy to say, I'm pretty pleased with both the X-T3 and the E-M1 Mark II.  For a guy like me who is NOT an accomplished wildlife photographer, I brought back some satisfying, albeit ordinary, images.  In my view, its all good!

Join me over at Instagram @dennisamook or my website, www.dennismook.com. 

Thanks for looking. Enjoy! 

Dennis A. Mook 

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