There's Still A Light In The House
Slimbridge is a place that I visited several times as a child but, have not been back to in about 20 years. I finally got the chance to revisit, and this time have camera equipment that I could have only dreamed about way back then. I set about taking a million and one photos of its inhabitants, using my 400mm lens as often as possible, while taking a couple of its residents as almost case studies of showing how I could photograph them in various different ways. The first of these selected were the many species of flamingos that seemed to be found dotted throughout the slimbridge reserve.
American Flamingo standing out in the crowd - 400mm F/5.6
Greater Flamingo Head-shot- F/5.6
Greater Flamingo - 400mm F/5.6
For the images above, I was looking to pick out an individual, while showing the colours of the flock behind. This was easier said than done, as the flock moved around in an almost rhythmic sort of dance, and did not keep still for more than a couple of seconds.
Feet - 400mm F/5.6
I also took some time to pick out details of the birds, such as their legs, feet, feathers and bill, as well as the birds interacting with their environment (drinking below). Using the 400mm F/5.6 meant that this was quite easily done even hand held, producing some interesting and striking results.
Drinking Flamingo - 400mm F/5.6
Greater Flamingo full body - 400mm F/5.6
Other Wildfowl at slimbridge did not escape my cameras lens. Below are a few other wild fowl that got a similar treatment to the Flamingos and later swans.
Tufted Duck colour selection - 400mm F/5.6
Teal - 400mm F/5.6
Avocet - 400mm F/5.6
Male Tufted Duck - 400mm F5.6
Red Billed Teal - 400mm F/5.6
Confident Rooke waiting for food - 70-200mm F4
I found myself trying to get shots of some of the birds stretching their wings, which I managed to do with varying degrees of success. I loved the details of the feathers as they take up the whole of the frame, turning a couple of the shots into some of my favorite of the day.
I of course spent a lot of time photographing the enigmatic and always spectacular Swans, with both Mute and the smaller Bewick swans on display around the centre. The only regret I did have from the day was not getting a good enough shot of them taking off and landing. I will have to go back at another time in the year to try and capture this properly….any excuse.
Mute Swan - 400mm F/5.6
Mute Swan - F/5.6
Mute Swan F/5.6
Bewick’s swan pair 400mm F/5.6
Bewick Swan in the reeds - 400mm F/5.6
I also had the opportunity to photograph some of the smaller inhabitants of the reserve, Taking some time to photograph some blue and great tits as they went about their day, bickering and flitting between feeders that had been set out very close to one of the main hides in the reserve. I was able to just sit and snap away, using manual focus to keep the small birds and feeder in focus, while blurring out the background. Again as was the case throughout the day, the 400mm F/5.6 was invaluable, and was used again for these shots. The only main issue was pulling focus as the birds flitted around the feeder.
Blue Tit on feeder - 400mm F/5.6
Great Tit and Blue Tit on feeder - 400mm F/5.6
Three Blue Tits - F/5.6
January as usual also brought grey, gloomy, cold and wet days, so the idea of getting out anywhere to take some photos seemed like a bit of a pipe dream, but luckily I was able to take a couple of trips out aside from Slimbridge. One of these places was Dyrham park:
Dyrham Park - 24-70mm F/2.8 HDR image of 4 images combined
We took a stroll around the grounds and inside the House, with me carrying, and finally getting to use my new, smaller tripod:
Manfrotto Be-free Advanced tripod with ball-head
The reason for this purchase was that I had decided to keep my larger tripod down in Cornwall and have a smaller tripod for use up here in Bristol. The new tripod has really cut down the weight and more importantly bulk that I carry around with me, and this trip was a perfect way to test out this more travel orientated, day to day tripod.
View from gardens - 24-70mm F/2.8 on Manfrotto Befree tripod advanced
I had a stroll off on my own to test out the new tripod and capture a few images like the one above and below of the grounds. The tripod was sturdier than I thought it would be, and held my Canon 5D MKIII plus 24-70mm Lens very well and can fit inside my bag, so maybe the perfect option for being out and about.
Church within the grounds - 24-70mm F/2.8 + tripod
Cock Fight Painting
Fox Pelt Painting
The interior was very dark and dingy, with apparent funding required to add electric lighting. This made getting any half decent images of the interior rather difficult.
Snowdrops with Robin - 24.70mm F2.8 + tripod
Back outside in the grounds of the house, I had set up my tripod with a 2 second timer delay and a nice slow shutter-speed to capture the snowdrops on this grave, when a Robin decided to flutter around in front of me, watching what I was doing. I managed to quickly change the settings to a quicker speed, to capture this image as the Robin sat for a moment in front of me.
Finally, a few shots of Norman who has gone from 85 grams to 232 grams since his arrival in november. He is a lot more confident, and is unphased by the flash I was using to get these close up images below.
Norman - 100mm Macro F/2.8 + Canon speedlite 430 EX ii
Low Key Norman - 100mm Macro F/2.8 + Canon speedlite 430 EX ii
Norman Exploring the flashgun case - 100mm Macro F/2.8 + Canon speedlite 430 EX ii
Tongue out Norman - 100mm Macro F/2.8 + Canon speedlite 430 EX ii
The difficulty with photographing him is he is always on the move, and getting a shot with his tongue out like this take patience as well as a lot of trial and error. In the future I will also look to have more images of him feeding (see below) which is a sight to behold.
Norman feeding - 100mm Macro F/2.8 + Canon speedlite 430 EX ii
FIN
