Fight or Flight (hummer-pics)

[Uncle Frank]

When you startle a small animal, it generally turns tail and flees. Not so with a dominant male hummingbird. Despite his diminutive size,
this Fearless Flier turned to face me when the flash went off. As a result, I was able these, as the second and third shots in the series.

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[MontyDog]

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[DiverX]

Sweet shots Frank!!

 

[hillrg]

Excellent shots Frank. How much of a crop?

 

[Uncle Frank]

Pretty deep, Rory. These beasties are very tiny, and even at the 80-200's full zoom and minimum focus distance, you need to crop out over half the frame.

 

[Flew]

Gee, I wish I could get some this good. Someday (maybe ;-)).

 

[greyflash]

UF, these are super images and the last one is definitely showing an attitude. Your DOF is really super in these images. Nice work.

 

[FlyingFlowers]

Awesome!!! I love the second one.

 

[sbuttrick]

Nice images Frank. I'm still trying to get Hummer shots that look at good as yours. Maybe I should have picked a different bird, like chickens, they're a little bigger and don't move so darn fast.

 

[Thos Quinn]

As always, great hummer shots Frank. I’ve had an interesting phenomenon with hummers around my feeder when using iTTL mode flash (without using FV lock) especially at dusk. These little guys have quite the reflexes! They react (sometimes severely) to the preflash and the resulting shots show hummers in the darndest positions (upside-down, etc.). I’m thinking of making a composite of hummer “acrobats”.

 

[Uncle Frank]

As always, great hummer shots Frank. I’ve had an interesting phenomenon with hummers around my feeder when using iTTL mode flash (without using FV lock) especially at dusk. These little guys have quite the reflexes! They react (sometimes severely) to the preflash and the resulting shots show hummers in the darndest positions (upside-down, etc.). I’m thinking of making a composite of hummer “acrobats”.

That'll be fun!

I find ittl useless for hummer pics, because they're such a tiny part of the frame, and don't reflect back enough light to turn off the flash. I find I get much better exposures using the distance (GN) mode, , which has no preflash. That works better with the slave flashes, too, as they like to trigger on the first light pulse.

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[Kevin Scott]

Beautiful shots!

 

[PhotoByMark]

Very cool shots.

I have noticed that when I go and sit outside they will just fly up and check me out. However, it seems when I try to do the same with camera in hand then they tend to not do it as much. For there size they are pretty brave little birds and I guess curious too.

 

[alanglazier]

These are fantastic. Thanks for sharing.

So you are using a 3 flash setup?

Alan