The Eagle Has Landed

[MSDawg870]

I like the one with the Eagles head down like she's praying for our country or something symbolic like that. Nice pics Robert

Yal ever seen this pic?
http://www.prayingeagles.com/

[Bullet]

Maybe she's baptist, our nation's bird can pray with her eyes open if she wants to.

Anyway thanks for ruining my moment, I tell ya some people. Hail Muhammed then , hows dat

[Bullet]

I like the one with the Eagles head down like she's praying for our country or something symbolic like that. Nice pics Robert

Yal ever seen this pic?
http://www.prayingeagles.com/

Yea i had seen it before thats what made me think bout this one doing the same thing but Rob says she's not cause her eyes are open. Them other eagles eyes were open and you can even read the prayer they were praying. Pretty amazing that he took the pic the day before we went to war, if in fact thats true

[Wingman]

Them other eagles eyes were open and you can even read the prayer they were praying.

Joe Ward was right; you are an idiot.

Okay, so maybe she was praying, but with her eyes open, kinda like people do when they're driving or flying or using a skilsaw.

[pitboss]

AWSOME!!!

jeff

[Bullet]

He called ME an idiot. Im at a loss, heartbroken

[shelbydanieldotsmugmugdot]

Great pics.

For anyone who doesn't know about him, Art Morris is THE authority on Birds in flight photos, or any type of birding photos. Granted, he's a Canon sponsored photog who uses a 1DsMKIII and a 600 mm lens, but you can learn all there is to know about shooting birds from this guy.

http://www.birdsasart.com/

You can sign up for his email newlsetters for free, and they are quite informative.

Wingman, you may have already said, but how close can you get to this eagle, and in what county are you in shooting it? If you want somebody to come shoot some pics with you one morning or afternoon, I'd be interested. Longest lens I have is a 300 2.8 with a 1.4 converter (roughly 500 mm @ f4 with my mark2), so I'm not sure if thats enough reach. I've never shot eagles before....

As for the flight shots, try this:

1. Set your shooting mode to continuous, so that you can hold down the shutter button to continue to take images with your camera’s burst mode.
2. Set your burst speed to the fastest possible, so that you can take the most amounts of images in the least possible time.
3. Set your auto focus mode to AI Servo AF. AI Servo AF will let you lock focus on your target and then continue to focus as the subject moves toward or away from the camera while depressing the shutter button half-way.
4. Set your dial to AV (aperture priority). Setting your camera to AV mode will help ensure that you have enough depth of field to get the whole bird in focus.
5. Set your aperture to 8.0. An aperture of 8.0 is a good balance between getting the entire subject in focus and maintaining a fast enough shutter speed on a sunny day. You may want to shoot wide open on cloudy days or if the background is dark.
6. Set your ISO to as high as necessary to achieve a shutter speed of at least 1/1000s. Generally you’ll want to freeze the bird in flight and you’ll probably be handholding the camera and lens, so a shutter speed of 1/1000s makes a good compromise.
7. Set your camera’s auto focus selection point (AF point) to the center AF point only. By using the center AF point only, you will more likely be able to keep the focus on the moving bird rather then having it lock to the changing background as you pan across your view. I think Art Morris recommends shooting with all the points, so you may want to try both. For anything moving, the center point works best for me usually.

~Shelby

[Wingman]

Thanks for the tips, Shelby! I could only take you as far as the public road. The landowner doesn't want many people on his place.

I was shown another nest Friday, about 4 miles north of this one. Went out there today and the female flew when I got about 10 yards from the truck. I was still about 500 yards from the nest. Really skiddish birds in this 2nd nest.

[Bankermane]

Great pics.

For anyone who doesn't know about him, Art Morris is THE authority on Birds in flight photos, or any type of birding photos. Granted, he's a Canon sponsored photog who uses a 1DsMKIII and a 600 mm lens, but you can learn all there is to know about shooting birds from this guy.

http://www.birdsasart.com/

You can sign up for his email newlsetters for free, and they are quite informative.

Wingman, you may have already said, but how close can you get to this eagle, and in what county are you in shooting it? If you want somebody to come shoot some pics with you one morning or afternoon, I'd be interested. Longest lens I have is a 300 2.8 with a 1.4 converter (roughly 500 mm @ f4 with my mark2), so I'm not sure if thats enough reach. I've never shot eagles before....

As for the flight shots, try this:

1. Set your shooting mode to continuous, so that you can hold down the shutter button to continue to take images with your camera’s burst mode.
2. Set your burst speed to the fastest possible, so that you can take the most amounts of images in the least possible time.
3. Set your auto focus mode to AI Servo AF. AI Servo AF will let you lock focus on your target and then continue to focus as the subject moves toward or away from the camera while depressing the shutter button half-way.
4. Set your dial to AV (aperture priority). Setting your camera to AV mode will help ensure that you have enough depth of field to get the whole bird in focus.
5. Set your aperture to 8.0. An aperture of 8.0 is a good balance between getting the entire subject in focus and maintaining a fast enough shutter speed on a sunny day. You may want to shoot wide open on cloudy days or if the background is dark.
6. Set your ISO to as high as necessary to achieve a shutter speed of at least 1/1000s. Generally you’ll want to freeze the bird in flight and you’ll probably be handholding the camera and lens, so a shutter speed of 1/1000s makes a good compromise.
7. Set your camera’s auto focus selection point (AF point) to the center AF point only. By using the center AF point only, you will more likely be able to keep the focus on the moving bird rather then having it lock to the changing background as you pan across your view. I think Art Morris recommends shooting with all the points, so you may want to try both. For anything moving, the center point works best for me usually.

~Shelby

I agree with most of this. However from that distance I would shoot with the lens wide open and adjust the ISO to get to 1/1000 sec. Just the way I do it.

[MSDawg870]

Rob I found some more eagles. There's two nests on the upper end of Arkabutla down the lake from Coldwater Point. One nest was vacant at the time I went by, the other one had two perched above it in the tree.

Pretty good area for pictures. You can see the nest from the ramp if you look left about a half mile.

I couldn't tell if they were white or black eagles though.

[Wingman]

I knew of one nest up there, it was on the south side down toward the west end...can't think of the name of that ramp, but they closed it off several springs and the eagles didn't nest in it.

We were in the lake one day near that nest and an immature baldie was standing on the bank. He flew up to a tree, hit a limb with his right wing and helicoptered to the ground. He stood there the rest of the day. Pilot wannabe.

[Wingman]

murphy nest 4.jpg

murphy eagle 4.jpg

[shelbydanieldotsmugmugdot]

Nice. Only suggestion is that you could do a little "Digital Fill" in PS and make that harsh head shadow look better.

~Shelby

[Wingman]

Thanks for the tips, but I don't have PS. That photo was one of the best of several dozen and I really wasn't satisfied with it. Zoom lens, no tripod and moving target. Very difficult to get it sharp and the white head was really blowing out the photo in the sun.

How in the world do you take good, sharp photos w/o a tripod while folowing a moving target?

[Gumbo]

thnx for posting these pics not in photobucket so others can see them...