My camera equipment is not typically used for wildlife photography. Among the several reasons is manual-focus lenses. So, the question one might ask is how do you get a sharp focus on a bouncing hummingbird, with the lens wide open, having a depth of field of just a couple of centimetres? Answering fast fingers would not be too credible.
First, I knew approximately where the bird would hover (above the hole which dispenses sugar), so I focused on that point. Then, when a bird arrived, I shot in “continuous mode”, meaning the shutter was triggered several time per second. Next, as the shutter clicked away, I swayed my body back and forth ever so slightly to change the point in focus. Finally, I spent hours in Lightroom looking for images that were in focus. There were a couple.
Leave a Reply