A tale of two photographs

I know I haven't posted this week. That's because I wanted to spend some time on my photography. So here's what I've decided - why don't I post something about my experience this week? I took a couple of photographs this week and I thought I learnt something from each of them. Neither of them are awesome snaps since I kinda took them in trying situations and of course, I'm always learning about the craft. I think though that some of my introspection may be of interest to the at least those of you interested in photography. Let me tell you a bit about each photo.

The new urban raptor

Photo here.
The Shikra or Little Banded Goshawk is a primarily a forest and farmland raptor. It's quite uncommon to see them in urban environs, especially residential areas. However, in recent months Shikras are becoming quite a regular if not common sighting in the city. My theory is that we may be seeing a rise in the number of rodents and the Shikras potentially are attracted to the food source. I'm no biologist though, so I can well be wrong. Now to this photograph. This is a juvenile, who came and sat right next to my balcony when I was sipping on some late evening tea - ready to head out for a run with my dog. I took this photo at f/5.6, 1/50 and ISO 1600. Here are some lessons I learnt:

• You never know when your next photo opportunity will arrive. A state of readiness is quite important. When I saw the bird, I was able to jump into the house, pick up my camera and get out to shoot in 30 seconds. If your camera is not at arms length, you're most likely to rue lost opportunities.
• Your camera is a great feedback tool. I was initially set to shoot at ISO 400. In fading light, that led to a really impossible shutter speed for hand-holding my 100-400mm lens. I kept looking through the viewfinder to adjust the ISO to a point where I was able to finally get a manageable shutter speed.
• Your subject deserves proper attention. While you could say this is a satisfactory shot, I actually missed a really good shot. I saw the bird fidgeting and I thought I should change the camera orientation to get a frame filling portrait. In the split second that I was trying to compose a length shot, the Shikra exposed it's beautiful belly markings, spread it's wings and took off. Had I not bothered about the new orientation, and tried to read the bird's body language, I would have had a much better shot to show you. Sometimes composition can be secondary to understanding your subject. Post processing can often help with composition, especially in nature photography.
• Calmness is a great virtue. I think I got too excited to see a Shikra at such close range in my colony. As a result I wasn't breathing right, I wasn't thinking clearly and I didn't balance myself well. If you blow up the image, you'll notice that there's a bit of blur and it's not really the nicest picture. Photography is like a sport - you need to have the right stance, you need to breathe normally and balance your posture. The clearer your thought process, the better you capture your subject (or so I guess).

The lovable neighbourhood owl

Photo here.
The Barn Owl is probably one of the most common species of owls across the world. Extremely social birds, these are mostly nocturnal and I can't ever remember seeing them in the day. They have little fear of humans and often make their homes in apartment complexes, roofs of mansions, tree hollows and of course, barns. I have a family of five owls staying on top of the last house in my lane. I see them every night, but they tend to stay in the shadows and my attempts at photographing them have generally been quite bad. This time however, I saw this guy when running with my dog. He was sitting on the tree opposite the house and the street light was illuminating the scene partially. I ran back home, picked up my camera and kept praying all this while that he'd still be sitting in the same place when I got back. Here are a few of things I learnt from this photo:

• The onboard flash isn't a bad tool at some times. Now this isn't a great photo, but it's good enough for me to help people recognise the bird. The light was poor, I don't own any other lighting - shining a flashlight would have just made the bird fly away. I had to make a compromise and use the flash. At the end of the day, it's what saved the picture and at least I have something to tell a story around.
• Manual focus is not scary. Autofocussing in that light was a nightmare. When there's no contrast with visible light in the scene, cameras struggle to autofocus on the right subject. I turned that off and manually locked onto this guy. The advantage was that I not only could get my focus spot on, I could also lock it in and shoot in a burst. Other situations where I've found this useful is where I'm really treading the line of minimum focussing distance - auto focus can sometimes go right through the subject. Manual focus comes in real handy in those spots as well.
• Knowing the photo you want helps in a big way. I knew I had no photos of the barn owl to show anyone, so I've been looking out for opportunities everyday. My gear is always in the living room, so I can always get it quickly and shoot. Every day when I get back home, when I leave for work, when I run my dog, I look for these guys. Whenever the opportunity presents itself I know I'll be out there shooting. I still don't have quite the picture I want, but I know that if I stay focussed I can get there at some point.

---

I usually don't post much about photography since I'm so much a learner at this - but these photos are such great learning moments for me that I just couldn't help sharing my thoughts. Hope they made sense - do let me know what you think.