The one thing to keep in mind when photographing birds like Herons and Egrets is while they are perched or moving while looking for food is that the bodies are somewhat tall but not wide until the go into flight they have a large wingspan and the birds stretch so parts of the bird may be out of the frame.

I joined 3 different birding groups since January and it’s been great!

Great video and practical advice for us new birders ! Beautiful pics !!

As you quickly found out, Small Obscure Birds are real SOB's to photography.

Hi, first time seeing one of your vids and found it very informative, especially the shutter speed, I tend to only go to a max of 1/2000 no matter the bird size bug thing I will try tne higher speeds and see how it goes. I'm glad you enjoyed watching the chicks grow up, isng it fascinating! For the past two years I've been watching and recording a family of swans and love how they get from these little balls of feathers into massive swans! I have also subscribed.

Its funny, I actually sort of felt the opposite for lesson 1. Bigger birds are harder to make good images of. Not because of the movement, it definitely takes more agility to capture smaller birds, but for three specific reasons: 1) Small birds are way easier to find, for every Heron or Eagle I see, I encounter hundreds or thousands of small songbirds so you just get way more opportunities to practice on them. 2) They are way more tolerant of humans. No bird is going to be brave, but I find small songbirds will happily land close to you if you are quiet and still. An eagle will NEVER do that. I find its WAY easier to fill the frame with a small bird than it is a big bird, even when at like 500mm just because the big birds are so much more timid. You will also find the big birds tend to always face "away" when they know a human is around, not always, but its super common for an Eagle or an Osprey to always be facing in the direction of escape which is away from you. 3) Its way easier to cream out the background with a small bird and create a pleasant composition in an otherwise unpleasant scene. I have yet to ever take a shot I like of a Great Blue Heron because those guys always like to stand right near shore beside tons of distracting twiggs, branches, etc. It may be easier to get the big birds, sharp, in frame, but its way harder to take gorgeous shots of them. (And unless you are walking around with a $20,000 exotic, it ca be really difficult to leverage depth of field). After years of trying I FINALLY managed to make a shot of a swan that I liked last winter after spending 4 hours lying on the ice freezing waiting for them to finally float into a composition I liked.

Personally, my best advice for people looking to have a breakthrough for bird photography is to get a canoe. It may seem like an odd recommendation but for whatever reason most birds are WAY more tolerant of a human in a canoe or kayak than they are of one walking. (I think the shape confuses them and they just don't see it as a threat but idk) You will find you can get way closer to subjects from the water and since most birds tend to prefer wetlands the canoe usually works quite well. :)

Great video! :)

Great tips, and I like the humility you demonstrate by emphasizing your journey as a beginner. Unfortunately (but maybe fortunately) my birding has had to start with hummingbirds. Ultra small, ultra fast, and I have encountered wing blur even at 1/5000 of a second! Amazed me! But to your point about learning their habits, I have learned some useful things in the last year that has allowed me to get some decent shots of BIF and of them fighting for territory with each other. Cheers!

Going out with a bird group is a great idea! Thanks 🙏

Your tips are so useful for Beginners like me keep motivating thankyou so much

Thank you so much

This was so helpful!

Great video, Kate. I'm about 4 months into bird photography so can relate to your challenge. I live in Charleston and go out weekly, usually to Magnolia or the Greenway, and have gotten some incredible shots even in my short bird career. I think it's important for new bird photographers to understand, the quality and type of equipment does matter unfortunately. You need something like a 200-800 zoom or a smaller telephoto zoom possibly with an extender. Birds are hard to get close to! Also, a full frame mirrorless with a good resolution really helps as you will be cropping to get those dramatic bird portraits. Lastly, golden light and the sun at your back are really important for the best results and for keeping the ISO lower. With the unwritten bird "rule" that the eye be clear, backlit shots are very challenging to get right. My best back lit shots are when the bird turns it's head into the light but it's body stays back lit. Then you get the best of both world's.

Excellent advice and inspiring!

Great Video Kate 👍

If you want to photograph a lot of small birds make a trip to Magee Marsh in northwestern Ohio during May. The birds stop over there to eat and store up energy before they fly across Lake Erie.

Auto ISO in manual is also important.

Great tips.  I usually shoot at 1/2000 but I will definitely give the higher speeds a try.

Another useful tip, if you have a garden, at least 1 or more bird baths of feeder stations will provide many more opportunities to shoot small fast birds! nice video thanks..

I had to relearn focussing coming from my Canon 7D & 1D3 to my R7. I really struggled at first. Setting the viewfinder to the fast update rate was key, and then I had to understand how to use the subject detection vs zone focus and when to activate tracking or not. All this is controlled by customising buttons. Now it is easy as can be. But it is a totally different approach than what I used before. With the dslr , I aimed and started focusing. With the mirrorless, I get the bird in the viewfinder and the camera identifies the bird and focusses, or I override that by using a button to tell it to focus where I am aiming and forget about trying to identify the subject. Once I adjusted to this, birds in flight was back on the menu and I now rarely miss. I love it. Doesn’t do anything for my crappy compositions unfortunately!

Nice video you did a great job