Torresian Imperial Pigeon

[Ironwood]

Been a few of these guys hanging around my trees lately, I shot these a few days ago, but only had a chance to look at them today.

I used the better beamer again, I think this is helping keep my iso down to a reasonable level and the resulting pics look a lot cleaner.

D7100, Tamron 150-600 @600mm, f8, 1/750th, iso400




@360mm

[avkomp]

not seen on of these, so thanks for showing. strong shadow probably doesnt do these any favours. not sure the beamer is doing the job. I can see hints of flash but you should be able to get them lit up light daylight if you want. I notice exif says 1/750 sec, do you have fp mode enabled on the flash? if not nikon flashes decrease pretty quickly in range as you go up in shutter speed.
seems contra indicitive, but it uses a smoke and mirrors thing to get high speed sync, it rapidly flashes and gets sync that way. this uses power and reduces the range big time.
if you can get the shutter speed down to a native sync speed, you get greater range.
in this example I reckon the sky is exposed well so 1/750 may well have been the right exposure, but if you dropped to 200 iso, you get 1/350 ish and the sky still be exposed right
but the flash would have more range. doesnt make sense on the strength of using higher iso seems like that you would be more sensitive and go further, but the higher shutter speed does kill flash range. I couldnt believe it when I first got my sb800 so I set out to test it and prove it. interestingly enough, you can look at the flash distance on the back of the flash and watch it reduce as shutter speed increases.

[Ironwood]

Cheers Stephen. I am well and truly still in the learning stages with this thing, so I am trying all sorts of things to see what works and what doesn't.
I am using a Yongnuo flash, it doesn't have an fp mode, I have it set on HSS (this may be the same thing not sure).
I am sure I could have gotten better photos of these birds if I had more experience under my belt, but I am happy with them all the same as they are better than what I would have expected to get without the beamer/flash.
In the 3rd pic, I think the flash has had more effect because I am closer to the birds than the first 2 pics.
I went back out this afternoon to try again with some different settings as you have suggested, alas I saw not one bird in shooting range.
Though I did get a Turtle .
600mm, f8, 1/250th, iso200.

[Galah]

The Tamron is not the best wide open but I have got some good shots wide open when I had to, also the VR (equivalent) is quite good for slow shutter speeds and the D7100 is more than usable at ISO 1600 and higher, especially for a white bird (though I'm someone who doesn't mind a bit of noise and have little time or interest in doing much post processing). So I reckon you could have done well with the pigeon without the flash Looks good anyway. I just definitely prefer not to use flash as there's nothing like a natural look.

[avkomp]

the turtle looks like the flash got there.
not familiar with the flash you mention but hss might mean high speed sync. on my cameras you had to turn on in camera also. was in e1 maybe 1/320 or 1/250 (auto FP)
not sure you get hss if the camera doesnt tell the flash to do so, at least with nikon speedlights. the auto FP thingy needs to be selected though.
I still think it would be worth finding a wall or something and use say 80mm or so on the lens and get a feel for what the flash is projecting at different ranges and zoom sizes. I found it very useful to me. we learned exactly what was going on in controlled conditions. after you know that, you mostly there I reckon

[wigz]

I prefer a fairly subtle use of the flash, using it as fill rather than overpowering natural light, if possible. The third one looks a pretty good balance to me. If it's really dark though you don't have a choice.

[Ironwood]

A little background why I am trialling the flash/beamer.
Where I live, it is a rare occasion that I will get to shoot a bird in good light, I live in a heavily treed property.My only opportunity to go out with the camera is in the afternoons, mostly when the sun has already gone behind the hill ( I live in a valley ) the sky is still bright, but I am in shadow.
So far I have been trying to handhold at 600mm, 1/250th or 1/500 , f6.3 and iso3200 and still underexposing. The D7100 is not exactly a lowlight queen, so most of my shots get deleted without a second look.
For $60, I thought this beamer thing is worth a try, I can see it has potential, but will need some fine tuning of my techniques. It will take me a while because my opportunities are very brief as I work 7 days and have a large property to maintain ( and I have other hobbies as well )

If I can win the Powerball on Thursday night I will buy a Nikon D5 and a 600mm f2.8, then I might be able to throw the beamer in the cupboard

[wigz]

You are probably aware of this, but be don't leave the beamer on the flash in the sun. I was chatting to another photographer a couple of years ago who had a better beamer, and he showed me the partially melted plastic casing on his flash. The beamer had done a good job of focusing the sun onto the flash. The flash was still usable but looked a bit ugly.

[Ironwood]

Yes, I have read some stories online when I was researching. But thanks for the warning.