An Introduction to Bird photography

An Introduction to Bird photography
A Guest Post by Lithuanian Photographer Tadas Naujokaitis.

Birds are very interesting creatures, but it’s not so easy to photograph them. Wild birds usually don’t pose where you want and, moreover, it’s often difficult to get close enough to take quality pictures. But if you know some basics of bird photography, it becomes much easier to capture amazing moments of the birds’ life.

Equipment
It’s not necessary to have an expensive camera of lens, however the proper equipment lets to take bird photos easier.

Lens
Most birds are quite shy, so you need at least 200mm (300mm is better) to take pictures of them. Longer focal length not only lets to photograph birds from larger distance, it also gives more blurred background. However more millimeters (or larger aperture) means more expensive, larger and heavier lens. Knowing all that, I think that 400mm f/5.6 lens is the best, if you want to have as much millimeters as possible, not too small aperture and still want to be mobile. Of course, you can make magnificent bird images with 100mm or less, just you should find more courageous birds or compose them to landscape.

Camera
In bird photography, almost all DSLR’s will make a good job. However, if you’re planning to photograph birds in flight, pay attention to fps (frames per second), high ISO results and AF (autofocus) system’s accuracy. If you don’t have a DSLR camera, then bird photography becomes a bit more difficult (especially due to slow AF), but don’t give up – a good photographer, I believe, will make better bird photos with mobile phone than a poor one with the most expensive equipment.

Tripod, monopod, flash, even remote control sometimes help much, but usually aren’t necessary.