Song Bird Photography Tutorial-How to Photograph Birds Video Lecture | Capture like a Pro: Digital Photography Tutorial - Professional Skills

hi I'm Tony North open for the book
stunning digital photography I'd like to
show you my bird studio now the bird
studio is basically just a place where I
lure
songbirds in so I can take pictures of
them at really close range and this is
the only way I've found to get really
close to these small birds I think when
we think about bird photography we kind
of imagine somebody trekking through the
woods and stalking birds and chasing
them and I spend that first couple of
years of wildlife photography trying to
do that and it just didn't work out as
soon as the bird knows that you're
chasing it it kind of takes off it's
almost like dating in that way a better
way to do it is to bring the birds to
you so you'll see behind me I have a
bird feeder and that's the bait and then
I have a few different places for them
to perch I never take pictures of the
birds on the bird feeder that's not a
good look
instead I set up places for them to land
outside of the bird feeder so they come
in and look at some see but usually rest
in different spots and in a second I'll
show you all the different places I've
set up basically different little
studios so I can get different looks I
have a big cannon 500 millimeter lens
here it's f/4 but you don't need
anything like that the beauty of this is
that you're able to get really close so
you can get away with one of those 75 to
300 millimeter telephoto lenses they can
get really inexpensively if you're
really good at it you'll find that
you're getting so close you can't even
focus and at that point it's time to add
an extension - now an extension tube is
a spacer that goes between the camera
body and the lens so you can see here
that I have a little extension tube that
allows me to focus a little bit closer
than the lens would normally be able to
focus downside to an extension tubes
that prevent you while it's attached
from focusing on infinity so you'll lose
longer distance focusing when I have
this attached I can focus a couple of
feet closer it's enough for me to get to
my bird studio for my desk here but I
can't focus on the trees that are in the
distance so it allows me to extract that
extra detail by getting even closer now
let's step outside and take a look at
the different spots I have set up for
birds this is my bird feeder you'll see
it's a tube style bird feeder it's also
squirrel-proof
this just means that the bottom part
falls down under their weight preventing
them from getting to the food
birds don't weigh enough to pull this
down so they can land here and still
access the food this is just a stick
that I found in my yard I buried it
about a foot into the ground at the
bottom so it's nice and steady and when
birds land here I can take pictures that
you would see in bird books these are
almost anatomical style pictures you can
see that I've stripped off every leaf
and stray branch from this so what I've
presented here is almost a
two-dimensional perch for them different
types of birds like to land on thin
branches or thicker branches some birds
especially nuts hatches and woodpeckers
will prefer to land on the vertical side
of it so they have a variety of
different surfaces they can land on but
the important thing is to strip off all
the stray branches you don't want
anything projecting towards the camera
because you're going to find birds
hiding behind it all the time now you'll
see a more natural environment here
behind me this is a crabapple tree that
I planted and it's been growing for
about a year now and birds land inside
of it and on the edges of it and because
there are so many stray branches here
it's a little bit harder to shoot around
the obstructions however a lot of
different birds won't prefer this type
of branch and they will prefer some
additional protection now when this one
grows crabapples is going to be a really
beautiful environment though this is
going to be ready in a couple of years
I'm really planning ahead and actually
designing a garden around the bird
studio one of the things you'll see a
stock behind me here
Cardinals in particular like to land on
that and though it's a little bit
farther away from my office it creates
just a really beautiful environment so I
hope you'll set up some sort of bird
studio nearby wherever you happen to
hang out having it near my office where
I'm working and on Facebook and
everything else has been a key to it
because I'm there all day you can't go
out and expect to spend 15 minutes doing
something and get a great wildlife shot
you need to put hours and hours in the
more time you put in the better your
pictures are going to be so it's worth
it to make it as simple as possible for
you to take pictures make it convenient
and I promise your pictures will get
better if you like this video click
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more than two
of videos just like this you have any
questions about it you can look me up on
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Tony at North org thanks