Northern Cardinal

Every time I go photograph birds at the Pedernales Falls State Park bird blind I tell myself that I’m no longer going to photograph Northern Cardinals. The Northern Cardinal is one of the most abundant birds at the blind and I must have taken hundreds of photos of them. But, almost every time, I come home with more. That said, I ran across this image while I was processing my photos from my last visit and I really liked it. So, here is yet another Northern Cardinal for your viewing pleasure.

I have said a lot about these birds in previous posts so I won’t give you more bird details. I will say, however, that depth of field while photographing birds is paramount. I learned this the hard way during one of my recent visits to the bird blind. I was photographing birds at close range (10-15 feet) with my 400mm lens set pm f/8 and I noticed that the bird was not sharp. When I got home and tried to figure out that was wrong I determined that my depth of field was too narrow (about an inch). And, by the way, that’s -0.5 inches and +0.5 inches from the focal point, so, if you focus on the tip of the beak you will only get one half-inch of depth. That’s not very deep for a bird. That’s the great thing about my photography hobby, I’m always learning! Now I photograph them further away or use a shorter focal length.

This image was taken with my Canon EOS 5DS using my Canon EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6 II Lens set on 400mm. The camera was set on Aperture priority mode with the aperture set at f/8, shutter speed at 1/400th of a second and the ISO set at 800. This is a single photograph processed in Lightroom and Nik Color Efex Pro.

You can view my Birds of Texas collection by clicking here. Please use the section below to post your comments, questions, or suggestions.

© 2016 T. Kahler Photography