This picture was shot today evening during heavy rain:

EOS 40D, EF 2.8/100 Macro, tripod, fill flash -2 stops with Speedlite 580EX II

It’s not my best close-up but I like it. If I had stayed at home because of the rain, I would have missed that shot (and several others).

Photographing during the rain is not without problems. I don’t mind if I get wet. I just have to pick proper clothes. But it’s more important to protect the camera and lenses from the rain.
Some rain drops probably won’t damage your camera. My Canon EOS 40D gets wet from time to time without any problems so far. But I don’t leave it out for hours in heavy rain. I always try to protect it. Many lenses from Canon and Nikon are weather sealed, but not all, especially not the cheaper ones. Check the manual of your lens. And most cameras (expect the professional bodies) are not fully weather sealed, either.
The most important thing is to keep the front lens dry. A drop of water won’t ruin your lens, but you will see the drop on your image and that will be ruined (or you will spend some time in Photoshop).

NEVER let water inside your camera when changing the lens. DSLRs are full of electronic stuff. If you get water into them, it might seriously damage the camera.

When I shoot in the rain, I always take an umbrella with me. I hold it over the camera when changing lenses or CF cards or when I am adding an extender. Some people take plastic bags with them and change lenses in there. Pick a method that suits your needs. The only important thing is to keep your camera dry inside.

You can also mount an umbrella on your tripod to protect your gear from the rain. There are several solutions available. See here for an example. Be very careful during wind when mounting an umbrella on your tripod. The wind might knock down the tripod and umbrella and your lens and camera can be ruined.

For some lenses and cameras, there are special water proof covers available, like those here in the Naturescapes.Net store.

Rain offers many possibilities for good photographs. You can include the rain in the image. This works especially when it’s very heavy rain or you can see raindrops falling on water.
Or you could find an animal that’s totally wet because of the rain (works very good with mammals when the fur gets wet).

In the case of the moth above, the rain let the temperatures fall so low that it was to cold for it to fly. So it rested on the flower where I could photograph it easily. During sunny weather, that would have been much more difficult.

You see, with a little preparation, there is no reason why you should stay inside during a little rain the next time you want to go shooting.

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One of the best things you can do to improve your photography (beside practice, practice and practice!) is to participate in forum where you can show your pictures and have a look at the work of others.

In a good forum, you will get feedback on what is good about your shot and what you can improve. And by looking at the work of others and carefully analyzing their shots, you will learn a lot about how good images are made.

Beside image critique, many forums also feature discussions about cameras, lenses, field techniques, Photoshop and more.

Here is a list of some great forums where you can show your shots and see how others do it. The websites mentioned provide more than just a forum. Often you will also find great articles and other useful resources there, sometimes including stores where you can buy a lot of useful items for nature photography like blinds or tripod heads.

Naturescapes.Net
My favorite forum. The quality of the images shown there is very high and many of the top nature photographers can be found there. I’ve learned a lot at Naturescapes.Net.

BirdPhotographers.Net
Another great forum with many famous bird and nature photographers. Despite the name, it’s not only focused on birds but all aspects of nature photography.

Nature Photographers Online Magazine
A great website with many interesting articles and a very good forum.

Juza Nature Photography
A great website with many useful articles about nature photography and a very helpful forum. Currently there are less people at the Juza forum than at Naturescapes.Net or Birdphotographers.Net but the number of members is constantly growing.

Rules for participating in a forum

Be sure to read the rules that apply to all members before posting something at the forum. Often the size of the image is restricted (it doesn’t make sense to post a full resolution 21 megapixel file).

The most important rule is to always be friendly. When you criticize another picture, always do it in a friendly way but still telling the other photographer what he or she could improve the next time.

If you show your pictures and someone tells you how you can improve it, be thankful and not upset. After all, you want to learn something.

Keep in mind that some shots don’t work for all people. You may show a picture that you really like and all your friends like but the other nature photographers don’t consider very good. Accept that. Photography is also a form of art. And art is always perceived differently by different people.

If you changed something in the image with Photoshop (beside sharpening) be sure to tell the other members of the forum.
Also show the basic information about how you took it: Location, camera, lens, f-stop, shutter-speed, ISO, exposure compensation, if you used a hide (blind), etc.
Those information is often very interesting to other photographers and will also help them give you advice.

If you aren’t already a member of one of the forums above, I strongly recommend to join one or more of them. You won’t regret it.

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Butterflies are a favorite subject among many photographers. And with the right equipment and some basic knowledge, everyone can get good butterfly photographs.
In this post, I want to share with you 11 tips about photographing those amazing little creatures.

1. Use a long macro lens

Most butterfly species don’t like it when you approach to closely. Because of this, a macro lens with a longer focal length is better suited for photographing them. A 50mm or 60mm lens is too short. I recommend to use at least a 100mm lens. Better is a macro lens with 180mm or 200mm like the Canon 3.5/180L Macro or the Nikon 4/200 Micro. Another great lens for at least the larger species is a 4/300. If necessary combine it with an extension tube or/and an 1.4 extender.

2. Learn about the biology of the different species

One of the most important tips in nature photography is to learn as much about your subject as possible. Learn in which habitat you can find which species, at what time of the year they fly or what plants they prefer. For example, if you want to photograph a particular species that you think is very beautiful and that occurs only in forests, than it’s pointless to search for the species at the coast.
There are many good books and websites available about butterfly identification and biology. Get a good one for your area.

3. Get up early

In the early morning, many butterflies can be found attached to flowers and other plants where they spend the night. In the early morning when it’s still cold, they normally won’t fly off when you approach them as it is still too cold for their body to warm up. This gives you much more time to compose and make your image. Use a tripod to keep your camera sturdy during exposure, which can often be only 1/15 or longer in the early morning hours. In the early morning, sometimes the butterflies are covered with dew which can make a picture much more interesting.
Sometimes, you can also find butterflies in those positions late in the evening.

EOS 10D, EF 3.5/180L Macro, tripod

4. Move slowly

If you are trying to approach an active butterfly flying from flower to flower, move very slowly to approach it. Try to not block the sun as many species will try to get out of the shadow. Once you are close, stick to slow movements when composing your image. Often, the butterfly will fly off before you get the shot. Be patient and try again.

5. Use a (prepared) perch and wait for the butterfly

Another way instead of that mentioned in point 4 is to pick a flower that is visited again and again by butterflies and setup your tripod and camera there. Then stay still and wait until the next butterfly lands. It’s good to use a cable release, so you don’t have to look through the viewfinder all the time. You could also take some flowers from your garden and set up at a good location with many butterflies.
Be sure to pick flowers that are visited by the species you want to photograph. Otherwise you will wait a long time without any butterfly ever landing.

6. Pay attention to the background

The background is very important. Make sure you get a calm background that has no distracting elements like bright flowers or stems of other plants. A longer focal length helps to get a calm background. Use the depth of field preview button of your camera to check the background.

7. Position your camera parallel to the butterfly

This is not always easy, but try to position your camera as parallel as possible to the butterfly so all of the wings is sharp.

EOS 40D, EF 3.5/180L Macro, tripod

8. Check if fill-flash can improve your picture

When photographing butterflies during midday when there is harsh sunlight, think about using a flash to reduce the contrast. Fill-Flash can also help in the morning or on overcast days when you want to get brighter colors. If possible make images with and without flash, so you can later see what works best. Often both approaches give you great images.

9. Don’t damage any butterflies or flowers

Don’t do anything that could harm the butterfly or flowers on which they perch. Don’t take pictures in the middle of a meadow where you would destroy many flowers just to get one good butterfly shot. Photograph only from trails are where you don’t harm anything.
In some books, you can read to put insects in the fridge for a while so they don’t move and you can photograph them. Don’t do that!
The animals and plants always come first in nature photography.

10. Create a butterfly friendly garden

If you have a garden, think about making it more butterfly friendly. Plant native flowers and trees, don’t use pesticides and leave some parts of your garden “wild”. Ask your local nature conservation society about what you can do to improve your garden as a butterfly habitat.
This will help you to attract various species to your garden where you can photograph them whenever you have time. And it will also do something good for their conservation.

11. Help to protect butterflies

Although this last tip is not about photography, if you want to ensure that there are butterflies to photograph in the next years and decades, try to join a conservation organization that helps butterflies. Many species are endangered and we all should work together to ensure their survival.

I hope those tips are helpful and I wish you as much fun photographing butterflies as I have.

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Bird photography is fascinating. You work with some of the most amazing creatures on our planet. In order to get good pictures, you need a good telephoto lens, often with a long focal lenght like 400 or 600mm. Sometimes a smaller lens like a 70-200 is enough.

The following list describes the various options you have when choosing a lens for bird photography.

70-200mm

This is a popular zoom range. Nikon offers a 2.8/70-200 VR. Canon offers a 2.8/70-200 IS, a 4/70-200 without IS and a 4/70-200 with IS (which I use). VR stands for “vibration reduction” and IS for “image stabilization” and describes a technique to reduce the vibration of the lens when hand holding it or even when on a tripod (some older lenses don’t support IS on a tripod). The 70-200 lenses are too short for most bird pictures, but can be handy if you want to photograph a landscape with birds in it. In same places, for example in some bird colonies at the coast or in parks, birds can be quite tame and then a 70-200mm zoom lens may just be perfect.

Artic Tern, EOS 40D, EF 4/70-200L IS

300mm

A 2.8/300mm lens is used by many photographers. Both the Nikon and Canon lenses are extremely sharp and have very fast AF (Autofocus). But 300mm is still to short for most situations. That’s why you will see most photographers who use a 2.8/300 using 1.4x or 2x extender with the lens. The 2.8/300 lenses are not cheap and cost several thousand Euros or Dollars. A cheaper choice is a 4/300 like the Canon 4/300 IS (which I use). Those lenses are also very sharp but much lighter and cheaper. The downside is that you will lose AF with some cameras. My Canon EOS 40D will not autofocus with the 4/300 and a 2x extender. With Canon, only the cameras from the 1D series provide AF with f8, for the other cameras, AF is turned off at f8. Nikon does not switch off the AF at f8 for their cameras. At the time of this writing, Nikon’s 4/300 does not yet offer VR (the Nikon 2.8/300 does have VR).

400mm

Canon and Nikon both offer a 2.8/400 with VR/IS. That’s a heavy beast (the Canon weighs more than 5kg ) and very expensive. I do not recommend that lens for bird photography. It’s too heavy, in my opinion and 400mm is still not very much when it comes to birds. But keep in mind that many photographers use that lens successfully, especially with good 1.4x and 2x extenders.
Canon also offers a 4/400 IS which is very light. That would make a great lens for flight photography and many photographers use it successfully. Some claim that it’s not as sharp as Canon’s 4/500 and 4/600. If you think about getting the 4/400 from Canon, try it out first on your camera and see if you like the results. Canon also offers a very light and small 5.6/400 (without IS) which is very popular for birds in flight as it can be handhold for a long time. The 5.6/400 is a very sharp lens and hopefully, a version with IS will follow soon. Nikon does not offer a 5.6/400 at the time of this writing.

200-400mm

Currently only Nikon offers a 4/200-400 lens. Canon does not although many Canon photographers (including me) would love to see such a lens. The Nikon lens is a dream of a lens. Very sharp and fast AF. Together with Nikon’s great D300 and it’s 1.5 crop factor, that lens would be like a 4/300-600 – a dream for bird and wildlife photographers. The downside of the lens is the high price. If you are a Nikon shooter, you should definitely consider trying that lens and see if the 400mm are long enough for your type of shooting. If that’s the case, the zoom advantage of the 4/200-400 can save you many pictures that you wouldn’t get with prime lenses, because sometimes you have to change focal length so fast, that changing a lens is not an options. Zooms win here by far.

100-400mm

Canon offers a very good 4.5-5.6/100-400 IS and Nikon a 4.5-5.6/80-400 VR. They are much cheaper than the 4/200-400 from Nikon and also much lighter. The sharpness is good, although not as good as with the 4/200-400 or 2.8/300. AF is slower due to the smaller f-stop. Nikon’s 4.5-5.6/80-400 is particularly slow, especially when used with an entry level DSLR from Nikon. When you have that lens and want good AF, use A D300, D700 or D3.

500mm

Canon and Nikon both offer a 4/500. Canon already introduced IS many years ago for this lens. Nikon recently (finally!!) came up with a new version of it’s 4/500 with VR. For me the 4/500 is the perfect bird lens. I love my Canon 4/500L IS. Those lenses are very sharp, f4 is still good, and they deliver amazing quality with a 1.4x extender and even with a 2x. I can handhold it for a while and have used it successfully for birds in flight like Black-headed Gulls, Griffon Vultures and Cinereous Vultures. It will still fit in a backpack that you can take with you on a plane. It’s cheaper than the 4/600 and although heavy (the Canon around 3.9kg). it’s still much lighter than the 4/600. That are the reasons why I chose the 4/500 over the 4/600. I use it a lot with a 1.4x extender on my Canon EOS 40D. That’s a dream combination for bird photography, as is Nikon’s 4/500VR together with the D300.

Black-tailed Godwit, EOS 40D, EF 4/500L IS, 1.4x

600mm

The 4/600 lenses from Canon and Nikon (recently also with VR) give you a longer reach than the 4/500. That’s the only advantage of the 4/600 over the 4/500, but a significant one. If you are shooting a lot of shy birds and don’t have to travel by plane a lot, the 4/600 might be a better choice than the 4/500.
The best would be to own both, the 4/500 and the 4/600 but that’s quite an expensive option. I do not own the 4/600.

800mm

Recently Canon introduced a new 5.6/800 IS. It’s lighter than the 4/600 but more expensive. I would prefer the 4/600 + 1.4x as this is a more flexible solution but I am sure some bird photographers will be very happy with Canon’s new 5.6/800. At the moment, Nikon does not offer a 800mm lens.

300-800mm

Sigma offers a 5.6/300-800mm lens for both Nikon and Canon. It’s very sharp and the zoom range is perfect for bird and wildlife photography. It’s expensive, heavy and long and it does not have IS/VR. But for some it’s a dream lens because of the zoom advantage. It would be great if Sigma would update the lens with image stabilization or Canon and Nikon would produce one themselves.
If you want a large super telephoto zoom lens, then the Sigmonster (as it’s sometimes called) may be what you want.

200-500mm

That lens does not yet exist. But what’s needed is a 4/200-500 with IS/VR from Canon or Nikon with a weight not over 3.5kg and the optical quality of Nikon’s 4/200-400. That would be the killer lens for bird photography. The zoom advantage would be great and allow for a much better composition of an image without the need the change your position of the lens (which is often not possible). I really hope that Canon or Nikon will come up with such a lens in the future.

What do I use?

Currently, I use the following Canon lenses for bird photography:

• EF 4/70-200L IS
• EF 4/300L IS
• EF 4/500L IS
• EF 1.4x extender

For over 90% of my pictures, I use the 4/500L as the longer focal length is simply necessary for most bird species. The 4/300L is great for tame birds in a park or for flight shots of gulls, gannets and other large birds that fly close to me. The 4/70-200L is only used for very tame birds like some Artice Terns I photographed recently (see image above). They flew just 2 meters above.
For me, the 4/500L is the best option. Lighter, smaller and cheaper than the 4/600L. It’s optical quality is superb, even with a 1.4x extender and also with a 2x extender.
If you use Canon and can afford it, I highly recommend that lens. But be sure to also check out the 4/600L. In the end, it depends on your specific situation what’s best for you.

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A diffuser is a small and cheap device that can really make a difference in the quality of your macro images. You just hold it between the sun and the subject you want to photograph.

Harsh sunlight is not the most beautiful light for nature photography. Take the following image as an example.

The strong contrast caused by the midday sun is not a very beautiful light and in my opinion this image is not good.
Fortunately, it’s not difficult to get a much better light as in the next shot:

Now the contrast is much weaker and the image has better colors and is much more pleasing to look at.

A diffuser saved the image, here. I just held it between the flower and the sun:

A diffuser is a very cheap item that you should always carry with you when you want to photograph flowers. With it you can photograph all day long, not just in the early morning and late evening hours when the natural light is better.
Instead of a diffuser, you can also just use a white shirt or something similar.

With macro photography, a small diffuser will be enough and normally you are so close to the subject that you can hold the diffuser yourself without needing an assistant (as would be required most of the times, for example, when photographing people).

The next time you are photographing flowers or other macro subjects, try a diffuser in harsh sunlight and you will be surprised by how much your pictures improve.

Be careful when using it with insects like butterflies. Sometimes, when you put a diffuser between them and the sun, they just fly off. In that case, using a flash to reduce the contrast might be a better idea.

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When you are photographing wild animals, patience and a “never give up” attitude help a lot. Let’s take for example the Eurasian Bittern, an endangered species of heron that lives in wetlands in Europa and Asia.

EOS 40D, EF 4/500L IS, 1.4x, from car, about 60% crop

It’s a very secretive species that is active mostly at night and during dusk and dawn.
Last April, I spent one week at the Neusiedler See national park in Austria. This year was a particularly good year for bitterns there, as it had rained more than usually during the winter and many places were very wet - a perfect situation for bitterns.
But that does mean that they were easy to photograph. We got a tip for a god location from the owner of the hotel where we stayed. But the first morning we tried to see and hopefully photograph them we didn’t see a single bittern. The same on the second and third day. We heard them every day and even during the night from our room in the hotel. But we never saw them.
After three days of fruitless searching, we decided to give it another try on our last day. This time we were very lucky and saw not a single but four different bitterns, two even in flight.
The one above was very cooperative. It came out of the reed for almost an hour and closer and closer to our car from which the picture was taken.

The lessen from this story is: Be patient and never give up. Many photographers spend many hours over many days to get the perfect shot of an animal. Perseverance is the key to success in nature photography. This is much more important than the latest camera or the highest number of megapixels.
So the next time you plan to photograph a bird or another animal, be prepared to try over and over again. In the end you will be rewarded with a great shot.
The same is true for landscape and flowers. I know of photographers who camped several nights next to a large tree just to get the perfect shot of the tree in perfect light.
Again: Never give up!

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I love my Canon EF 4/500L IS. It is a great lens, very sharp even wide open. IS works great and the AF speed of the lens is amazing. But sometimes when I frame a bird or another subject I am a little too close and it would be great to have 450mm. Or sometimes the birds is a little to small for 500mm but when I add a 1.4x extender it is too big in the frame. Of course I can always crop the shot taken with 500mm but then I will always loose some data and pixels. Sometimes you can get around this problem by slightly moving towards the subject or away from it, but that is often not possible (for example when you are in a hide).
What we really need is a telephoto zoom lens. Nikon offers an amazing 4/200-400 VR which is very sharp and immensely popular among Nikon shooters. I don’t understand why Canon still doesn’t offer such a lens.
The problem with 200-400mm is, that for many animals 400mm is just not long enough. Sigma offers a 5.6/300-800. The range of the focal length is perfect for wildlife and birds. The problem is that this lens is very long and heavy (it is also knows as the “Sigmonster”). Also, it does not have image stabilization.
What we need is a Canon or Nikon 4/200-500 with image stabilization and a closest focusing distance of about 2.5m at 500mm (great for small birds and large insects). If that lens would have a bigger weight than the current 4/500 lenses from Canon and Nikon, I am sure it would be a big seller. Almost every nature photographer who could afford it, would probably buy it. And probably also most sport shooters and any other photographer who needs or wants a long lens.
So far, nothing is in sight. Nikon recently announced new versions of their 2.8/400, 4/500 and 4/600 with VR (finally) so I doubt that they will come up with a zoom in the near future. Canon announced a 5.6/800 IS so maybe there is room for a 4/200-500.
Sigma some time ago announced a 2.8/200-500. But that is nonsense as that lens is way too heavy for practical use. I wonder why they built it. If they had offered a 4/200-500 with image stabilization and fast AF, they would have had a real winner.
So for now, all we can do is to wait and see if sometimes in the future Canon or Nikon (or someone else) will offer a 4/200-500. Next time you see a Canon or Nikon representative ask them for such a lens. If enough photographers keep asking them, maybe someday they will wake up.

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