What’s Up?
Morning photography at Huguenot Memorial Park in Jacksonville, FL continues to be fabulous with no wind or a SE breeze instead of the forecast wind from the SW. David and Michele Pugsley headed home after their third great morning. It is the best year for chicks in more than two decades. I have room for you in the AirBnB for three nights — beginning on Monday 29 June. If you are nearby and can make it, text me at 863-221-2372 to learn about a practically free IPT. It never hurts to try.
Saturday past was the very first time that I used the 200-600 with the a-1 ii. And it turned out to be the perfect lens for ten flight at Huguenot.
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This image was created on 28 June 2025 at Huguenot Memorial Park, Jacksonville, FL. Standing at full height, I used the handheld Sony FE 200-600mm f/5.6-6.3 G OSS lens (at 600mm) and The Latest Greatest Sony Flagship Body, the a1 II Mirrorless Camera. The exposure was determined by Zebras with ISO on the rear wheel — ISO 800: 1/4000 second at f/6.3 (wide open) in Manual mode. RawDigger showed that the exposure was 1/6 stop short of perfect. AWB at 7:38:14am on a mostly sunny morning. Wide/AF-C with Bird-Eye/Face Detection performed perfectly. Click on the image to enjoy the larger, inexplicably sharper high-res version. Image #1: Royal Tern in flat flight with butterfish (?) for chick
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Why the 200-600 When You Own the 400-800?
I’ve been using the handheld 4-8 while seated for both chicks and for flight. But with the right wind, I prefer standing for flight and after a while, the 4-8 is simply too heavy for me to handhold for extended periods. So when we take a flight walk to look for a spot where the birds are turning toward us to land, I switch out the 4-8 for the somewhat lighter 200-600 (4.65 lbs. vs. 5.45 lbs.) Despite being less than a pound lighter, I can pretty much handhold it forever for flight. Item last: it is a lot easier to find and frame fairly distant subjects at 600mm than it is at 800mm.
Backgrounds Other Than Sky
As you can see in this and the following image, the Sony a-1 ii rarely has a problem with backgrounds other than sky. While I will always attempt to acquire focus on the bird with a sky background and then follow it down, the a- ii will usually attain AF even when you start with relatively busy backgrounds.
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This image was created on 28 June 2025 at Huguenot Memorial Park, Jacksonville, FL. Standing at full height, I used the handheld Sony FE 200-600mm f/5.6-6.3 G OSS lens (at 600mm) and The Latest Greatest Sony Flagship Body, the a1 II Mirrorless Camera. The exposure was determined by Zebras with ISO on the rear wheel — ISO 800: 1/4000 second at f/7.1 (stopped down 1/3- stop) in Manual mode. RawDigger showed that the exposure was 1/3 stop short of perfect. AWB at 7:54:46am on a mostly sunny morning. Wide/AF-C with Bird-Eye/Face Detection performed perfectly. Click on the image to enjoy the larger, inexplicably sharper high-res version. Image #2: Royal Tern in flat flight with butterfish (?) for chick
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Flat Flight
Flat flight images work best either when the bird is flying directly at you or angling toward you. If you photograph a bird in flat flight from the side, you wind up with a pancake. In other words, not too good. For best results, try to keep the wind (and the light) behind you.
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This image was also created on 28 June 2025 at Huguenot Memorial Park, Jacksonville, FL. Standing at full height, I used the handheld Sony FE 200-600mm f/5.6-6.3 G OSS lens (at 474mm) and The Latest Greatest Sony Flagship Body, the a1 II Mirrorless Camera. The exposure was determined by Zebras with ISO on the rear wheel — ISO 1000: 1/4000 second at f/6.3 (wide open) in Manual mode. RawDigger showed that the exposure was 1/2. stop short of perfect. AWB at 8:08:18am on a mostly sunny morning. Wide/AF-C with Bird-Eye/Face Detection performed perfectly. Click on the image to enjoy the larger, inexplicably sharper high-res version. Image #3: Royal Tern with (bug-eyed!) shrimp for chick
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How Large a Crop?
This one looks quite sharp to me. Actually, it looks stunningly sharp. What percentage of the original frame do you think is depicted? Reveal in the next blog post.
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This image was also created on 28 June 2025 at Huguenot Memorial Park, Jacksonville, FL. Standing at full height, I used the handheld Sony FE 200-600mm f/5.6-6.3 G OSS lens (at 600mm) and The Latest Greatest Sony Flagship Body, the a1 II Mirrorless Camera. The exposure was determined by Zebras with ISO on the rear wheel — ISO 1000: 1/4000 second at f/6.3 (wide open) in Manual mode. RawDigger showed that the exposure was dead-solid perfect. AWB at 8:24:47am on a mostly sunny morning. Wide/AF-C with Bird-Eye/Face Detection performed perfectly. Click on the image to enjoy the larger, inexplicably sharper high-res version. Image #4: Royal Tern in flight with Spanish Mackerel for chick
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Wings Up, Zero Shadows
Wings fully up or wings fully down are generally big plusses for flight images. And, in a perfect situation, with the bird right on sun angle, it is possible to make a flight image with no shadows anywhere. With the amazing AF accuracy offered by today’s high end mirrorless camera bodies, the standards as to what makes a great flight image are being raised continually. The Complete and Quintessential Guide to Photographing Birds in flight by Arash Hazeghi, Ph.D., and Arthur Morris, BIRDS AS ART, will be released soon and will surely help folks to raise the bar even higher.
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