Saturday, October 4, 2008

My Quest For A Bird In Flight

One of the things I have been trying to do since I began this website, is get a picture of a bird in flight. So far, it has been one of the hardest things for me to accomplish. I would see the birds, but I just haven't been fast enough with the camera. Every time I'd lift the camera to get the shot, the bird would be gone. It's one of the most frustrating things about this for me.

If I wanted a photograph of a deer, it seems I would see one in a matter of days. I started thinking of ducks, and there they were in the pond at Woodland Hills. I wanted a few insect photos, and they began to stop and pose for me. When I really started thinking about snakes, I almost stepped on one, and it stopped to let me get it's picture. Deer, and even some geese, actually showed up in my backyard. But I still wasn't fast enough for any birds unless they were waddling around or swimming.

I'm sure by now you're wondering what these two pictures have to do with this flying bird business. Well, they are pictures of a nice little area of a park I visited. I may talk about the park in the future, but not just yet. Anyway, this beautiful little field I was in, was just full of birds. It was the scene of one of my more memorable failures to get a shot of a flying bird.

I saw all of these birds hopping around and having such a good time. I wanted to join in the fun, and capture it forever. The birds had other ideas. I moved to the very center of the field, and waited for any of them to take flight. They did, but they were so fast that I couldn't get a clear shot.

Pretty soon they started taking turns literally flying circles around me. I started spinning around like an idiot, trying to take pictures of these birds. After doing this for a little while, I began to realize they were doing this more than was normal. I think they were teasing me! They must have loved watching me make a fool of myself.

Once I got too dizzy... I mean, once I wised up to their game, I stopped and gave up. This was after I got several very blurry pictures. Some of them did have flying birds in them, but just looking at them brings a motion blurred headache. After a while, I walked away feeling stupid and defeated by a bunch of little birds.

This picture just above is the best one of a flying bird from that day. What? You say you don't see a bird? Just down and to the left of the center of the grass is a dark streak. That's one of those evil birds. It was moving so fast, I couldn't get a proper picture of it. Who knew this would be hard!

All of this happened a long time ago, in a park far far away. Did things get any better since then? Did I get any flying bird pictures? Will I spin around some more, until I lose my lunch? Why am I asking myself these questions, when I already know the answers? Because you don't know them! Tune in tomorrow to see me give some birds what fer.

4 comments:

  1. Did you just give us the bird?

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  2. I think I need a better camera to capture a bird in flight. Every time I try, the picture is blurred around the wings :-(

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  3. John - I think it's mostly a matter of luck. I've been having a lot of camera trouble lately. Especially with blurry pictures.

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