# 7D II - what are your recipes for birds?



## sanjosedave (Jun 19, 2016)

7D II - what are your recipes for birds?

Thx


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## Keith_Reeder (Jun 19, 2016)

sanjosedave said:


> 7D II - what are your recipes for birds?


Could you be more specific? "Birds" is too broad an ask.

Birds In Flight?, Small, twitchy, birds? Big slow, obliging birds?

You get the idea...


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## d (Jun 19, 2016)

sanjosedave said:


> 7D II - what are your recipes for birds?
> 
> Thx



There are plenty of options for you here: http://honest-food.net/wild-game/pheasant-quail-partridge-chukar-recipes/

Cheers,
d.


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## candc (Jun 19, 2016)

In general stop down 1 stop, bif 1/1600 or faster mode3 is or is off. Perched birds 1/250 with is mode1


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## AlanF (Jun 19, 2016)

iso 640 is standard for me, higher values are too noisy for cropping. There is some shutter shock at up to 1/200s so use silent mode for slow speeds. My lenses (100-400mm II, Sigma 150-600mm C, 300mm f/2.8 II + TCs) all work best wide open. I use back-button focus, A1 servo, low-speed continuous shooting unless high speed is necessary, centre spot focussing (often best for BIF as well), plus appropriate tracking, and AV mode set to iso 640 and widest aperture. I put these plus RAW into custom setting C1. C2 has the same but + 1 ev for shooting against a lightish background, C3 has +2ev for birds in flight against the sky or small birds silhouetted against the sky so I can switch in an instant. The regular AV mode on the mode dial has variations of these depending on circumstances.


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## sanjosedave (Jun 20, 2016)

BIF mostly


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## candyman (Jun 20, 2016)

sanjosedave said:


> BIF mostly



I rented a 7D MKII some weeks ago for BIF (I usually take photos with a 5D MKIII)
If I can (weather conditions), I mostly stay below iso 640. I use f/7.1 and shutterspeed 1/3200. I always use 'M'anual mode. I used spot metering and hi-speed shooting with Zone AF activated (if I remember good).

Edit: btw - for more detailed information, see 7D MKII Guidebook

https://learn.usa.canon.com/resources/articles/2014/eos7dmk2_afGuidebook.htmlp


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## Sabaki (Jun 20, 2016)

My ISO is generally set from 400-800, depending on how bright the day is.

My shutter speed is a minimum of 1/1250 for small birds but I much prefer speeds in excess of 1/2000 all the way to 1/8000 if there is enough light

Aperture I generally keep at f/5.6 (Canon EF 400mm f/5.6) as to blow the backgrounds away but will go up to f/8.0 if I have enough separation between my bird and the background.

Learn to pan. It is an essential part of photographing birds in flight. The theory is that if you can pan at the same speed as your target, you are effectively making the bird a stationery subject.

I would recommend trying to understand the custom settings for tracking on the 7Dii. It'll allow you to think on the fly whether to lock focus or tracking depending on your environment.


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## KfirGuy (Aug 10, 2016)

Out of curiosity (and because I am unable to start topics of my own), what has your experience been with regards to noise when shooting birds in flight? As a regular photographer of the more metallic and less feathery birds, noise in the sky at even ISO 100-250 on my 7D has long been my biggest frustration. Do you find the 7DII to perform materially better in rendering sky at all?


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## tron (Aug 10, 2016)

AlanF said:


> iso 640 is standard for me, higher values are too noisy for cropping. There is some shutter shock at up to 1/200s so use silent mode for slow speeds. My lenses (100-400mm II, Sigma 150-600mm C, 300mm f/2.8 II + TCs) all work best wide open. I use back-button focus, A1 servo, low-speed continuous shooting unless high speed is necessary, centre spot focussing (often best for BIF as well), plus appropriate tracking, and AV mode set to iso 640 and widest aperture. I put these plus RAW into custom setting C1. C2 has the same but + 1 ev for shooting against a lightish background, C3 has +2ev for birds in flight against the sky or small birds silhouetted against the sky so I can switch in an instant. The regular AV mode on the mode dial has variations of these depending on circumstances.


Thank you Alan for your contribution. I hadn't thought to dedicate all 3 Custom modes to birding which is silly of me since my 7DII does only birding!

However, I do enjoy EC capability in Auto ISO manual mode (that I miss in my 5D3).

So I presellect shutter speed (something fast) and set aperture to fully open (most of the times).

In addition I use +1/3 or +2/3 EC.

The issue is however that even in this case custom modes would help equally the same by configuring as you said different amounts of EC.


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## FEBS (Aug 10, 2016)

Do have a look at the website of Glenn Bartley. ( http://www.glennbartley.com ). He has several ebooks with very good explanation how to photograph birds.
He just posted a few hours ago a thread on this site called "birds from brazil" http://www.canonrumors.com/forum/index.php?topic=30472.msg612389#msg612389


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## Mikehit (Aug 10, 2016)

KfirGuy said:


> Out of curiosity (and because I am unable to start topics of my own), what has your experience been with regards to noise when shooting birds in flight? As a regular photographer of the more metallic and less feathery birds, noise in the sky at even ISO 100-250 on my 7D has long been my biggest frustration. Do you find the 7DII to perform materially better in rendering sky at all?


Yep. I upgraded to the 7DII and the actual noise performance is about 1 stop better but the way the noise is rendered makes it easier to manage and for me it is about 1.5 to 2 stops more useable.


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## TheJock (Aug 11, 2016)

Many thanks to AlanF and Sabaki, I have been struggling to achieve that "perfect" clarity in a lot of my images with my 100-400L & 5DIII combo and have been seriously considering selling the lens for the Sigma 150-600S. Your settings have given me a lot to think about and I will be heading out to try them out prior to my trip to Kruger National Park in September, here's hoping that my soft images is 100% user error and not some problem with my lens!!!
Many thanks again for your help & support with various novice questions, this is why I love CR 8)


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## Sabaki (Aug 11, 2016)

Stewart K said:


> Many thanks to AlanF and Sabaki, I have been struggling to achieve that "perfect" clarity in a lot of my images with my 100-400L & 5DIII combo and have been seriously considering selling the lens for the Sigma 150-600S. Your settings have given me a lot to think about and I will be heading out to try them out prior to my trip to Kruger National Park in September, here's hoping that my soft images is 100% user error and not some problem with my lens!!!
> Many thanks again for your help & support with various novice questions, this is why I love CR 8)



Stewart, if you're from Cape Town, South Africa, pop in at Intaka Island. Plenty opportunity to practise your bif photography


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## KfirGuy (Aug 11, 2016)

Mikehit said:


> KfirGuy said:
> 
> 
> > Yep. I upgraded to the 7DII and the actual noise performance is about 1 stop better but the way the noise is rendered makes it easier to manage and for me it is about 1.5 to 2 stops more useable.
> ...


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## tron (Aug 11, 2016)

I have programmed my 7DII to change the number of focusing points to 65 when I press the AF back button.

I keep my 7DII at AI Servo using central AF point with expansion. I use this for (more or less) static birds. However I want to be ready for flying birds which may or maynot be able to target them correctly via the viewfinder (subject to distance, position and bird speed). 

So when shooting a difficult to target flying bird I press the AF back button and switch to 65 points. So there is a significant chance to focus correctly. If it is easy to target the bird through the viewfinder then I do not use this method. I target it via the central point.


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## dcm (Aug 11, 2016)

You might check out these videos.
http://www.learn.usa.canon.com/galleries/galleries/tutorials/birds_as_art_morris.shtml

And he'd be glad to sell you a book 
http://www.birdsasart-blog.com/2015/03/05/the-7d-mark-ii-users-guide/


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## Mikehit (Aug 11, 2016)

Grant Atkinson, a member of this site, has some interesting videos.

https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=grant+atkinson


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