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<\/p>\nA rude awakening in the mountains yesterday.<\/p>\n
Yesterday morning I was chomping at the bit to go shooting. Mostly because of bad weather and poor light for bird photography I hadn’t been in the field for two full weeks but the forecast for yesterday was for bright blue skies, which the weather satellite and radar confirmed when I got up, so I headed to the nearby mountains to scratch my bird photography itch.<\/p>\n
But 20 minutes later as I approached Parley’s Summit my hopes were dashed by incredibly foreboding skies looming right in front of me. A huge bank of dark, roiling clouds was hiding in the mountains right over my intended destination. It looked like it could snow for a week but by that time it was too late to turn back so I continued to my destination and took what fate had handed me.<\/p>\n
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1\/1000, f\/6.3, ISO 1600, Canon R5, Canon EF500mm f\/4L IS II USM + 1.4 tc, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/p>\n It was mostly a hummingbird kind of morning. I caught this male Black-chinned Hummingbird in a stretching pose that I thought was interesting, despite his bright, looping perch that I find a bit distracting. In such poor light I was surprised when the…<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n 1\/1000, f\/6.3, ISO 1600, Canon R5, Canon EF500mm f\/4L IS II USM + 1.4 tc, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/p>\n metallic violet iridescence of his gorget lit up a little when he turned his head my way slightly. The iridescence of the gorget of this species is mostly on the lower throat of the males.<\/p>\n Once I saw some of those colors through my viewfinder my goal became to capture them in even more of their glory but the only times that happened was when…<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n 1\/800, f\/6.3, ISO 1600, Canon R5, Canon EF500mm f\/4L IS II USM + 1.4 tc, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/p>\n he had his gorget facing me straight on, so I could never see his eyes.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n 1\/800, f\/6.3, ISO 1600, Canon R5, Canon EF500mm f\/4L IS II USM + 1.4 tc, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/p>\n His colors flashed even when he was preening but I still couldn’t see his eyes or get a catch light.<\/p>\n I ended up taking over 2700 photos, mostly of hummingbirds perched and in flight, but in that poor light most of them are garbage. Or they soon will be, after an agonizingly long and painful culling session in my near future. I’m just thankful I was shooting with my mechanical shutter at “only” 12 frames per second.<\/p>\n If I’d been using my electronic shutter at 20 frames per second I’d be tempted to delete every last image in one swell foop.<\/p>\n Ron<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A rude awakening in the mountains yesterday. (4 photos)\u00a0<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/06\/black-chinned-hummingbird-6623-ron-dudley.jpg\" "\\"black-chinned-hummingbird-6623-ron-dudley\\"")
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