{"id":154839,"date":"2024-03-03T05:45:16","date_gmt":"2024-03-03T12:45:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.featheredphotography.com\/blog\/?p=154839"},"modified":"2024-03-03T07:39:05","modified_gmt":"2024-03-03T14:39:05","slug":"western-meadowlark-takeoff-and-flight-series","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/2024\/03\/03\/western-meadowlark-takeoff-and-flight-series\/","title":{"rendered":"Western Meadowlark Takeoff And Flight Series"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sometimes, in the literal blink of an eye, the photographer’s instincts take over and save the day.<\/p>\n

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1\/8000, f\/5.6, ISO 640, Canon R5, Canon EF500mm f\/4L IS II USM + 1.4 tc, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/p>\n

Four days ago I almost didn’t stop for this Western Meadowlark on Antelope Island because ‘he’ wasn’t particularly close and he was partially hidden by his rabbitbrush perch. But it had been a slow morning for birds and I had a chance with takeoff and flight shots so I figured I’d better take advantage of every potential opportunity, including this one.<\/p>\n

He didn’t take off for a very long time but in the end I’m glad I had the patience to wait him out.<\/p>\n

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1\/6400, f\/5.6, ISO 400, Canon R5, Canon EF500mm f\/4L IS II USM + 1.4 tc, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/p>\n

I very nearly missed his takeoff because at the split second he launched, I blinked. But in that microsecond with my eyes closed I realized that as I was closing my eyes I’d seen him squat, which might indicate that he was beginning the takeoff process. So with my eyes still closed (or at least not completely open yet) I instinctively began to fire off a burst.<\/p>\n

This photo and the following four are sequential shots in the burst without any skips.<\/p>\n

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1\/6400, f\/5.6, ISO 400, Canon R5, Canon EF500mm f\/4L IS II USM + 1.4 tc, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/p>\n

Liftoff.<\/p>\n

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1\/6400, f\/5.6, ISO 400, Canon R5, Canon EF500mm f\/4L IS II USM + 1.4 tc, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/p>\n

While he was still perched I’d realized I had too much shutter speed so I lowered my ISO from 800 to 400. But it wasn’t enough to slow down my shutter speed much.<\/p>\n

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1\/6400, f\/5.6, ISO 400, Canon R5, Canon EF500mm f\/4L IS II USM + 1.4 tc, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/p>\n

Even a chubby and relatively slow meadowlark was already moving fast enough that I…<\/p>\n

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1\/6400, f\/5.6, ISO 400, Canon R5, Canon EF500mm f\/4L IS II USM + 1.4 tc, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/p>\n

didn’t follow him quickly enough with my lens. So by the time this shot was taken he was very close to the left frame edge and in the photo after this one I cut off half of his bill.<\/p>\n

This last photo isn’t quite as sharp as the previous five but I think it’s sharp enough to conclude the series.<\/p>\n

Ron<\/p>\n

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Note: Some folks might think that the literal blink of an eye isn’t enough time for me to process what I’d seen as I was beginning to close my eyes and then push the shutter button. But I swear to Darwin, that’s exactly what happened.<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sometimes, in the literal blink of an eye, the photographer’s instincts take over and save the day. (6 photos)<\/p>\n

Continue reading<\/span><\/i><\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":154844,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[3,6,334,370],"tags":[31,7369,2738,311,7368],"class_list":["post-154839","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-antelope-island","category-bird-photography-methods","category-birds","category-western-meadowlarks","tag-antelope-island-2","tag-photographers-instincts","tag-takeoff","tag-utah-2","tag-western-meadowlark-in-flight"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/western-meadowlark-7513-ron-dudley.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1zzJh-Ehp","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154839","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=154839"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154839\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":154900,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154839\/revisions\/154900"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/154844"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=154839"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=154839"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=154839"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}