As a “Frequent Flyer” at Zealandia, I purchase a yearly membership so I can visit as often as I want. This means if the weather shows promise that is one of my regular destinations for photographing birds. I can go as far as I want into the valley, or not very far at all and still find birds, so it is very rare that I come away with nothing.
This morning it was very overcast and there was even a couple of small showers on the way into town. It was so dark at Zealandia that I almost decided to give it a miss thinking the lens wouldn’t cope. We walked to the bottom of the dam and planned on making the decision to turn back at that point. Then I noticed a couple of cameras pointed at the kakariki feeding area.
I am never one to miss an opportunity so I joined them, only to see a sparrow having a munch on the millet. The others left and I almost did the same – then a kakariki flew in, and another, and another, until there were about six of them around me. I had to use every trick in the book to get useable images in such bad light.
I pushed the camera to ISO6400 and f/8.0 and underexposed the images by 2/3 of a stop. I still only managed around 1/125 sec in speed. Thankfully I had the monopod or I would not have achieved anything at all. I wasn’t expecting to have many useable images when I got home to look at them on the big screen.
To my surprise, most of them were useable and not only useable but what I would call better than average for my shaky hands. I was very happy with the day’s results. These images are just a few from the day and are not necessarily the best ones, just a random mix as I am going through them all. Enjoy!
