One of the prettiest African birds I've photographed is this red-cheeked cordon bleu finch. It has been drinking water from a dripping faucet in a small town in Ethiopia, and it allowed a surprisingly close approach after it settled on a branch above the water source. I waited to shoot until the bird turned its head so I could capture the beautiful red mark on its cheek. I stood about 12 feet away and moved very slowly as I raised the camera to my eye because sudden movements startle birds and usually makes them take flight. I used a 300mm f/2.8 Canon telephoto plus a 1.4x teleconverter, giving me 420mm of focal length. My settings were 1/250, f/4, 200 ISO. In this case, I opted for the large lens aperture because I wanted the tree vegetation behind the finch to go out of focus so all the attention is focused on the bird.
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