Here is another shot from the raptor workshop in Canada this past weekend. At 20 frames per second, the number of excellent frames of this barn owl surpassed my expectation and it was hard to choose which one to post. Just like with shots of people and animals in motion, it's all about the position of the legs. With birds in flight, it's the wing position that makes or breaks the pictures. Because of the bright sun, I did some burning and dodging in post-processing to minimize contrast. My settings were 1/3200, f/16, and 3200 ISO. I used a small lens aperture for extensive depth of field because as the owl flew toward the camera, I wanted as many sharp frames as possible. I don't trust autofocus mechanisms to follow focus on a fast flying bird moving toward the camera especially when using a long lens and especially when the camera-subject distance is close. My focal length was 220mm on a 100-500mm zoom.
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