White-throated Fantail

Gallery: AvianPosted December 6, 20171,431 views5 comments

We spent a fair amount of time in hides during my recent trip. This shot was from the first of two visits to this hide near our lodge at Baan Maka. At the hide there was a waterhole which was fairly close to our position, and after most of the large birds left numerous smaller birds would show up and bathe. One of the birds that put on quite the show was this fantail, he would swoop towards the water with fan flaring, and hop all around the perimeter of the waterhole kicking up whatever it was he was interested in. Every time the bird re-visited the hole I took numerous shots in hopes of getting a frontal fan display. The image above was the best on the card. We used no flash the first day in this hide, so the ISO was at my highest comfortable setting to allow for maximum speed, while trying to retain as optimum an image as I possibly could. It was somewhat fortunate that construction of the waterhole was placed under a natural opening in the canopy, which allowed some additional light to drop in.

Lung (uncle) Sim's Hide
Kaeng Krachan, Thailand

D500
500mm f/4
1/400s @ f/4.5
ISO 2000
Manual
Gitzo

Comments

5 comments

Comment posted by Dennis Plank on December 6, 2017 at 6:57 PM

A very cool bird and wonderful pose, Chuck. The put some really cool perches out for you as well. I don't know what this bird looks like, but it does look as if you could come up with the exposure a bit.

Registered on January 28, 2008, 1767 Posts, 23192 Comments

Comment posted by Charles Gangas on December 6, 2017 at 7:22 PM

Hi Dennis,

Thanks for the comments. The bird is dark brown in natural light, and the light near the hide was low. As I noted in the comments we didn’t use flash during that shoot so the overall scene was dark.

Best,

Chuck

Registered on August 12, 2009, 544 Posts, 2414 Comments

Comment posted by Jim Hansen on December 6, 2017 at 8:58 PM

I like this image a lot Chuck. The pose with those splayed tail feathers is quite remarkable. As has been mentioned, I think it would benefit from a little exposure increase.

Registered on May 5, 2011, 161 Posts, 908 Comments

Comment posted by David Schoen on December 7, 2017 at 12:26 PM

This is a very cool shot compositionally but it does need to be brightened up somehow.

Registered on November 6, 2006, 1213 Posts, 4587 Comments

Comment posted by Kurt Bowman on December 8, 2017 at 9:51 PM

I really dig the pose here Charles, but I have to agree with others, this is a bit underexposed. I think it would really improve the image and give a stronger impact because the timing and pose are terrific.

Registered on June 19, 2008, 1005 Posts, 8028 Comments