F Is For ... Finch

Time to take the camera out for a test drive today!

Originally, I was going out with a mate this morning, but he cried off, this turned out to be a bit of a blessing in disguise, as the weather this afternoon was a bit gloomy!

Those who dislike camera technical talk may want to look away now ..

I really wanted to see how the camera worked on high ISO settings, so breaking my own rule of switching off the AUTO ISO I let the camera do the work, and see how they came out.

This male chaffinch was taken on ISO 640, the one downside of my Alpha200 was that it's usable ISO range was only to ISO400, after that it was go arty and turn them black and white, or low saturation. So already a much better performance. But when you look at this Treecreeper picture and realise it was taken at ISO1600, three times what my old camera would cope with, you really do realise what you pay for.

I've been wanting to get a male Chaffinch picture on here for ages! Chuffed with this one!

I had an enjoyable couple hours down there, with another "are you the Ponty Cyclops?" moment. I watched a stoat hunting in the undergrowth, which was brillant, but alas impossible to photograph. The Kingfisher was showing well, but the perennual problem of dog walkers put paid to it sitting still long enough to get a shot.

Without doubt the one that one got away was this Water Rail Charging Snipe, oh for a little less clutter from the reed beds!

A dozen or so pictures from today have been added to the Forest Farm Flickr set.