The Lark, Ascending...

You might have seen CleanSteve's excellent shot of a skylark scooting past at ground level. It was great fun and relaxing to spend time with someone new, after all this time. Only recently has the lockdown relaxed to the point we could, and Minchinhamton Common was a usefully wide and disparately populated venue to do so.

Bird in flight (BIF) remain a difficult challenge, particularly such small birds, that fly so erratically. Quite approachable in the ground, as shown in my last Wednesday's shot, once on the rise they quickly disappear into the blue. As they descend, they hoist their tail feathers to stall their horizontal flight, then drop straight down into the grass.

This one is a small crop, only a tenth of the full frame. It might have been larger if I'd remembered to take the teleconverter with me... but then, it'd have been even harder to frame the bird at all. This won't be the last shot I go for. I've got the shutter speed now, all I need to finesse is the art of using the rest of the camera functions!