Kevin’s been busy doing lots of gardening over the last couple of days, accompanied much of the time a very vocal male blackbird. This afternoon he’d chosen to sit in our silver birch tree and was singing his heart out so I decided to try and capture him in action. I had very mixed results when photographing the red kites last Sunday so I decided to try a technique suggested by Martin Bailey in one of his photography podcasts and shoot in manual mode for once. I set my exposure to suit Mr Blackbird’s feathers rather than the predominantly grey sky and the strategy worked pretty well, giving me a much higher hit rate than last weekend. I can see this is a technique I will try again in the future after today’s success. Thank you Martin for finally persuading me to try out manual mode!

What a fantastic singer! Great shot, Helen! Eiram · 2012-04-07: 18:45

Beautiful perspective Helen. I love his little ruffled head feathers. What a cutie. danrav · 2012-04-07: 19:44

It sounds like a very happy song! lgnelson · 2012-04-07: 20:32

Wow awesome capture I can hear the song mystic1 · 2012-04-07: 22:02

Magnificence of details, colors... We can only admire. Thank you Helen josy63 · 2012-04-08: 02:30

Lots of joy in this fantastic image, Helen....beautiful capture! lookagain · 2012-04-08: 07:40

How lovely... our blackbirds are too busy vandalising our lawn to bother with much singing at the moment... Annbramwell · 2012-04-08: 08:00

wow, that did work out well!!! amazing details on such a black bird urmysunshine · 2012-04-08: 10:13

Congratulations on the result is very nice, my friend! ????? · 2012-04-08: 14:02

Wonderful captured! Ryana · 2012-04-08: 14:27

Amazing! pandka · 2012-04-08: 15:35

Very nice! iso400 · 2012-04-08: 17:31

Great close up - looks as though it's been in the wars a bit though. Yes - stick to manual mode, it's so much better to be calling the shots. Jarvo · 2012-04-11: 18:44

Great shot! I was really surprised to learn that you don't usually use manual mode. The quality of your photos made me think you used it all the time! lukesmom · 2012-04-15: 13:51

Tagged: bird blackbird wildlife song