Tree swallows are beautiful, with their iridescent feathers and stunning aerobatics they are always a welcome sight. I hope you’ll enjoy this collection of tree swallow photos.
Tree Swallows
4 thoughts on “Tree Swallows”
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Creative Nonfiction 315
Photography & Observations
Creative Nonfiction 315 
Brilliant photography, Chris. I really enjoyed this set of shots, and the ones prior to this. Those little birds fly really fast, very hard to capture them in the moment and it certainly takes a lot of patience. In the second photo the swallow looks like it’s coming for you 🙂
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Thanks Mabel!
Catching inflight shots of them is tricky, but possible if you pre-focus your lens, and wait for them to fly into range.
The method I use is to manually focus the lens on a ground target at a known distance, and to set the shutter release to sports mode.
From there it is a matter of picking out a space in the air that matches your focus and waiting until they fly through it. You’ll get more misses than hits with this method, but all you need is one or two good shots.
They seem to be inquisitive little birds, because they usually make a few passes over my position.
They are very boisterous too, they were harassing that bluebird who was trying build a nest inside a bird-box.
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Thanks for the tip, Chris. I started shooting in manual mode a couple of months ago, still finding it hard to focus manually but with practice I’m sure that will help.
Very hard to tell those birds are boisterous. They look harmless! But perhaps you chose not to show that 🙂
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