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| White crowned sparrow on a favourite perch. |
The white
crowned sparrow is a common summertime visitor to Western and much of Northern Canada. I hear its familiar chirping and see its
telltale black and white striped crown on many of my travels. I spotted this one yesterday near the beach
in southeast Washington. They feed on
the ground, taking both seeds and insects.
It is amazing to watch them moving leaf litter; with both feet planted
on the offending target, they hurl it backward with a synchronized jerk,
unlodging any morsels hiding underneath.
They are not
terribly shy. I often find them perching
atop tall plants or trees surveying their kingdom. Photographing them in this position is often
problematic because of backlighting.
Backlighting happens when the background is brighter than the light
coming off the subject. This causes the
camera to underexpose the image, leading to a flat, gray background with a dark
foreground. The solution is to
compensate for this. There are three
quick methods.
1) Use exposure compensation. The +/- button is your exposure compensation
button. Most cameras will have access to
this feature either directly through a button, or indirectly through a menu
option. When pressing the button and
holding onto it, you can add to or subtract from an exposure by rotating the
command dial at the same time. Some
cameras may allow you to press and release the exposure compensation button and
then change the setting, then press it again to go back into shooting
mode. The challenge is twofold; first, you have to estimate how much you want to compensate the exposure by. I find many backlit situations benefit from a
+1 setting, although I have gone past +2 on some occasions. The other issue is forgetting to turn it off
after using it.
2) Use exposure lock. This handy little feature is often found as a
button with EL or FL written on it, allows you to lock your exposure at a
predetermined value. In the case of the
sparrow above, lowering the camera so there is little backlighting and holding
the button will lock the exposure in. Reframing
you then take the picture. This has the
advantage of not having to estimate what value to use, and it turns off automatically. This sounds marvelously magical, but the issue
is finding an area with lighting similar to the one your subject is in. This can be a bit of a hunt-and-find
methodology. I pay attention to my
viewfinder exposure settings when using this and keep in mind how much extra
exposure I need. If you are not familiar
with shutter and aperture values, this makes finding the right balance more
difficult.
3) Using manual exposure mode. Most people are uncomfortable with manual
exposure mode. In fact, many will set
their cameras to full auto or intelligent auto and leave it there. Although intimidating, manual mode will
unlock the potential of your camera if you know how to use it. There is a steep learning curve, as some
knowledge of aperture and shutter speed settings is mandatory, and you have to
be comfortable working with changing both those settings manually. I photographed the white crown sparrow above
in manual mode. The light of the day was
unvarying; this meant that I could use the same exposure settings for all my
shots unless something changed significantly.
With the flat grey cloud cover, the exposures were consistent. Also, I use RAW files instead of jpegs, which
means I have extra latitude for correction if the exposure is off. Together they allow me to capture my images
with relatively few corrections.
