They glide overhead creating the perfect shot as their body forms a silhouette with the sun behind them. Birds are excellent targets for photography. Taking bird photos is something that many photographers have tried at some point. It can be a lot of fun and luckily there are many species of birds. You could go exploring far and wide to find the types of birds that live locally. Gulls, hawks, crows, those brown birds that are in all the fast food places.

When taking bird photos, having a few simple tips will go a long way. Birds are very fast compared to humans. Most birds won’t stop to let you take a picture of them either. Some birds will. I’m sure you’ve had a time where you threw a McDonald’s potato chip at a bird and the bird scrambled to pick it up. I’m sure some of you may have even thrown chips at the birds trying to get them to leave you alone.

Birds are not silly creatures. I have a parrot that knows how to say “Hello”. He is not stupid at all. He has his own unique personality and won’t let some of my family members near the cage. Instead, he lets me pet him and goes on my finger!

If you are going to photograph birds, you have to be very good with animals or have a good telephoto lens. Image stability will be of great help when taking close-ups of birds from afar. If you don’t have image stability, you’ll probably need a tripod for telephoto bird photography.

Birds tend to move around a lot. This is a big problem for photographers. Sure you can set the shutter speed to a very fast setting. But when you take telephoto close-ups that require longer exposures, you have no choice but to cross your fingers and hope the bird doesn’t move.

If you’re going out to take pictures of birds, be prepared to have a little patience. It may take a few shots to get one that’s really nice. I tend to have to delete a lot of photos. Not because they are poorly composed, but because of motion blur.

Birds can also help add images. If you have a photo of a landscape and you see a group of birds flying, wait for them to enter the photo and then take photos. This requires a lot of patience, but the results are worth it.

A good idea to get birds to come to you is to set up a bird feeder or tray in your backyard. All the birds will flock to your yard. This gives you the perfect opportunity to photograph them from an open window. However, be careful when doing this. When I installed a bird tray house in my backyard, the birds paid me back with white spots all over my car! I ended up getting rid of the bird tray and found wild birds instead.