5D Mk IV – EF 70-200 F/4L – Speedlite 580 EX II – 1/4000, f/6.3, ISO 2000, Eval Meter

This is a hummingbird pic I promised to show not too long ago. When we were in Roatan in April, I brought my 5D Mk IV along with a tripod, flash, and remote. Instead of bringing my EF 70-200mm f/2.8L II lens, because it weighs a ton, I opted for the much lighter f/4L version. This lens while old, and slower than its counterpart, is a great lens still, and also very easy to travel with. I brought this setup specifically to take hummingbird pictures.

Overall, during this trip, I took 367 hummingbird pictures. Out of that, I picked out 23 ‘Keepers’ – that’s about a 6% success rate. Hummingbirds can be difficult to photograph, but with patience, a little trial and error, and some luck, you can get some fabulous shots. Probably the first couple hundred pics were done to get my settings right. Once I was satisfied that the settings were good, I went to work.

For this photo, and virtually all the keepers, I set the camera on a tripod relatively close to the feeder. The lens was set at a focal length of 109mm. Shutter speed was 1/4000 sec. ISO was set to 2000 while I was in the sweet spot of the aperture at f/6.3. I manually focused on the feeder at a point where the birds would come in to eat – I didn’t want the camera to refocus every time I pressed the shutter. I had a wireless trigger attached to the camera with the remote in my hand. A flash was also mounted and it was set to high speed sync.

Then I just let the birds come in and do their thing while triggering the shutter repeatedly. I think all of the keeps were really good, but this one is my favorite.