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I was looking for flash information on the properties detail but didn't see any.  The flash fired.  All of the settings and camera stats are the same (f/16, 1/200 sec, ISO-400).

Although the head is a bit fuzzy note how KIWI's comments about capturing the wing came through.  With more lighting I would have captured a great flight/wing shot.

Important field identifier on this shot, and the most reliable for the AHY male Anna's is the shape of R5, the outermost of the tail rectrices.  

I did not use the reflector suggestion.  It is still on my list of things to add to the set up.  Still trying to figure out how to set that up. 

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Latest Birds: Black-throated Green Warbler, Pine Warbler, Eastern Kingbird, Rufous-backed Robin, Crissal Thrasher

Now my million dollar shot.  I am not a photographer, but you guys are helping me get there.  I get a good shot by accident now and then, but I photograph for getting my IDs.

This shot is an ID shot.  I have never caught an AHY male black-chinned.  I have first and second year females and a hatch year male, no after hatch year male, until now.  Note the tail, this is very distinctly AHY male black-chinned.  May not be that exciting to the public, but it means, with patience, I have a purple shot coming.  Another example of the KIWI flash comment evident in this picture. f/16, 1/200 sec, ISO-400

 

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Latest Birds: Black-throated Green Warbler, Pine Warbler, Eastern Kingbird, Rufous-backed Robin, Crissal Thrasher

Matt:

.  You east coast guys need to stay up later. 

This was fun waiting, then seeing the results... he is right, you need to speed the shutter,... you weren't sitting there trying to  focus during the action were you?  did you shoot continuous mode? half push the button to let it focus first, then all the way...and blast away... part of my real interest in this thing, is we don't expect hummers for a couple of week, and i have never used a DSLR for this... I used a canon S3 IS..when i see what you did, and what worked, then i can apply it then..I know self-centered guy that i am...
did you post your shots full sized to your gallery here? then we can see all the exif info too...
Basically it boils down to -- are you happy with the results.. were they useful? Did you have FUN? remember it is suppose to be fun too.. thanks for letting us in on the project. look forward to more from you. thanks

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http://whatbird.com/forums/photos/early_summers_birds/
IM: oldguyrich

All the shots taken today were from a tripod, I shake too much and these birds move way too fast.  All the shots were also prefocused and then placed on manual providing a single depth of field.  That was a detriment on some of my shots as a great looking bird was just out of focus.  I did not shoot in continuous mode as recording the raw files was taking time.  I could shoot about 5 pictures before the camera had to pause to finish the feed to the memory stick.  Each shot was almost 15meg.  All the pictures preceding this note were only cropped, so actual size.

After noon I switched to point east and changed my method per lyceel's suggestion.  For this series I used the 70-300mm lens, turned off the IS and placed on manual focus.  I was about 8 feet from the perch and set the camera to aperture priority at f/8 and ISO to 800.  I mentioned the excitement about purple in a prior message and almost did it.  If I had followed lyceel's advice I would have had the shot.  I needed a reflector.  (f/8 1/4000 ISO-800 220mm)  This picture was cropped, reduced in size, sharpened once and added brightness to show up the throat.  Almost had him.  Reflector suggestions very welcome.  Male after hatch year black-chinned hummingbird, note the pointed rectrices, dull dusky crown and lack of extensions on the gorget.  I did get some purple though.    

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Latest Birds: Black-throated Green Warbler, Pine Warbler, Eastern Kingbird, Rufous-backed Robin, Crissal Thrasher

Another shot with the same settings.  (f/8 1/4000 ISO-800 220mm)  This one is an after hatch year female Anna's.  I liked this camera setting, gave me depth of field and still kept the shutter speed high to minimize blur.   

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Latest Birds: Black-throated Green Warbler, Pine Warbler, Eastern Kingbird, Rufous-backed Robin, Crissal Thrasher

Wow, it's amazing how fuzzy the primaries are even at 1/4000".  On the plus side, the Rebel XS seems to handle ISO 800 without too much noise.  I wonder if ISO 1600 would have looked better?

Looking at those, I'm wondering if a reflector would be enough to give you the light you need.  I can definitely see how an array of flashes would come in handy now.

By the way, if you feel like spending a lot of money, a Nikon D300 can go to 1/8000" shutter, and with a fast memory card it can capture 100 RAW images at 6 frames per second without missing a beat.  If you want to keep your lenses, I imagine the Canon 50D is similar.  Just thought I'd throw that out there

By the way, Matt, thanks for posting your results.  I think I've learned quite a bit from your efforts.

Most of my advice came from my own experience, but I've never shot hummers before.  I just extrapolated what I knew to try and fit your situation.  It's another thing entirely to see the images that result from various settings and tweaks.  If you plan another session soon, please let us know!

One more thing...

Matt:

I needed a reflector.

You can still try improvising, but this one's pretty cheap...

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/358610-REG/Impact_R1322_Reflector_Disc_White.html

I actually had a third session Sunday setting the shutter priority at 4000. Interesting thing happened.  I would assume that the camera would keep the same amount of brightness in each shot, just change the aperture to compensate for the change in sunlight.  The panel below are identical areas of cropped background from two successive shots.

Top:        1/4000 ISO-1600 f/13

Bottom:   1/4000 ISO-1600 f/11

Most of my pictures in this session came out like the bottom half which resulted in my birds coming our duller than expected.  The aperture priority had much better results.  

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Latest Birds: Black-throated Green Warbler, Pine Warbler, Eastern Kingbird, Rufous-backed Robin, Crissal Thrasher

lyceel:

One more thing...

Matt:

I needed a reflector.

You can still try improvising, but this one's pretty cheap...

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/358610-REG/Impact_R1322_Reflector_Disc_White.html

I intend on picking this one up this month

http://www.adorama.com/JTFR24GS.html?searchinfo=reflector&item_no=8

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My New Avatar is in memory of Nancy my darling wife of 10 years who passed away on Monday November the 16th 2009 after an illness

My photo gallery http://thekiwi.org/photography/index.php

Matt:

I would assume that the camera would keep the same amount of brightness in each shot, just change the aperture to compensate for the change in sunlight.

That's what it's designed to do.  The smaller f number means a larger aperture, and hence, more light should have been coming in.  Something must have happened to give you less overall available light between the two shots, and then something was going on in the scene to cause the camera to not open the aperture enough to compensate.  It kind of looks like you had direct sun in the top shot and cloudy or diffuse sun in the bottom.  Do you remember what the lighting conditions were between the two shots?

When you say the aperture priority had better results, what do you mean, exactly?  Did you have less vibrant color in the bottom shot?  Was it just totally underexposed?  It seems that hummers have a lot of iridescent plumage, which only shows up well if you have direct, specular lighting (like direct sunlight).  If the sun goes behind a cloud, the lighting becomes diffuse, and the iridescence fades.  I suppose this is yet another advantage of using flash.  I imagine you pretty much have to have direct sun (or an array of flashes) to get enough light for these images.

One more thing you can try is bracketing in manual mode, although it might be a bit tedious.  Switch to manual, set the shutter to 1/4000" and the ISO to 1600 (or 800, if 1600 is too noisy), then take several shots.  Start with an aperture that you know is close to a good exposure level, take one shot.  Set the aperture up by a half stop, and take a second shot.  Then, go down a full stop from there (which is a half stop down from from your first shot) and take a third shot.  I don't know how much time your subjects give you, though, so this idea might not be practical.  Your camera might have an auto-bracketing feature that can help with this.

Also, my suggestions were focused on trying to stop the wings, which they failed to completely do.  If the images you're getting aren't useful for scientific purposes, then you might want to just go back to aperture priority anyway.  You'll probably get nicer images that way, although you won't get the wings at all.

 

I have concluded from these sessions that the camera balances the brightness of the shot better in aperture priority than in shutter priority.  I didn't get any underexposed shots using the aperture priority mode. 

I really don't need to "stop" the wing in mid flight.  When the bird starts to land its wing frequency reduces enough to get a shot usable for identification (see attached).  Note that this guy has pollen on its beak.  

Thanks a bunch for all the guidance. 

Both you and KIWI gave me some good ideas about reflectors.  Will let you know what I come up with. 

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Latest Birds: Black-throated Green Warbler, Pine Warbler, Eastern Kingbird, Rufous-backed Robin, Crissal Thrasher

Well, there you go.  Problem solved! 

I kind of like to see the wings moving.

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Lifer Count: 113
Favorite Lifers: Resplendent Quetzal, Keel Billed Toucan, Blue Crowned Motmot, Crimson Fronted Parakeet, Osprey
Recent Lifers: Cooper's Hawk, Brown Headed Cowbird, Killdeer

FYI--don't know if this was answered already--but when using a tripod you should turn the IS off.  A remote will also help with any other shake.