The large, mostly white raptor that cruises over lakes, rivers, and coastal waterways in search of fish. Impressively widespread: found on every continent except Antarctica. Mostly white head and underparts; dark brown back. In-flight holds wings with a kink in the wrist (shaped like an “M”).
– perch near the pond, river, beach-ready to catch fish for food
The osprey or more specifically the western osprey (Pandion haliaetus) — also called sea hawk, river hawk, and fish hawk — is a diurnal, fish-eatingbird of prey with a cosmopolitan range. It is a large raptor, reaching more than 60 cm (24 in) in length and 180 cm (71 in) across the wings. It is brown on the upperparts and predominantly greyish on the head and underparts.
Striking and essentially unmistakable, with elegant shape, boldly pied plumage, long bluish-gray legs, and long, slender, upcurved bill. Curve is stronger on female. Usually breeds in small colonies; nesting birds call noisily. Nonbreeding flocks locally number in hundreds. Feeds while wading or swimming, sweeping its bill side to side. Most common in coastal wetlands and brackish lagoons and estuaries, but will also appear inland, particularly on or near large lakes. (Ebird)
Normally refer weavers, weaverbirds, weaver finches and bishops. These names come from the nests of intricately woven vegetation created by birds in this family.
1. Baya Weaver, 黄胸织雀, 黃胸織布鳥, Ploceus philippinus, キムネコウヨウジャク, Burung Tempua
non native male with bright yellow head
update
– the male having bright yellow head, female dull overall dull brown. Normally moving in group with munia
– 公鸟，头部黄。母鸟全浅棕色。通常是群体活动。
20240106, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
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– pretty common at open grassland and paddy field. male with bright yellow crown.
– another hot day at Paddy field and all of sudden, saw this bird carrying a long leaf flying toward us.
– a slightly complicated species to be ID among Edible-nest (which also either white-nest or Germain), Black-nest & Mossy-nest which best to id by their nest build
– for Penisular Malaysia, many believe the mix of White-nest Swiftlet (Aerodramus fuciphagus) and Germain’s Swiftlet (Aerodramus germani) or some study claims North – germani and South – fuciphagus
– a slightly complicated species to be ID among Edible-nest (which also either white-nest or Germain), Black-nest & Mossy-nest which best to id by their nest build
– for Penisular Malaysia, many believe the mix of White-nest Swiftlet (Aerodramus fuciphagus) and Germain’s Swiftlet (Aerodramus germani) or some study claims North – germani and South – fuciphagus
– shy and not difficult to be found at most the islands near Sabah
update 202404
– a casual relax short break with only camera and myself .. managed to have few good birds and enjoy my cold drink with beautiful beach view. Lucky to have few birds included this use to be shy bird and came out feeding without worry about me.
– a special almost represent Sulawesi as almost any where you can see symbol
A massive black-and-white megapode with a rose-pink breast and a diagnostic prominent knob on the nape. Found in lowland and hill forest, in areas near beaches or areas with volcanic sands in which they lay their eggs. Immatures show a blacker head with a white throat and a tufted crest. Occurs in pairs that forage on the ground and roost in trees by night. Often best seen at known egg-laying sites, either during laying sessions, or roosting in trees nearby. Generally silent, but occasionally gives a loud, bubbling “waow.” [Ebird]
update 202310
– another main target for a short Photography tour, not really a difficult bird to be seen but it stay far from the hide and very alert with sounds. But there are few individual come to the ranger area which gave some close pictures.
One of the reasons to own 8k video most probably is to crop the video like this one to get more clarity (but I didn’t reduce it to 4k just want to show 8k video and zoom in)
let’s have a look at 4k and tell me how’s this video looks like? very good? good? normal?
I am glad to be given a chance to be tried on the Fujifilm XF70-300mmF4-5.6 R LM OIS WR. Even though we don’t have that many opportunities to do more tests on this setup because of the Covid-19 lockdown.
for quick sharing from Fujifilm XF70-300mmF4-5.6 R LM OIS WR Liew WK – Lens Stories
For birding Photography, we always concern about on few camera and lens specifications
1. Image Quality
– how sharp and how’s the ISO performance
– with Teleconverter Image quality
2. Autofocus performance
– how fast the autofocus, how accurate autofocus, and how good is the tracking capability
3. Weather-resistant, Weight and Size
– no one can deny bigger lens (longer and bigger aperture) will give you better image quality but we need to know how much we can tolerate with Image quality drop with the size and weight reduce.
– most of the bird photography here (Tropical rainforest – Malaysia) involves a lot of tracking, walking, hiking so it is not really a good choice to carry heavy equipment to long hours to do bird photography here.
Some Extra Features
4. Minimum Focus Distance
– most of the Bird photographers also a nature lover who may also capture many other creatures (butterfly, snake, etc
– minimum focus distance of 0.83 which give magnification 0.33
5. Image stabilization
– I can’t comment much as not really do a lot of testing on this but some of the dark conditions where I shoot ~600mm at 1/10-1/30s also give a very good success rate but for my comfort. 1/100 is a base shutter speed to get a very high success rate for myself.
I also captured some videos handheld
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Very low light condition
ISO1600, F8.0, 1/30
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1. Image Quality
– with previous testing on the Fujifilm equipments
– as previous testing share, the X-T4 AF performance FAST, accurate and tracking is good too.
– I won’t share any single point AF here as all others above are using AFS or single focus but here I am sharing what I am concern about continuous focus for both lock focus & tracking capability
– Both above Loglight Condition sharing pictures were captured in very low light condition and AF is still fast and accurate for AFS
All pictures below captured with AFC – continuous focus and Zone (almost full screen). [I let the camera and lens decide to lock the object and track without any additional setting change]
i. Terns
– many of them flying far and near with moderate speed but in any direction under the hot sun
– most of the focus can lock fast and continuous tracking the bird by the next 1-2 s as the tern fly out from the frame
– it is almost no fail to lock focus when the birds flying with blue/white sky and sea background which has enough contrast
– it is getting difficult to lock focus when a bird flies into the frame where the background is green
– this owl all of a sudden fly out from the small palm oil plantation- the focus lock fast but the tracking miss 50% intermittent as it is flying toward me fast and close (some of the focus frame lock on the wing but not the head).*** the tracking may able to improve by some AF setting. as the focus locking is fast enough to focus again after miss out of focus within 1-2s flying toward me seriesFujifilm X-T4, Fujifilm XF70300, TC 1.4x [434mm, ISO800 F.8.0 1/1250]
– This is a special case where this hornbill standing on a building wall. So make use of the continuous focus & tracking mode. Even the bird is near the tracking work since the bird begins flying until it missing into a tree.
– the moment happens just ~2s, while I am shooting 7fps. and the focus just miss 2 frame
– it is very difficult to capture swift picture due to normally they are flying fast, all different direction
– success rate is not very high due to the flying speed very fast and accelerates in any direction for feeding. But the camera and lens still able to lock the focus as long as my position is at the right position.
– due to the APS-C sensor size the lens design in a smaller size compared to an equivalent 35mm equivalent lens (100-400mm)
– the lens with X-T4 which is 607g (including battery and SD memory card)
– 1.4x TC
with such focal length 107mm to 457mm or (107mm to 457mm)x1.4 or x2)
look at the size
4. Minimum Focus Distance
– this lens can take a photo at a minimum focus distance of 0.83 which give magnification 0.33 think this is also good for some butterfly, big object macro
– Adobe Camera RAW 12.4, same recovery and other parameters for the same test
*** I found the Dynamic Range setting not just affect JPEG output, but also affects the data inside the RAW files. So testing also included DR100 (off), DR200 (suppose reserve highlight exposure 1 stop) & DR400 (suppose reserve highlight exposure 2 stop)
But check out the RAW files recovery result below !!! it is some magic that happens !!!
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1. Highlight Recovery Test
1A. Highlight Recovery Test: Dynamic Range setting
– make sure of in Camera setting to protect Highlight details
Even with the direct JPEG output, the highlight details have been protected (DR200 1 stop and DR400 2 stops). But let’s have a look at the RAW file recovery
LEFT: DR100
CENTER: DR200
RIGHT: DR400
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1B. Highlight Recovery Test: RAW files recovery
Test1: Highlight recovery from RAW files
– ISO1000, F5.6, 1/15 – this makes the picture +4 (4 stops overexpose)
– Adobe Camera Raw recovery. [Highlight -100%, Exposure -3.00]
#
Test1Bi. Highlight recovery, DR100 (DR off)
– All setting same as mentioned above
– DR100
– LEFT: Direct JPEG from Camera
CENTER: RAW
RIGHT: recovery setting as above and save as JPEG
#
Test1Bii. Highlight recovery, DR200
– All setting same as mentioned above
– DR200
– LEFT: Direct JPEG from Camera
CENTER: RAW
RIGHT: recovery setting as above and save as JPEG
#
Test1Bii. Highlight recovery, DR400
– All setting same as mentioned above
– DR400
– LEFT: Direct JPEG from Camera
CENTER: RAW
RIGHT: recovery setting as above and save as JPEG
#
Here’s come the magic of the RAW file and the Dynamic Range settings !!!!
– Look at the right face of the toy & background paper beg
– the DR400 not just protect highlight data in JPEG but in the RAW file, preserve more than what we expect (3 stops + 100% hight recovery)
DR400DR200DR100
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2. Shadow Recovery Test
– 5 stops underexpose
– ISO800, F5.6, 1/8000
– DR100, 200, 400
– below are JPEG direct output from Camera
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Test2A. Shadow recovery
Test1: Highlight recovery from RAW files
– ISO800, F5.6, 1/8000
– this makes the picture -5 (5 stops underexpose)
– Adobe Camera Raw recovery. [Exposure +5.00]
#
As the discussion of Dynamic Range is to protect Highlight data of the pictures. But I still go ahead with my test with DR100, 200 & 400
#
Test2Ai. Shadow recovery, DR100
Test2Ai. Shadow recovery, DR200
Test2Ai. Shadow recovery, DR400
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For the 5 stops Shadow recovery, most of the details of the focused object still intact.
But when we turn on the Dynamic Range (DR200 & 400) gives an impact on the RAW files. Something really weird where DR400 actually give negative impact which produces more color noise and purple tint when exposure recovery
#
So we need 2 settings for Highlight & Shadow recovery
1. Highlight recovery: Highly recommend Turn on DR400
2. Shadow recovery: Highly recommended Turn of DR which is DR100
1. Greater Painted-Snipe, 彩鹬, 彩鷸, Rostratula benghalensis, タマシギ, MERAGI BIASA
– very beautiful bird
– abnormal breeding behavior where the male will taking care after lay egg
– very shy bird
update 202105
– casual lazy birding, driving around. but not a bad morning at all, found this pair of the lovely couple.
– male and female are also beautiful. the one focus is female
