Pierre Steenberg

Subject's size in the frame

January 12, 2025 • Leave a Comment

There use to be an old adage in photography which said: If your images are not good enough, you are not close enough. The idea was to fill the frame. To a large extent, I still agree with this adage. Where I diverge from it is what to fill the frame with. If I take an image of a bird and I fill the frame with only the bird I may have a very good im...

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All the actors

January 05, 2025 • Leave a Comment

A huge herd of buffalo was coming to the water to drink. Photographing big herds can be challenging. If the big herd itself is your subject then perhaps show its numbers. But if you are not focusing on the herd as a subject, isolating individual members can be difficult. There never seems to be a clean shot as the background is cluttered with fello...

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Harsh light, cloudy day - just wait

December 29, 2024 • Leave a Comment

It is a cloudy day but not overcast. The sun is bright and harsh. These are not ideal conditions for flower or butterfly images (see the blog a few weeks back about making the best of such lighting conditions). Do we give up and stop photographing? I think not! This image was taken on exactly such a day. Based on the blog that I referred to abov...

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Break the pattern

December 22, 2024 • Leave a Comment

When something is different it draws our attention. If you look at a tray full of green apples with just one red apple in the mix, where are your eyes going to look? If ten lions all look into the same direction and one lion looks elsewhere, which lion are you going to look at? We seem to be attracted to that which is different. However, that is on...

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Shoot, shoot, shoot

December 15, 2024 • Leave a Comment

Birds move around quickly. I have seen many photographers take one image only to examine and admire that image on the rear screen or through the view finder. Then they take another image and do the same. The problem with that is that for every second that you are looking at an image already taken you are missing the opportunity to take more images,...

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Backgrounds matter

December 08, 2024 • Leave a Comment

At the entrance of the reception area I noticed the orange plant. You have to understand, I am ALWAYS looking for images. I was thinking about taking an image of the flowers when I saw the bird flying in. That orange plant is the food of the bird! It was evident that, that bird is going to come back over and over again. My brain was spinning, think...

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Back and rim lit butterfly

December 01, 2024 • Leave a Comment

Last week we spoke about photographing butterflies in harsh light. We highlighted turning that kind of light into a back lit shooting opportunity. Under certain circumstances we can also get some rim-lighting. Is it possible thought, to get both back lighting and rim-lighting at the same time? Well, technically speaking rim-light is back lighting....

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Back lit butterfly

November 24, 2024 • Leave a Comment

The best light for insect photography, such as butterflies, is overcast but bright light. The next best light is using a flash while the insects are in the shade. Often times we create that shade by using a large diffuser for our flash. This creates both the shadow over the insect and the soft light from the flash. But what are we to do when we see...

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The classic clean bird shot

November 17, 2024 • Leave a Comment

Last week we talked about taking images that tell a story. The story we told was of a Magpie Shrike. But what about that classic clean bird shot? Have those gone out of favor? Perhaps so, at least as far as winning bird photography competitions are concerned. But does that mean that, that classic clean bird image is not pleasing and should we avoid...

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Tell the story

November 10, 2024 • Leave a Comment

No every bird is best displayed in portrait form. Portraits don't show a long tail or the habitat. Portraits don't always tell the story. Don't get me wrong, there is a place for a good portrait. Things just get boring if every image is a portrait though. Take the Magpie Shrike, for example. They like to perch and then to look down as they look for...

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