Ready to be amazed?

... by how thoroughly underwhelming after sunset bird pics are. I've been pretty ill for the last week or so, so I decided that some late fresh air would do me good. I headed to Black Hole Marsh in case the Barn Owl decided to show. It did, but not until around 20:00 which on a very overcast day, meant that it was dark (actually fairly dark rather than just dull). I took a couple of TERRIBLE pics of it at quite a distance. I certainly needed the f2.8 of my new lens even though the 200mm focal length at the long end was about 600mm too short... Nevermind though, at least I did see it so it could been worse. Slightly.

I took quite a few other pics for the hour or so I was there. I'm surprised by how 'okay' I can make some of the pics look in post production with saturation fiddling and noise reduction etc (colours 'appear' nearly B&W when it's dark, but RAW data from picture files can go a long way at making them look 'better').

Here's the shots; all taken after 7pm (some after 8pm). General ISO setting was 800 - 1600 (I DESPISE using ISO this high on my camera bodies. Any photographer who works on a budget of some kind will know why!), and shutter speeds were disgustingly low. Definitely beats staying in ill at home though! :)

More pics (and a little bit of good news regarding the River Coly...) from the weekend to follow soon.