I’ve got tens of thousands of photos of the Reddish Egrets I see at Ft Desoto Park in St. Petersburg FL. But somehow, every time I go, I seem to get something a little different. I guess that’s what keeps us coming back right?

These egrets run around with the wings up in the air, hopping and floating and diving all morning long. I have so many photos of them above the water or with their head in the water. But I don’t have a good one that’s in between.

I thought the way that you could see its eye was kind of fun. Not to mention the light is absolutely superb here. It was about 30 minutes after sunrise, but some high wispy clouds to diffuse it just a little bit.

Gear, Settings and Post Processing

I used my Sony Alpha 1 with the 600m lens for this one (plus the 1.4 TC). I had my camera set to AF-C. I was using Zone Auto Focus (center position) and the Bird Eye feature was engaged at the time. Though it wouldn’t have made a difference if it wasn’t on at all since I was far enough away from the egret that it would have all been in focus.

I was on Manual Exposure mode at f/5.6, Auto ISO which was at 1250, and 1/3200th sec.

Post processing was done in Lightroom for exposure, cropping, color and toning corrections and a quick trip to Topaz DeNoise AI for some noise reduction. (more on Topaz here)

As always my editing is covered in my Wildlife Editing Secrets Course. Also, you can find links to all of my gear, computers, hard drives, etc… over on the Gear page which can be clicked on in the top menu (or just click here). And it’s always appreciated if you use the links on that page (even if you’re not purchasing that specific item) when buying anything. It doesn’t cost you a penny and it’ll help me out a bit ?

And if you want to learn more about actually photographing the birds, check out “Matt’s Guide to Bird Photography”. People absolutely LOVE this course!

Thanks!