Why Avifaunatics?

I’ve been a keen photographer for many years, gravitating towards nature and wildlife over time, falling in love with birdlife - the avifauna - particularly. Birds are fascinating in every way: each subspecies evolutionary optimising for their niche in often fragile ecosystems. They endure the harshest of conditions, just to raise their offspring this season, starting all over next with the same unbreakable will to survive.

Watching and photographing birds is also a very aesthetically pleasing endeavour: their elegance in flight, their perfect looks and lovely plumage, and the amazing display of their beauty each spring when the breeding season begins.

And then there is the photographic challenge. It’s sports photography on steroids as it requires similar technical skills plus the required patience and then sudden action that nature and wildlife ask of us.

I’m a big fan of our avian friends - a true avifaunatic. I’m sharing my photographic work, hoping to spark a little avifauna fascination in you as well. Thank you visiting this site.

The following sections mention people, brands and products and may therefore be considered advertising – albeit without anything in return from those being advertised.
It is just my way of saying thank you: to many talented photographers from whom I was able to learn and to the many engineers and developers in the optics industry and adjacent fields who give us outstanding tools so that we can capture and share the beauty of nature and thus make a small contribution to its preservation.

Inspiration

The best way to learn and be inspired is to look at other photographers’ work. Here are my personal favourites whose advice and knowledge sharing has been invaluable to my own development of skills and technique, choice of gear and strategies to find, watch and photograph wildlife. I’m leaning towards Canon shooters as I’m using some of the same gear.

Jan Wegener

Famous for his clean backdrops, love for parrots and lots of other Australian species, and for his stunning image edits.

Jan is a fabulous bird photographer, editing master teacher and Youtuber. I use 97% of Jan’s settings on my cameras.

Simon D’Entremont

Another Canadian on my list of favourite influentials and inspirers. Great at explaining the basics and the sophisticated.

Simon’s images of birds of North America and of African mammals just look gorgeous.

Fabian Fopp

Swiss nature photographer and biologist with a keen eye for birds and alpine mammals such as ibex and chamois.

Fabian often shares insightful field work experience on Youtube and illustrates it with his outstanding images.

Steve Perry

Runs a very successful Youtube channel and shoots North American and African nature and wildlife (mostly mammals and birds).

Steve’s technique tips have been super helpful! He is a Nikon guy, and highly recommended for users of other brands too.

Glenn Bartley

World traveller in pursuit of birds in their habitat. Living in Canada, loving Latin America. Has very rich ornithology knowledge.

Glenn partners with Jan on The Bird Photography Show on Youtube, a regular must-see.

Hermann Hirsch and Jan Leßmann

Hermann and Jan and their very creative and artistic photography drive my appreciation of nature close to home which one easily overlooks.

With ZEITWEISE, they feature other great nature photographers like Karsten Mosebach, Klaus Tamm, Levi Fitze, etc.

Duade Paton

“Get down low” - Duade is never shy of lying down in the mud and that shines in his awesome waterfowl photos.

Duade confirms you don’t need the latest and greatest gear, occasionally proving it with his trusty 40D and 400 f/5.6.

Radomir Jakubowski

Radomir covers a pretty broad nature photography spectrum: intimate landscapes, mammals, amphibia, flora etc.

I love his bokeh-loaded macro flower photography, for which he also uses the RF 135 f/1.8 lens whose look I adore as well.

Tim and Charlotte Parkin

My primary inspiration for habitat photos (aka landscape) is Tim’s and Charlotte’s curation of fabulous photography in On Landscape.

A subscription means easy access to the best landscape photographers like Joe Cornish, Guy Tal, Rachael Talibart, David Ward, Keith Bevan and many others.

Gear talk

Gear does not matter, it’s the photographer who makes the photograph - not just takes it as the famous Ansel Adams quote goes. And yet, in nature and wildlife photography, gear does matter to a certain extent. There is nothing that can beat long focal length when it comes to capturing images of skittish or dangerous animals without disturbing them. And, besides the photographer’s technique and artistic expression, image quality is a function of sensor size, lens technology and processing capacity. Plus, if technology fascinates you like it does me, why not upgrade over time?

  • I’ve been a Canon shooter since 1987. My first serious camera was from the then brand-new EOS analog SLR series an EOS 650. I went digital with an EOS 400D, then upgraded to semi-pro level with a 7D - its APS-C format was great for wildlife - and then full frame with a 5D Mark IV that opened up a new world of image quality. Going mirrorless with an R5 and an R6, and most recently an R5 Mark II, again provided more options in terms of autofocus, speed, etc.

  • The lens portfolio gradually shifted with camera technology, from kit lens to mid-range zooms, to wider aperture L series primes. Actually, I’ve always been more willing to spend on better glass than on upgrading cameras.

    Finding birds in the first place often requires good spotting optics. ZEISS Victory SF binos are trusted companions.

    For habitat / landscape images, I try to get it right in camera and therefore rely on the Lee 100 filter system.

  • This is about schlepping (too much) gear around, for which I rely on F-stop backpacks and Peak Design straps, clips and other carry gear.

    While handheld shooting even with larger lenses has become way more convenient due to lens makers designing for weight savings, good stabilisation is still an important contributor to image quality. I use tripods and monopods by Gitzo, Manfrotto, Sachtler and Ulanzi & Coman, along with heads by Wimberley and Benro.

    LensCoat covers and raincoats protect my gear in the field - there is no such thing as bad weather.

  • My primary workflow software stack consists of

    1. FastRawViewer for culling

    2. DxO Pure Raw for initial RAW processing and denoising

    3. Capture One as primary editor

    Occasional editing is done with Adobe Lightroom and Nik Collection for some final touches.

    Video editing relies on Final Cut Pro X and DaVinci Resolve - I’m still a bit undecided between the two.