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RENIER LE ROUX

Nikon D750

Nikon 70 – 200 mm lens

RENIER WRITES: I photographed these Cape cormorants in Strand in January. I usually take landscape photos so I wasn’t sure about the settings I should use. I did know I needed a fast shutter speed – in this case it was 1/2 000 second. The widest aperture my camera would allow at that speed was f4, ISO 100.

I later realised it would have been easier to shoot using aperture priority mode, not manual. And maybe my photo would have been sharper had I used a tripod – the birds were moving fast.

TOAST SAYS: A tripod doesn’t help much with an action photo because you need to be able to move your camera and quickly re-frame as required. Your friend in a situation like this is a really fast shutter speed, as you also noted.