Taking Flight

Miguel Lasa may be a physician by training, but he’s a top wildlife photographer by avocation

By Mike Stensvold, Photography By Miguel Lasa

Ospreys are one of Lasa’s specialties. These raptors dive feet-first into shallow water to snag fish, their primary source of food. Capturing the action is a challenge. One secret: Try to find a smaller body of water, so the osprey has to dive in near you.

The Right Stuff
Like most bird pros, Lasa uses pro D-SLRs and lenses. “You need a fast shooting rate to ensure that you get a shot or two with the wings in the right position,” he explains. Obviously, a quick and accurate AF system also is essential. Lasa uses a 10 fps Canon EOS-1D Mark III for flight shots, and he has many colleagues who use pro Nikon models, which are excellent for flight shots, too. Lasa uses a full-frame EOS-1Ds Mark II for environmental shots (photos of birds in their environment can add variety to a portfolio of tight action shots) and even an EOS 40D (with its 1.6x crop factor) for bird portraits. (Interestingly, his award-winning polar bear shot was made with the 40D.)

“When you’re in a blind, any noise—even that of changing lenses—can cause the birds to leave,” Lasa says. “So a telephoto-zoom can provide some noiseless compositional flexibility, letting you bring distant birds closer and also capture nearer ones without clipping fully spread wings.” That said, Lasa uses pro 300mm ƒ/2.8 and 500mm ƒ/4 prime lenses, and thus has to make an educated guess as to which will work better from the blind for a given situation.

Unless he’s deliberately trying for a blur effect, Lasa uses higher shutter speeds, at least 1/1000 sec. He adjusts his ISO, generally between 200 and 800, as the light changes to maintain a fast shutter speed. His fast pro lenses also help here.

“For best image quality, it’s better to expose properly at a higher ISO than to underexpose at a lower one,” says Lasa. “I switch to ISO 800 if 400 won’t give me at least 1/1000.”

He uses shutter-priority AE mode, so he can be sure of having a fast enough shutter speed. He also likes the artistic background blur of wide apertures, so he adjusts his ISO to allow him to use the desired shutter-speed/aperture combination in the existing light level.

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Richard Dumoulin makes this comment

Tuesday, 22 September 2009

Part II (see previous comment) The snowy owl become used to feeding by the man and they "cry" for more mouse (see the majestic photo of the snowy owl on page 3 - this is exacly an image of a snowy crying for a mouse... in the wild a snowy owl will never approach you and never do that). The snowy owls became domesticated last winter and they followed people around "crying" for mouse. This thing did happen in Ontario and the local photographers there were not happy at all. Now the business has moved to Quebec. We are not happy at all. I personally perfer to wait 4 hours in the cold and snow to take a photo of a wild bird. Domestic snowy owl can be photographer at the zoo. Don't make money domesticating wildlife bird for rich photographers. Please respect nature and wildlife.
Richard Dumoulin makes this comment

Tuesday, 22 September 2009

Hi! Good article but not all the truth. I live in Quebec Canada where most of the snowy owl photos have been made. Local photographer respect the snowy owl, it is the bird that represent Quebec. I have seen M. Lasa's workshop in action. No need for patience or a long lens. They were using baits (live mouse) to get the snowy owl at 10-15 feets from the group. A mouse was thrown in the snow every 10-15 minutes. If you want my advice, these are easy shots.
Svetla Yankova makes this comment

Thursday, 09 July 2009

Exceptionally!
Manos Papadomanolakis makes this comment

Thursday, 09 July 2009

Really beautiful pictures.......big congrats!!!
Ashley makes this comment

Thursday, 25 June 2009

these are some really beautiful pictures. you guys did an awesome job photographing these birds. keep doing your job.
Bob Walker makes this comment

Thursday, 04 June 2009

Absolutely fantastic images and a very informative article.
Robert M makes this comment

Tuesday, 26 May 2009

Nice! Love the pictures.

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Taking Flight

Miguel Lasa may be a physician by training, but he’s a top wildlife photographer by avocation

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