Catch me if you can

That is a Spielberg movie title. The challenge here is not trivial either. This is the scene of colony of Swallows at Rangana Thittu (in South India) where hundreds of Swallows nest together every year under this sloping rock in the middle of water. I made a frontal picture of the entire colony a year back. This time, I wanted to capture action. I asked the boatman to pull the boat to the side so that I can get a side view of Swallows as they enter the nest.

The next 15 minutes has been one of my first experiences of "blind shooting". The Swallows approach the nest from random angle at fast speeds and leave without a warning. The only response I had was to push the ISO to 3200 and shoot blindly whenever the autofocus was able to latch on to something. I might have made 60 images. When I look at them, there are many interesting blurs but none that can actually depict the scene of many Swallows flying in and out. Finally I settled on this picture where there is more than one Swallow and some flight action. Given a chance I want to try this challenge again. Would be happy to hear guidance on how to handle such situations.


PP Technique: Contrast adjustment. Cropping of 10% at bottom right.

Technial Details: Canon 6D, Canon 100-400 at 400mm, ISO 3200, F 6.3, 1/400