Setting daily goals is a great way to improve your photography It's a simple and reliable technique to focus your energies on the matter at hand--making great images. Goal setting is used by all sorts of people for many different purposes since it's quite effective for achieving a specific objective. I routinely set goals for myself whenever I begin a day of shooting. I start the day looking forward for a certain portrait, maybe it's a mountain range with alpine light cresting it's peaks, it could be anything. I start the day hoping to achieve my goal by the time the night comes.

This month's image was the result of a "trip" goal. I began my last adventure to Bosque del Apache with the goal to shoot a portait of a Sandhill Crane while in-flight. I wanted the image at anytime during the trip and didn't restrict it to any particular day. While an extremely open goal, it did remind me every morning I had an objective to achieve. This daily reminder tended to focus my energies. It meant when the opportunity presented itself, needed to shoot with the greatest magnification my equipment could muster. With my D1h and it's 1.5x magnification of the image--it's really a 67% crop of a full framed 35mm sensor but that's another story--I could get a 900mm equivelant lens with my 600mm f/4 AF-S. Add to that my matched 2x teleconverter, I could get 1800mm's. That's a lot lens. Special care and skill to properly utilized such a monster configuration was needed.

Extra planning was used to accomondate this configuration. I had to carefully pick a time when the sun was bright enough to let me set a fairly small aperture yet still not have to deal with overpowering mid-day light. I also had to choose a location that was active late in the morning. That's a lot to think about, even then I couldn't guarentee my subject would fly where I wanted it. Natural subjects work on their own agendas. They have their own minds and work they're own way. The best planning in the world can't overcome the lack of a cooperative subject or suitable weather. That's why I say "if at first you don't succeed, try, try again". Okay, I didn't invent the phrase but it sure applies here.

One last bit of technical info about this image. There are many self-described experts that loath using tele-converters. They say image quality simply isn't good enough. I say bunk! For my purposes, they work great. There are a couple difficulties such as the auto-focus not advertised to work with my 2x converter and 600mm f/4 lens. Despite that I've found when the light is great enough auto-focus will work most the time. It's not perfect but as you can see, you can coax enough performance out of the gear to get some amazing images. As before, it seems planning is the key to get the conditions where the lens combination will function suitably. If you happen to watch an accomplished photographer do his work, it may seem to the casual observer he simply showed up at a location and started firing away making great image after great image. As we can see now, lots of planning, including something as simple as setting goals are basic tools any photographer can use.

Cheers

Tom Hill