Cluck cluck

Yes, it's show time again! November is the big open show of the year at the local poultry fancier's club. Apparently people travel the length and breadth of the country to get there. And I thought anglers were mad.

There's a problem with going to an event time after time in that you either run out of ideas for pictures or start repeating yourself. On the other hand there is also the chance, admittedly slim, that you'll get so bored of taking the same old pictures that you'll get all wacky and start trying off the wall ideas. They don't always work...

This time I decided to stop until people were packing up to see if any new opportunities would arise. Once the presentations were over it was bedlam in the show shack. People everywhere carting large crates of fowl around. Hardly any room to move, let alone swing a camera. Still, chickens are endlessly inquisitive and entertaining. All you need is good timing.

I had hoped the end of the show might be a time to get a few shots of people with their fowl, but all they want to do is get away. I'd tried a few people/chicken shots earlier but the backgrounds are always cluttered, with insufficient room for a wide aperture to work it's blurry magic, making framing shots tricky. The light is too low to keep the ISO down, too. I guess flash might be the answer, but it goes against my nature to use it.

Once more I was using my fast zoom. The results can be okay, but for some reason I tended to stop it down a bit too much and buggered up a few shots through too high ISO. Okay at screen size but I'm not sure how well they'd print. Not as badly buggered as one would-have-been-good shot that looked like it had been taken in thick fog. I hadn't realised the shack was so warm and the lens misted up as soon as it came in from the cold. My specs doing the same should have given me a clue...

I don't know why it should be that I feel happier using two bodies with fixed focal length lenses on them instead of one body with a zoom that covers both lengths and more. But I do prefer using my feet to alter my framing over turning a zoom ring. Maybe it's because it makes you think more about framing shots? Or maybe I'm kidding myself?

Obligatory gallery here.

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