Seriously I didn’t! I heard it though, those throaty engines you can hear from a long way off. I was literally lying in the sand having a great time photographing shorebirds like the Sanderling and Black-belied Plover below. Planes weren’t even on my mind, just birds. But then I heard the C-130 which we had seen a couple of days prior flying really low as we ate breakfast. With the sound, I took my eye from the viewfinder and saw it was coming right down the beach in our direction. I knew I wasn’t going to be able to stand up fast enough to make the shot and I wanted the shot so, I went into aviation photographer mode for a moment. I had to get my shutter speed down and fast to get prop blur. I needed to change AF mode. I cranked the aperture down to f/40 giving me 1/30 and I hit the i button and switched to AAAF. I then put the BIG bird in the viewfinder and until my chin was a couple inches in the sand panning with it, I shot. It’s a fun, simple shot I like and afterward, went right back to the little birds. The moral, gotta be prepared because often in photography, we didn’t see that coming!
