I was down on the flats shooting the Swallows on a gorgeous morning. Off in the distance is home, the Sierra Mountains, still snow capped and in that filtered light – simply gorgeous. Then up the river I see a White Pelican lift off the water. I throw the D500 / 300PF up to my eye, gently touch the shutter release activating the AF system (in Auto Area AF), the system locked on and I let it rip, and rip, and rip and rip hoping the Pelican’s flight path would put it in front of our home.
There was no way to know if the Pelican’s flight path would take it with the background I wanted when it first lifted off. If I waited to put the camera up to my eye once I saw the background, by the time the camera locked on and I took the photo, there is a good chance that the background would be loss. So shooting the D5 or in this case, the D500 with that basically unlimited buffer, I let ‘er rip! As you can see, there are 102 shots from this series from lift off to the rude butt shot (that’s a lot of sharp images!). Now this kind of photography, of just letting ‘er rip is a luxury, wasn’t that long ago that wasn’t an option. Now while not the greatest photograph, to me, seeing this cool bird over our home makes it special. Having gear that can capture special memories is important since photography is all about memories. Cause it’s not every day you see White Pelicans over snow!