USE SINGLE-POINT FOCUS, SPOT METERING, AND AUTO ISO
When you use a lot of focus points, you’re just as likely to get a twig or branch
near the bird in focus, rather than the bird itself. If you are photographing
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with the moving subject. Since the bird may be against a very dark or very
bright background, you don’t want an exposure mode that balances the whole
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metering for exposure.
Some bird photographers will dispute using Auto ISO, but my goal is to get the
sharpest shot possible, with as little noise as possible. I’d love to be able to set
ISO to the minimum (ISO 100 on my camera), but that’s not realistic for darker
lighting situations. Auto ISO will always choose the lowest usable setting; one
option is to set a maximum ISO of about 800, though when doing so, I’ve run
into conditions where I lost shots: The shutter wouldn’t snap because the light
was too low.
TAKE ADVANTAGE OF EXPOSURE COMPENSATION
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compensation setting to, well, compensate for that.
USE CONTINUOUS FOCUS
On Canon gear, this is called AI Servo, and on Nikon and Sony systems, it’s
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acquired, even for long bursts of shots and even if the bird moves. For best
results, familiarize yourself with your camera’s focus system, since they vary
by manufacturer.
CHOOSE RAW FILE FORMAT
Since you’re most likely going to need to adjust lighting, you’ll want all the data
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shoot to this format, you’ll be able to recover a lot more information in dark
areas of the image that you want to bring out with photo editing software.