Taking bird photos was tough with film. You could take portraits of birds that held still. But birds move. A lot. Worse, they fly. Getting a good picture of a flying bird required wasting money to develop one blurred shot after another.
In the 80s and 90s, Nikon single lens reflex cameras were the workhorse tools for bird photography. (And for photojournalism.) When Audubon magazine published the winning photos of their annual contest, picture after picture came from a Nikon. But Canon pushed hard and by 2000, the Canon name appeared next to many of the winners.
Charge-coupled devices (CCDs) were developed by the military. A U2 spy plane could shoot film, return to an airbase, and have the film developed. But spy satellites could not send film back to earth. The military needed to record photons of light on tiny electronic pixels (picture elements) and beam the information to the ground. The circuit board that holds pixels is a sensor. Initially these gizmos cost a fortune. As costs fell, professional astronomers started using CCDs instead of film. Eventually CCDs shrank in size and cost and were stuffed into cameras. Kodak could no longer sell Kodachrome.
I have been an amateur photographer for most of my life. The death of film was unsettling for me and for several years I gave up photography. The new digital cameras that were affordable produced fuzzy images. To get good detail, you needed to cough up a small fortune. And the technology was changing fast; I was reluctant to invest in a camera system that might be quickly out of date.
By the 2010s, bird photographers moved on to digital single lens reflex cameras. They were using Nikons and Canons. More and more pixels were placed on sensors, so images showed more detail and better color.
Lenses also improved. They now contain small electric motors that move glass pieces to bring a bird into focus. Tiny motors also control the amount of light that comes through the lens. Modern lenses automatically adjust the opening (aperture) that lets light in. When you use a modern camera, some of the photo process is now controlled by a computer chip.
Lenses improved in other ways. They are now designed with computers. They use new types of glass which improve light transmission. They are astonishing in complexity; for example, the lens I use most for bird photos (in early 2024) is Fujifilm’s 150-600mm lens. This lens has 24 different glass elements in 17 groups. These lenses are now routinely manufactured in rugged designs that can be carried easily.
Another big advance was image stabilization. When you point a long telephoto lens, it is hard to control camera shake which can blur the picture. You can use a tripod, but tripods are heavy and take time to set up. You can use a faster shutter speed; but that reduces the amount of light hitting the sensor. The new technology puts tiny motors into the camera body, the lens, or both. Electric motors move lens parts or the sensor to compensate for your shaky movements. These compensations are made many times per second. It is now easier to get a sharp image without a tripod or a fast shutter speed.
In the last decade, camera companies have added algorithms so that you can set the camera to recognize and focus on certain objects. My cameras can be adjusted to search for a human face, or human eyes, or the right or the left eye of a human. Seriously! Other objects have been added to this focusing list: trains, airplanes, automobiles, bicycles, animals, and … wait for it … birds! When I point my camera at a bird, the viewfinder shows a little green box which is centered over the bird it is focusing on. This borders on magic.
Marie Read published “Mastering Bird Photography” in 2019. Her superb book lists specific Nikon and Canon digital single lens reflex (DSLR) cameras that she recommends and she gives detailed advice about the settings for those cameras. But her advice was soon out-of-date. In a DSLR camera, the light comes through the lens and falls on a mirror. The mirror reflects the light to the viewfinder, so you can see what the camera’s digital sensor will “see” when the mirror flips up out of the way. But the mirror, so useful in film cameras, is not needed in a digital camera. Instead, the viewfinder can electronically “see” whatever the sensor sees. Without a mirror, the cameras could be lighter, cheaper, and smaller. DSLR cameras are being replaced by mirrorless designs.
Another change that overtook Read’s book is the growth of Sony cameras. Sony builds wonderful sensors, terrific autofocus algorithms, and great lenses. The top-tier bird-photo cameras are now made by Canon, Nikon, and Sony. On the web, I found that Read has started using Sony gear. The leading cameras for birds are arguably these, with January 2024 prices from B&H Photo.
- Canon EOS R3: $5000
- Nikon Z9: $5500
- Sony a1: $6500
- Sony a9III: $6000
These are all amazing cameras. The first 3 appeared in 2022, the Sony a9III in 2023. They will do everything short of finding birds and bringing them to your home. They are all mirrorless cameras with “full-frame” sensors, meaning the sensor dimensions are the same as an old 35mm film negative: 24mm x 36mm.
In 2023 I went on four instructional bird walks with expert bird photographers, one amateur and three with professional experience. Two used a Canon EOS R5 camera ($3400), one used a Nikon Z9, and the fourth used an older Nikon. A camera requires a lens. A great bird lens for a Canon mirrorless body would be the Canon 600mm f/4: $13,000. Serious bird photographers can sell their first-born and purchase this lens.
Another advance is that film development has been replaced by computer software. Programs such as Adobe Lightroom allow a photographer to control the exposure, colors, and other details of a picture at a reasonable cost. On a computer, it is easy to store and search your photos; much easier than pawing through the Kodachrome slides in my garage.
In summary, modern digital cameras offer:
1. Sensors that can surpass 35mm film for sharpness.
2. Fast shutter speeds.
3. Up to 120 images per second.
4. Automatic focusing, with algorithms for birds.
5. Automatic exposure adjustment.
6. Image stabilization.
7. Remarkable optics.
8. No costs for film and minimal costs for film processing and storage.
For a discussion of my personal camera gear, see “My camera gear.”
An update in June 2025
What cameras do leading bird photographers use now? I recently purchased a book of bird photographs: Will Nichols and Paul Sterry, Editors. Bird Photographer of the Year. Collection 9. Princeton University Press, 2024. The book is a collection of winning photos from thousands of submissions by photographers all over the globe. Stunning images that show off the capabilities of modern cameras.
There are 259 images in the book. A few photographers had several winning images. If someone had more than one image with the same camera model, I counted only one of those images; 227 pictures in total. Here is the breakdown by manufacturer:
Canon: 108 pictures, 48% of the total.
Nikon: 73 pictures, 32%.
Sony: 35 pictures, 15%
Other: 11 pictures, 5%.
So Canon, Nikon, and Sony dominate the high-end sector of the bird photography world. Of the 227 photos, 152 (67%) were taken with mirrorless models. Most of the rest were taken using older digital single-lens reflex models made by Canon and Nikon. The most common models used from each company, all of them mirrorless, were the Canon EOS R5 (68), the Nikon Z9 and similar Z8 (32), and the Sony A1 (21). These numbers are in line with the recommendations made by some well-known photography web sites:
PetaPixel: They rate the Nikon Z8 as best for birds. But they also rate the Sony A1 as the best overall mirrorless camera.
Digital Photography Review: Their top choice is the Canon EOS R3 II. Next is the Nikon Z8.
Photography Life: They pick the Nikon Z9 and Canon EOS R5. But they also praise the Sony A1.
Mirrorless Comparisons: Mathieu Gasquet ranks cameras for birds in flight as follows:
Sony A1
Nikon Z9/Z8
Sony A9
Canon EOS R3
Sony A7
And so on.
For the bird photographer, this is an embarrassment of riches. Canon, Nikon, and Sony all offer terrific cameras and lenses for bird photography. My current camera in June, 2025, is the Nikon Z8, but I suspect I would be just as happy with a Canon or Sony model.
Peter Cummings
Posted January 31, 2024
Birds of Bishop 