Eurasian nuthatch at a feeding station. Picardie, France.

…that’s what this Eurasian nuthatch (Sitta europaea) must have thought at the sound of my camera’s mirror moving up. It’s quite remarkable how they’re already on their way out by the time my shutter opens, around 70 milliseconds! Nuthatches are pretty cool birds anyway. Fittingly called ‘boomklever‘ in Dutch, which translates to something like ‘tree clinger’, they can traverse down the trunk of a tree upside down as if they’re glued to it.

I’m not much of a bird photographer to be honest (hey, the longest lens I own is a 200mm), but I was playing around with a remote trigger system today. It’s not quite as reliable and responsive as I would like, and I intend to start using a different system very soon (more about that later). Still, a remote trigger like this allows you to capture images you would otherwise never be able to.

Four tips for photographing wildlife with a remote trigger

• If possible without disturbing your subject, coax it in front of your camera by controlling its pathway. It’s not likely to pose in front of a scary black object all by itself.
• Use flash to freeze the motion. The duration of a hot shoe flash is typically less than a thousandth of a second, which is much shorter than you’re likely to get away with using available light.
• Consider using mirror lock-up mode on your camera. This will prevent the sound of the mirror moving up to startle the animal you’re photographing (as happened with this nuthatch photo).
• If every millisecond counts, set your camera to use first-curtain sync. This will save you a couple of milliseconds (look at the distance between the nuthatch’s beak and its blurry silhouette — that’s how much of a difference it can make).

Note that for for fast-paced action shots, a simple remote trigger like this is probably not the most appropriate solution. You’d be far better off with a (far more expensive) camera trap. More about that in a later post.