That title was my clever way to get into my topic: sometimes it’s good to chimp (look in the live view) to see the shot you just took. I’ve read many tutorials that say don’t chimp. It wastes time and you might miss that one shot, etc. Yesterday my experience taught me that you should chimp at least a couple of times to make sure you’re getting the scene correctly.

Now for the birds part of my title. My friend, Jean, and I went down to Woodbridge Ecological Preserve in Lodi, California yesterday to catch the Sandhill Crane fly in. We had a lot of time before sunset (We found out that they come to roost after sunset.), so I started shooting anything. We drove up the road; met some other photographers; took some more shots; went back to Woodbridge. It was then that I looked at some of my images. They looked flat and somewhat orange. It dawned on me that I had been experimenting with the white balance the last time I used the camera. The white balance was set to shade!

So, is chimping truly a bad habit. I think it’s a matter of how much you do. But, from now on, I will take my test shots at whatever location I’m at, look at the images and make corrections if I need to.

Photoshop Elements saved my images by light editing. Did I shoot any cranes; yes, but they were too far away for even my 300 mm lens. They did fly in after sunset, and it was amazing. You’ll get to see the best of what I could salvage. Fortunately, I discovered my mistake before sunset.