Talonfab Pty Ltd - Blog by John Harrison

Parabolic Microphone Wind Noise - Design Factors That Matter

Mon, 17 Aug 2026 09:47:47 +1000

Look closely at a TalonFab dish and you'll see aerodynamic design features intended to manage wind noise from the outset. The first of these features is a deep focal length to diameter ratio. This allows the microphone to be recessed and out of the wind. The second feature is the rounded shape of the rim.

Edge shape

A parabolic dish in the wind is a bluff body. If the wind is at the right (or wrong!) angle then a turbulent layer of airflow can rips off the rim edge and hit the microphone. As part of designing our microphones we modeled wind noise risk using an airflow simulations as we iterated on the dish geometry. To the results in context we also simulated a reference dish representing a common moulded design - 43cm across (f/D ≈ 0.38) , capsule held at focus on a boom and a sharp trimmed rim.

Both traces use the same relative-risk scale in a moderate 6 m/s breeze. Head-on, both dishes perform well: a parabola pointed into the wind shelters its capsule in the cushion of decelerated air ahead of the bowl. The difference emerges as the wind direction changes. At its worst angle, the sharp-rimmed reference dish reaches a wind-noise risk score of 22; the 580 peaks at 15. Large dishes are generally expected to perform worse in wind. This one doesn't, thanks to the two design features mentioned above: the rim profile and the capsule position.

To isolate the effect of the edge, we ran the same 43 cm reference geometry again with one change: a 6 mm rolled lip in place of the sharp trim. The worst-direction wind-noise risk score fell from 22 to 15—similar to the larger 580 with its recessed microphone—purely because of the edge profile. A rounded lip softens the velocity spike at the rim, and gentler separation produces a weaker turbulent layer over the capsule.

Where the microphone sits

The other important design factor is where the capsule sits relative to the rim plane.

On the 580, the capsule sits just below the rim plane, inside the aperture. The flow solution puts the local air speed at the capsule at about 30% of the free-stream wind speed head-on and about 70% in a crosswind—the dish body is acting as an effective windshield. The 300 recesses its capsule 27 mm into the bowl, providing similar shelter.

The moulded-style reference uses the opposite arrangement. At the focus of a shallow dish, the capsule stands about 90 mm proud of the rim. In a crosswind, it experiences roughly 90% of the free-stream wind speed. At that point, the dish offers little protection: every gust reaches the diaphragm almost as if the dish were not there, with rim-generated turbulence on top of it.

This is a geometry choice made when the focal ratio is set. A deep dish (the 300 uses f/D ≈ 0.21) places the focus inside the bowl by design. A shallow dish puts the focus—and therefore the capsule—out in the weather, and no rim treatment can fully compensate. That is why we treat “microphone at the focus” and “microphone in clean air” as a single design problem.

The acoustics of edge rounding

The acoustic concern with rounded rims is edge diffraction: sound scattering from the rim and arriving at the capsule via a secondary path. The effect is real, but scale matters. Bird-recording wavelengths range from 43 mm at 8 kHz to more than a metre at the bottom of the band. At those wavelengths, whether the last few millimetres of the rim are square or rounded is a tiny perturbation. A few millimetres of edge radius changes the effective aperture—and therefore gain and beamwidth—by only a fraction of a percent.

Our acoustic simulation model captures the dish’s finite size well, though not fine edge diffraction itself. It shows no meaningful difference in on-axis response or beamwidth between a sharp lip and a rolled one.

So what's the "best" design?

It's a genuine multi-way trade-off, and we weigh it like this:

Depth: A recessed microphone position reduces wind noise.
Wind: A larger roll produces a weaker shear layer and less noise. After capsule depth below the rim, lip shape is the most important geometric lever for wind performance.
Acoustics: At audio wavelengths and practical roll diameters, the effect is near-neutral, so the roll carries essentially no acoustic penalty.
Stiffness and durability: A rolled lip is more durable because it reduces stress concentration.
Manufacturability: This is where 3D printing pays off. A rolled, variable-radius lip costs nothing extra in additive manufacturing; it is simply more toolpath. In moulding, a returned lip can complicate the tool and release, which helps explain why sharp, trimmed edges are so common on moulded dishes. When the rim shape is free to change, we can set it from simulation results and iterate it for each dish size instead of accepting the manufacturing constraint.

That last point is the fair version of “printed dishes are better here”. A mould can certainly produce a rounded edge; printing simply removes the manufacturing pressure to compromise it. On the 580, the production lip has an effective radius of 2.7 mm, straight from the mesh. The 300 uses a smaller lip suited to its size and relies more heavily on its recessed capsule position, which the flow model identifies as the other major wind-noise lever.

The rim won't make your recordings sound better. On the wrong morning, though, it can help determine whether you get a usable recording at all.

Darwin to Mitchell Plateau - Trip Report

Sun, 09 Aug 2026 14:49:48 +1000

There are easier Australian birds to photograph than Black Grasswrens. Unfortunately, none of them are Black Grasswrens!

I had originally planned to drive from Darwin to the Mitchell Plateau in 2020 to see them, along with a number of other Top End birds, but the trip was cancelled due to COVID-related interstate travel restrictions. That at least meant I already had a rough itinerary and had done some very basic research. At some point I started talking about the idea with Veeraj Sheema and Raghav Sharma, and we eventually ended up booking a 4WD Toyota Prado with all-terrain tyres, insurance on the route and recovery equipment in Darwin for an eight-night road trip.

The most common way to attempt Black Grasswren is to travel by 4WD to the area around Mitchell Falls on the Mitchell Plateau and search for them there. It’s also possible to reach the area by light aircraft and helicopter. In the past, the species was sometimes attempted at other sites, such as Bachsten Camp and Surveyors Pool, but at the time of writing these sites have been closed to visitors for a number of years. A final option, for those less concerned about getting the best photographic conditions or having plenty of time to search, is offered by some Kimberley cruise operators, which make landings in areas where Black Grasswrens can be found.

Darwin

Veeraj and Raghav landed in Darwin earlier than I did, so they squeezed in some early-morning birding, collected the hire car and made a start on the shopping list before picking me up from the airport for a final round of supplies. We had brought most of our camping gear with us in our luggage. Lightweight hiking equipment is ideal for this sort of trip, as things like compact air mattresses, inflatable pillows and down sleeping bags take up little space and weight compared with conventional camping gear. This meant we could bring most of what we needed from home and only had to buy food, cooking supplies and a few odds and ends after arriving in Darwin.

We had agreed to sort out breakfast and lunch individually, while cooking dinner communally and sharing things like fruit and snacks. Veeraj had borrowed a camp stove from a friend in Darwin, and we picked up a frying pan. Unfortunately, none of the places we visited seemed to sell a suitable knife, and we also couldn’t find gas canisters that fitted the borrowed stove. We therefore spent much of the trip chopping vegetables with a $3 pair of scissors and bought another small stove from Bunnings.

Darwin, Pine Creek, Katherine

Our first destination was Pine Creek, where we had agreed to stay until sunset, or close to it. The main target for all three of us was Hooded Parrot. We weren’t initially sure where to concentrate our efforts, but after a short drive around we eventually settled on the small Water Gardens park in the centre of town, reasoning that the parrots would probably come in to drink at the ponds.

At first, there was no sign of them. Eventually, though, a few appeared in trees overhead before moving across to the Pine Creek Multi Resource Centre, where they drank from a dripping tap directly in front of a rather unattractive chain-link fence. Fortunately, things improved before long. The birds began staging in the park again and eventually started coming down near another tap on the edge of Railway Terrace.

We crept over very slowly and managed a few basic shots. At one point I walked towards the tap, where several birds appeared to be waiting for water, and turned it on just enough to create a slow drip and a small puddle. The parrots allowed me to approach within two or three metres before flying up into a tree above me. Once I moved away, they quickly returned to drink and bathe, giving us opportunities for photos on the ugly steel railings around the tap and for a few attempts at flight shots.

After bathing, the birds began feeding on the grass immediately behind us. We lay down and kept very still while they gradually worked their way towards us, and this was when I managed some of my better photographs. Unfortunately, the opportunity only lasted a few minutes before a couple of other birdwatchers approached and inadvertently flushed the flock back into the trees.

After the birds had moved on, we spent a little more time looking around Pine Creek before continuing south towards Katherine. We stopped there for dinner to break up the drive, although the meal was fairly disappointing, then continued for another hour or so to the Vince Connolly Limestone Creek campsite. I drove cautiously because of the increased risk of wildlife on the road after dark, but in the end we saw only one or two Agile Wallabies.

Gorrie/Dry River Road

The next morning we birded at a waterhole along one of the creek lines crossing the Gorrie/Dry River Road. It turned out to be one of the best mornings of the trip. We spent a few fairly painful hours lying on the rocky ground under camouflage and watched as a steady variety of species came in to drink at close range. These included Banded Honeyeaters, Great Bowerbirds, Rufous-throated Honeyeaters, Hooded Parrots and plenty more.

We also spent some time searching the surrounding area for Northern Shrike-tit and Black-tailed Treecreeper. We only managed to find the latter, but the waterhole itself more than made up for it.

We would later return to this site in the afternoon, but the light orientation was best in the morning.

Kununurra and Wyndham

We spent much of the middle of the day driving towards Wyndham. We made a quick stop at Timber Creek, although we planned to return on the way back and the midday light wasn’t particularly good, so it was mostly an opportunity to stretch our legs. We did manage to flush a Chestnut-backed Buttonquail while looking around for them, but none of us really got a satisfactory view.

By mid-afternoon we had reached Kununurra. Unfortunately, Western Australia’s quarantine restrictions meant we had to throw out some of the vegetables we had bought in Darwin, so we made another stop at Coles to replace them. A Great Bowerbird hanging around the border quarantine station seemed to be making excellent use of the steady supply of discarded food.

Once we had replenished our tomatoes and other supplies, we headed to Lily Creek Lagoon for a quick look around. Crimson Finches were feeding on the grass, and we were able to add a few waterbirds to the trip list.

As sunset approached, we headed to Mirima National Park to look for Sandstone Shrikethrush. We eventually managed a distant view, but as crowds began arriving for sunset and the area became increasingly noisy, we decided to retreat.

With the sun going down, we drove on to Wyndham, checked into the caravan park, cooked dinner, showered and went to sleep.

The following morning we drove to a well-known waterhole along King River Road, parked nearby and set ourselves up under camouflage in the hope of photographing finches coming in to drink. Unfortunately, two other birders joined us and chose to sit very close to the water without any concealment or much apparent concern about giving the birds space to approach.

They told us that the birds had come down to drink the previous day and that there was therefore no need to sit further back. I assumed the birds were probably somewhat habituated to people at this particular site, so we stayed and waited. Some finches did eventually come down to drink, but it was also obvious that others were hesitant to approach. At one point an entire group flushed when one of the birders stood up and walked a few metres to tell the other that something had flown in.

Unfortunately, the Gouldian Finches were among the more cautious birds. Although we saw them around the waterhole, I never managed to get any photographs of them drinking.

As the morning wore on and the light became increasingly harsh, we headed back to the road and found no fewer than three 4WDs parked across it rather than in the nearby parking area. Another group had set up beside a small puddle on the opposite side of the road, sitting in deck chairs with their feet almost in the water while waiting for finches to come in. At that point we decided we had had enough and drove back to the caravan park to check out.

As I was checking out, I was told enthusiastically about this Gouldian Finch waterhole and how you could simply sit right on the water’s edge and watch the birds come in to drink. Unfortunately, that made me suspect our experience was probably fairly typical of the site. It is a shame, because it could be an excellent place for both birding and photography if visitors gave the birds a little more space.

Wyndham to Mitchell Falls Campground

After some negotiation, we decided to drive straight through to Mitchell Falls in a single day rather than stopping overnight along the way. It meant a long drive of around nine and a half hours, but it would give us an extra buffer day if we needed more time to find the grasswren, at the cost of losing an evening photography session.

The first part of the drive, as far as the Pentecost River crossing, was sealed and straightforward. The crossing itself was also easy. Water levels were low, as expected in late July, perhaps only 20–30 cm deep, although the riverbed was a little rocky. A large flotilla of caravans had stopped on the far side to photograph their successful crossing, which gave us a convenient opportunity to get ahead of them.

Not long afterwards the road turned to gravel, and it took us another four or five hours to reach Drysdale River Station. It was heavily corrugated in places, and we were often able to use creek crossings as opportunities to get past slow-moving caravans. The coil-sprung Prado we had hired was reasonably comfortable in the conditions, however, and the drive never became particularly punishing. Eventually we joined the Gibb River–Kalumburu Road, where the gravel had been more recently graded and was much more pleasant to drive.

At Drysdale River Station we refuelled, stretched our legs and, before long, set off again with Veeraj at the wheel. We soon turned onto Port Warrender Road and crossed the King Edward River. During the wet season the crossing can become extremely deep, but at the time it was only around 30 cm and presented no difficulty driving slowly across in low range.

Beyond the crossing, the corrugations returned. The road was also narrower and more winding, so our pace dropped considerably. We eventually reached the Mitchell Falls campground a bit after sunset.

Birding on the Mitchell Plateau

We got up well before sunset to search for the Black Grasswrens. I have used this approach with other birds - with other species I have often found it possible to hear quiet contact calls, or sometimes territorial calls before the sun comes up, and then get into the right area as the best light appears. We initially tried a track north of the camping area as it looked to have accessible suitable habitat. Although the habitat looked promising it produced nothing! We think we heard some Grasswren early in the morning, but we simply didn't any views after spending a morning scrambling across the sandstone.

After retreating to camp for a lunch and having a very hot nap in our tents, we rehydrated and went back to Little Mertens Falls for a swim. By mid-afternoon we started searching for the grasswren again. This time we split up and I saw some good looking habitat south of the falls that I wanted to check out - terrain simply looked right based on habitat photos I had seen and I knew there were records in that area. As I went to check it out Veeraj and Raghav searched another area on the northern side of the falls.

Travel south of the falls was quite slow going - scrambling across broken sandstone was required, and occasionally I had to retrace my steps due to dense clumps of vegetation or cliffs blocking my progress. Although this wasn't especially dangerous, I carried plenty of water, navigated using topographic mapping taking regular breadcrumbs on my phone, told R and V roughly where I was headed and carried a Garmin inReach as backup should anything go wrong.

After around two hours of searching I finally heard distant calls and the mostly fruitless day was all immediately justified! Following the calls carefully through the rocks eventually revealed four Black Grasswrens.

Photographically the conditions were straightforward. My Canon EOS R1 paired with the RF 600mm f/4 acquired focus without difficulty, although I found the camera tended to overexpose the dark plumage slightly against the pale sandstone, requiring minor exposure compensation.

The only casualty of the search was cosmetic. During one scramble I slipped and chipped a small piece of magnesium from the R1 body. I figured the depreciation was an acceptable price for finally photographing one of Australia's most sought-after endemic birds.

The next morning I took Veeraj and Raghav back to see the grasswrens. I think that they were a little disappointed from missing out on the previous day, but they were exactly where they were the previous evening, so we all got great views and all was well that ended well!

Aside from the grasswrens, White-quilled Rock-Pigeons were encountered every time we searched suitable rocky country. One bird became so accustomed to people that it regularly drank beneath a tap at the campground toilet. Kimberley Honeyeaters were also widespread, not to mention the Monjons that were everywhere.

We had talked about spending more time looking for herps as well, but it was probably the worst month for activity, and we were all honestly a bit sleep deprived to varying degrees so didn't try too hard at night.

Drysdale Station

After the successful morning and some exploration the previous day, we started making our way back towards Darwin. We left at around 1pm and made it to Drysdale station at around 4:00pm. The station itself was pretty quiet, aside from the human activity. We tried searching the nearby river for Purple-crowned Fairywren and photographed some other stuff instead. In the morning we searched the other side of the river, where we had received a tip-off from another birder, and photographed the pair there.

Driving to Timber Creek

We opted to start driving pretty early. This gave us a chance to get ahead of the caravans and spend a bit less time in the car. We stopped at Kununurra for some more fresh fruit and then kept going to Timber Creek in one hit. We tried a well known waterhole for more finches, but there was too much water to make photography easy. I did get some shots of Buff-sided Robin however.

At Timber Creek, we stayed at the caravan park, which was noisy (thanks to some humans and some Barking Owls!), and the unpowered campsites were next to the septic tank, so the smell overnight was honestly not great either! Without other great options, we tried the waterhole again in the morning with similar results.

Back to Darwin

After leaving Timber Creek, we tried the waterhole near Katherine again and had a good look for Northern Shriketit without much success. We then stayed in a caravan park in Katherine before trying Edith Falls for our last attempt at Gouldian Finch photographs. This wasn't successful either - a bird that'll need to wait until next time!

Soon we headed for Darwin. We stopped at Fogg Dam and Howard Springs on the way back. I was amused to find Rainbow Pitta within 50 meters of where they were approximately 7 years prior!

Summary

The Black Grasswren was the primary objective of this trip, and from that point of view it was a success. I had been prepared to spend several days searching if necessary, and in the end persistence and trying to read the habitat were probably the main reasons we found them. The successful area was rocky, lightly wooded and had roughly one-third ground cover of Triodia.

There were plenty of secondary highlights. Hooded Parrots at Pine Creek gave excellent close-range opportunities on the first evening, Purple-crowned Fairywrens were eventually photographed near Drysdale River Station, Buff-sided Robins showed well near Timber Creek, Kimberley Honeyeaters were widespread on the Mitchell Plateau, and Rainbow Pittas at Howard Springs were almost exactly where I had seen them years earlier. Gouldian Finch remained the main miss and will need another attempt.

Waterholes were a recurring theme during the trip too. Some of the best birding came from sitting quietly and waiting for birds to approach, particularly at the waterhole near Katherine. The contrast with the Wyndham Gouldian Finch site was fairly stark. Sitting directly on the water’s edge, moving around and giving birds little room to approach made photography much harder. If people want to see or photograph birds at small dry-season water sources, giving them space and remaining still is usually the best approach.

One observation that stayed with me on the Mitchell Plateau was the amount of Buffel Grass around many of the established walking tracks. Whether or not it is already having a measurable effect on Black Grasswrens, it certainly appeared to reduce the extent of suitable rocky spinifex habitat immediately accessible from the trails. The better habitat I found required moving further off track into less disturbed country. Without more active management, I suspect Black Grasswrens will become progressively harder to locate around the main visitor areas.

Logistics were also important to the success of the trip. We had to work around long driving days, corrugations, limited space in the vehicle and, at times, limited sleep, while remaining flexible enough to make the most of the best birding and photography conditions. If there was one lesson from the trip, it was that preparation and organisation gets you to the right place, but patience and persistence are what eventually produce the photographs.

For a bird and location list see my eBird trip report.

Parabolic Microphone Focus: Various simulated scenarios

Sun, 19 Jul 2026 20:46:13 +1000

Every parabolic dish concentrates on-axis sound towards the microphone. Put the capsule there and everything the dish gathered arrives in phase. Miss it, and the arrivals from different parts of the dish stop agreeing with each other - first at the highest frequencies, where a millimetre is a bigger fraction of the wavelength.

We wanted to know exactly what missing it costs and validate our designs ahead of printing prototypes, so as part of developing our microphones we ran simulations with varying microphone position along their axes in simulation and track the on-axis gain at 2, 4, 8 and 16 kHz. This is what it looks like for the prototype Parabolic Microphone 580:

Source Distance Moves the Focus

A parabolic dish’s textbook focal point assumes the incoming sound waves are effectively flat. That is a good approximation for a distant bird, but not for a sound source only a couple of metres away. A nearby point source produces a noticeably curved wavefront, which changes where the reflected sound comes together. The graph above is produced with a source at 10 meters - not infinitely far away.

We simulated the TalonFab 580 at 8 kHz with point sources placed 2, 5, 10, 25 and 100 metres away. At 5 and 10 metres, the best microphone position was the designed position. At 25 and 100 metres, the simulated optimum shifted only about 2.5 mm towards the dish with a tiny loss in gain - too little to matter in practice.

The 2 metre source was different. Its optimum moved about 20 mm away from the dish, towards the source. This is the near-field effect made visible: the closer the source, the more curved its wavefront, and the further forward the reflected sound reaches its best focus. This matches intuition - parabolic microphones are not especially useful for very close subjects.

Across the distances where a parabolic microphone normally earns its keep, the current fixed position remains comfortably inside the broad 1 dB tolerance region. At 2 metres, moving the capsule could recover some 8 kHz gain, but at that distance the signal to noise ratio of the call is probably already very good and a parabolic microphone is of limited benefit. Still, it does mean it's a good idea to reduce the amount of equalisation for very close subjects which is one of the reasons the frequency response compensation in TalonFab Recorder and Editor has adjustable strength.

What happens if your parabolic dish is distorted?

The whole sweep from above assumes the dish is actually the shape it's meant to be. A printed dish is very close: it comes off the machine as its CAD surface and holds that curve to under a millimetre.

A thin dish thermoformed or moulded from sheet is a harder case because those manufacturing processes are not as precise without additional quality control steps - mould wear, the change in shape during cooling and over the dish lifetime is more difficult to manage.

We simulated that too the same 580 mm dish, but warped out of shape by up to 2 and 4 mm, with the capsule sitting at the design focus in every case.

Through most of the band the three curves sit on top of each other. Distortion only bites at the very top: 2 mm of warp costs about half a decibel at 16 kHz and essentially nothing below 8 kHz, while 4 mm costs about 2 dB at 16 kHz, half a decibel at 8 kHz, and still almost nothing across the core 1-4 kHz range where most birds live. So for gain alone, a few millimetres of distortion is a top-octave problem - it trims the sparkle, not the substance. We'd rather show that plainly than pretend a warped dish is useless. It isn't.

Another subtle cost is the one this article is about: the focus. An oval dish isn't a paraboloid any more - it's steeper across its short axis than its long one, so the two directions focus at slightly different points along the axis. There's no longer a single sharp focus to sit the capsule at; you're splitting the difference between two. And a dish that's warped, or a touch too deep or too shallow, moves its focus bodily along the axis.

We can watch that happen. Here is the same 580 mm dish, ideal versus warped by 4 mm, with the capsule swept along the axis:

At 8 kHz (dashed) the warp barely registers - both curves stay within half a decibel of each other across a broad, forgiving range. At 16 kHz (solid) it shows: the ideal dish still comes to a clean peak, while the warped dish sits about 2 dB lower with its top flattened into a plateau. There's no single sharp position to aim for, because its horizontal and vertical planes now focus at different points. The best spot to focus has changed and could be adjusted for, but wherever you park the capsule, something is slighty out. That's the top-octave sparkle going a little soft.

None of this is a fixed error you could design a mount around, because the size and direction change from one part to the next - which is exactly why some dishes made this way tend to come with a mount you can adjust.

What happens across different temperatures?

A parabolic dish does not stay exactly the same size as its temperature changes. Like any polymer part, it contracts in cold weather and expands when it gets warm. The useful question is whether that movement is large enough to change the dish’s focus or affect its performance.

We modelled a 580 mm dish between −10 and 40 °C, using 20 °C as the reference temperature. The first case represents a typical polycarbonate dish. At −10 °C its predicted diameter is about 1.22 mm smaller than at room temperature. At 40 °C it is about 0.81 mm larger, giving a little over 2 mm of movement across the full temperature range. Because the entire parabola scales with the diameter, its focal distance changes as well. For a nominal focal length of 203 mm, the polycarbonate model moves from about 0.43 mm shorter at −10 °C to 0.28 mm longer at 40 °C. The total focal movement across the temperature range is about 0.71 mm.

The ASA-CF model performs a lot better - the carbon fibres significantly reduce the amount of thermal expansion. Its predicted diameter changes by about 0.21 mm below the room-temperature value at −10 °C and 0.14 mm above it at 40 °C. That is roughly 0.35 mm across the complete 50-degree temperature swing. Its corresponding focal-distance movement is about 0.12 mm from one extreme to the other.

Despite ASA-CF's superior performance, it doesn't really matter in practise. Even with polycarbonate a change of focal length of 0.71mm would be insignificant to the point of being inaudible, and, at least for TalonFab products, the microphone mount is made of the same material - so it tends to expand to compensate.

Uneven temperature is another possibility - part of a dish left in the sun in the car for example. We didn't simulate this situation as in practise it would be similar to the dish warp scenario we looked at above.

Why TalonFab mounts are fixed

This data is the reason TalonFab mounts have nothing to adjust.

A printed dish comes off the machine as the CAD surface - we hold the produced geometry with millimeter precision and accuracy for known microphones, so the focal behaviour is known before the validation in prototyping. The dish, arm and capsule seat print as one rigid assembly in carbon-fibre reinforced ASA, a stiff filament chosen so the geometry stays put through handling and temperature swings. The capsule is placed at design position every time: on the 580 that's comfortably inside the 1 dB window at every frequency we publish, 16 kHz included and it's similar for the 300.

Adjustable mounts exist for a sensible reason - they're the rational choice for universal dishes, where one reflector has to accept whatever microphone you clamp into it. They're also rational for dishes that may have larger local deviations or ovality due to looser tolerances in the manufacturing process or where they are made from a thin or flexible material.

Different capsules put their diaphragms in different places and actual focal lengths vary with tooling, so a sliding boom and a thumb screw let the user hunt for the focus by ear. It can work fine. The failure mode is also obvious from the plots: "by ear, in the field, with cold fingers" is how you end up parked 20 mm from focus wondering where the top octave went. If you use an adjustable dish, our advice is to align it once at home against a distant, constant sound source at 6-8 kHz where the plots are sharpest - then mark the position and never touch it again.

One honest caveat: a fixed mount is fixed for the microphones it was designed around. TalonFab mounts position the capsule of the Røde Lavalier GO and the Deity W.Lav Pro - and that known-capsule focus is the price of never fiddling. We think it's the right trade for a field tool - the same philosophy as carrying a prime lens instead of a zoom.

Final Thoughts

Focus tolerance is real but finite: for a big dish a few millimetres is free, 20 mm costs lost gain in the top octave. Design the mount so the capsule can't be anywhere else and the whole question disappears from your field workflow - one less thing to get wrong early in the morning!

How to EQ a Parabolic Microphone

Sun, 19 Jul 2026 20:25:46 +1000

First recordings through a parabolic dish tend to surprise people: the bird is gloriously loud and close, but everything sounds too bright and thin. Nothing is wrong at this point - the issue fixable with EQ applied in software after the fact.

Why parabolic recordings sound bright

A dish's gain isn't flat. On-axis, it rises roughly 6 dB per octave above its cutoff, because higher frequencies see a proportionally larger reflector. Here's the response of both our 300 and 580 microphones - gain relative to the same microphone with no dish:

Two things to notice here:

The rising tilt. The 580 picks up about 13 dB at 1 kHz but about 30 dB at 8 kHz, so recordings arrive tilted roughly 15 dB across three octaves. That's the brightness you're hearing.
The low-frequency dip. Every parabolic dish has an interference notch below its working band - 283 Hz on the 580, 635 Hz on the 300 - where the direct sound and the focused reflection arrive out of phase and partially cancel. Physics, not a defect.

What happens if I didn't perfectly aim the microphone at the subject?

If the microphone is not pointed at the subject, then the frequency response changes, and there is less gain at high frequencies in particular. How much this occurs depends on the size of the microphone and the degree to which it is off axis:

Not a such a big deal for a 300mm microphone, but it has a significant effect in the top octave for the TalonFab 580mm mic where the right equalisation to apply depends more on how closely it was aimed at the target. So in practise some judgement is probably required in terms of how aggressively to EQ the highest frequencies. This information also tells you that live monitoring is more valuable for larger microphones, that listening to the top-end sparkle is most important when aiming and that smaller microphones are probably a better choice for high frequency sound.

In TalonFab's case, since the geometry is known we can simulate and then measure the response of the exact production shape, and avoid guesswork. We provide an easy way to apply the required equalisation - TalonFab Editor and Recorder has curves built right in. We even include the ability to adjust for an off-axis target. These filters are usually best combined with a high pass filter to remove wind noise.

If you're using a generic dish and response curves or equalisation software are not provided, then something like the following is recommended:

Apply a high pass filter (12-24 dB per octave). Pick the frequency based on the spectrum of the signal you're interested in. For example if a bird call is primarily above 1 kHz, you might try 900Hz. It's rare that you'll get useful signal below say 120Hz, so this could be a good starting point if you don't want to analyse the spectrum of the recording.
Tilt the top down. Apply a broad cut that increases with frequency above about 1 kHz for a small 30cm dish or about 500hz if you have a bigger 50 or 60cm one - roughly 6 dB per octave of correction, reaching about −15 dB by 8 kHz on a big dish, less on a small one. Cut rather than boost; it preserves headroom and never amplifies noise. Note if that if your dish has loose manufacturing tolerances, or you you think didn't point it exactly at your target, then at the highest frequencies the amount of cut should be reduced to compensate - 3-4db per octave from 5k for a 50 or 60cm dish and from 8k for a 30cm dish would be a good starting point.
Leave the notch alone. Don't try to boost the low-frequency dip back to flat. The dish genuinely captured little signal there, and a full boost mostly amplifies wind. If you must, half-filling it with a broad gentle bell is reasonable.

Summary

To get really good results from a parabolic microphone equalisation is required. But the exact curve to apply depends on the geometry of your dish and whether you pointed it exactly at your target. For this reason some listening and adjustment is required in practise, particularly for the top octave. TalonFab Editor and Recorder lets you do this with TalonFab parabolic dishes at the click of a button, but it's possible to do a reasonable job with parabolic equalisation if you're using another another microphone.

How to Record Bird Calls: A Complete Field Recording and Editing Guide

Fri, 17 Jul 2026 08:53:47 +1000

This post walks through recording, cleaning up and sharing bird calls using the TalonFab Recorder and Editor - a free tool with an efficient workflow for recording, editing and playing back calls. The app is free, has no ads, no account requirements, no data collection, and it works with any microphone: the one built into your phone, a small shotgun mic, a USB microphone or interface, or a TalonFab parabolic microphone for the best possible quality.

Currently, the beta version of TalonFab Recorder and Editor is available in the browser at editor.talonfab.com.au. We also expect to release native versions for Android, iOS, Windows and macOS X after further field testing!

The app supports recording with your phone using the built-in microphone, a small external shotgun microphone, or for the best quality a TalonFab parabolic microphone . If you'd prefer to use an external recorder, then the app can be used to edit your calls after recording.

What makes a good bird recording app?

When I reviewed other tools in an earlier post, the checklist was: uncompressed recording, enough editing control to be useful in the field, sensible export formats, and no subscription ambush. This app was built to that checklist, then extended with the things bird recordists actually need:

Uncompressed WAV recording and editing at up to 32-bit float and up to 384 kHz where your hardware supports it
Real visualisations — waveform, spectrogram and frequency spectrum with a synced playhead
Non-destructive editing — your original audio is not modified as you adjust filters.
One-toggle parabolic compensation for TalonFab dishes lets you achieve flat frequency response
On-device AI noise reduction (beta) - audio never leaves your phone
Export to WAV, FLAC or MP3, or create a spectrogram "reel" video for socials

How to record bird calls

In this section we cover a simple workflow to set up a microphone, record a call and then to apply filters to improve the quality of the call. In this section we assume that you will use TalonFab Recorder and Editor for both recording and editing. But if you want to use a dedicated audio recorder, you can just skip to the editing steps.

1. Setup

Make sure your microphone is connected to your phone correctly. Open the app and tap Record. Choose your input device - the phone's own mic, or an external USB microphone or interface if you have one connected. Pick a sample rate and bit depth: 48 kHz is fine unless you want to capture ultrasonic calls, choose the highest bit depth available, 32-bit float or 24 bit both beat 16-bit. The extra dynamic range captures very loud and very soft sounds together, so you can fix levels later.

If you have headphones, you can enable monitoring and select the right monitoring interface. Check that you have selected the right microphone as input and the right output for monitoring. If you don't want to monitor, just do a quick 10 second recording to make sure everything is as expected.

2. Locate your subject and position yourself

The first step is to position yourself to maximise the signal-to-noise ratio of your recording. Getting closer to the subject will always help - halving the distance will improve the signal by about 6 decibels. If you're using a directional microphone (like a shotgun microphone or a parabolic microphone), then you can also think about the direction to maximise the signal to noise ratio of your recording - try to place the subject at your front and competing higher frequency noise at the same frequencies at your back. Neither type of microphone is directional for low frequency noise like traffic.

3. Press record and capture the call

Once you're ready, point your microphone at your subject and press record. Hold everything still during this time and take care not to bump the microphone or anything it is attached to - any handling noise will come through in the recording.

If you're using an app version, recording continues with the screen off and is more battery efficient. If you're recording at night you can also enable night mode for a red only display to save your night vision.

4. Crop and filter the call

When you stop, the take opens in the editor. Use the spectrogram view to find the call — birds that are hard to see on a waveform are obvious on a spectrogram — and set the crop so only the section you want remains. Crop is non-destructive: so you can always change your mind later. If you've cropped a lot, it may be helpful to click on "Output" so that the spectrogram and timeline views only show the cropped part of the call.

The low cut is your main noise-killer: it removes traffic rumble, wind and handling noise. Start around 250 Hz; if your subject's call is high-pitched, you can often go considerably higher - look at the spectrogram or waveform views and listen to figure out how much.

There's also a high cut for hiss above the call, and notch filters for single steady tones like a persistent insect. Add a notch, drag it onto the offending frequency, and adjust its width (Q) until the tone disappears without touching the bird call.

5. Parabolic compensation (dish users)

Skip this step for other microphones. Parabolic dishes are not tonally neutral - they boost high frequencies progressively and have a dip in the lower mid range depending on their size. Here it's a switch: enable Dish compensation, pick your dish (Parabolic Microphone 300 or 580), and the app applies a precise correction curve for that exact dish. The aim slider scales the level of correction in the top octave; adjust it if you think the mic wasn't aimed precisely at the bird. Note that you may need to combine this filter with the low cut filter for good results because it partially compensates for the mid range dip in frequency response present in all parabolic microphones.

If you're using a competing brand of parabolic dish, then it's possible that there may be some analog electronic correction built in. If the manufacturer suggests equalisation or doesn't mention any correction, then picking the option that most closely matches the size of that dish and adjusting the strength will likely be some improvement over no correction. For example if you own a 55cm (22in) dish then you might pick the TalonFab 580 option. If your dish is not precision manufactured and has high frequency roll off, or you think you didn't quite aim at the bird, then the aim correction filter can help too.

6. AI noise reduction (beta)

For recordings where there is broadband noise competing with call spectrum, enable AI noise reduction. The model runs entirely on your phone; nothing is uploaded. Processing takes a moment (it's slower in the web version). The effect in the beta version is usually subtle and whether it can help will depend on the type of noise.

Note: Currently eBird policy prohibits the use of any noise reduction. To remain compliant with that policy avoid use of this feature for uploading bird calls to eBird. Xeno Canto also recommends avoiding the use of noise reduction.

7. Normalise

Leave Normalise on and the app automatically brings the processed recording up to a consistent peak level after all other processing. Some speakers distort at 0dB - it may be helpful to reduce the output gain in some circumstances.

8. Save and Export

Once you're done, you have a few ways to get audio out of the app:

Save project writes a single ordinary audio file with your original untouched audio plus all your edit settings embedded inside it as metadata. It plays anywhere like a normal unedited file, but reopening it in the app restores your whole session, sliders and all. This is the "keep the raw take" advice from my earlier posts, automated.
Export… renders the processed audio only. Use this for the copy you upload or send.
Export Reel… exports a video. The edited recording is the audio and a timeline and spectrogram view makes up the visual component.

That's the whole field workflow: record, trim, compensate, filter, normalise, save. With a little practice it's two or three minutes per recording.

Final Thoughts

The most important part of recording bird calls is still what happens in the field: getting close enough, pointing the microphone accurately, avoiding handling noise and capturing a clean signal before the bird moves on. No app can fully rescue a recording that contains more wind, traffic or movement than bird call.

What TalonFab Recorder and Editor does is make everything after that faster and simpler. Recording, locating the call, trimming it, applying useful filters, correcting the response of a parabolic dish and exporting a finished file can all be done with lightning speed.

You also do not need specialist equipment to begin. A phone microphone is enough to practise the workflow, while an external microphone or parabolic dish can provide a substantial improvement when you want cleaner recordings of distant or quiet birds.

The browser beta is available now at editor.talonfab.com.au and is free to use. Native Android, iOS, Windows and macOS versions are planned after further field testing. The goal is straightforward: make it easier for birders to capture, preserve and share good recordings without turning audio editing into a separate hobby.

East Pilbara and Cue - Trip Report

Wed, 10 Jun 2026 20:04:32 +1000

My primary objective for this trip was pretty straightforward: obtain photographs of Pilbara Grasswren and Western Quail-thrush. Banded Whiteface and Grey Honeyeater were the secondary objectives. The original plan was to fly from Sydney to Newman, spend time with the grasswrens around Radio Hill, then travel south to Austin Downs Station to search for Western Quail-thrush and Banded Whiteface before returning to Newman via Tom Price for the flight home.

The trip did not begin as planned. Upon arrival at Newman Airport, Qantas informed me that my checked baggage was not there. So I was left with some slightly-too-warm track pants, a white t-shirt and my camera. My missing bag contained all of my camping equipment, camouflage clothing, spare accessories and charger. I had a bluetooth tracker in my bag, but it had gone flat, so I couldn't even check if it was just hiding at the airport somewhere. I spent some time completing the lost baggage paperwork, then I collected the hire vehicle and headed off to do some afternoon birding.

Radio Hill - Pilbara Grasswren

Since it was only a short drive from the airport and I had landed mid afternoon, I headed to Radio Hill in Newman to start looking for the Pilbara Grasswren. Radio Hill is adjacent to the enormous Newman West mining complex. My first impression of the area was not the spinifex or the birds, but the scale of the mining industry. Massive haul trucks, dust plumes and infrastructure dominate much of the landscape. The mine is visible from almost everywhere around the site and serves as a constant backdrop to the birding. I couldn't help but wonder if the grasswren was once found on the mine site.

My first afternoon was spent exploring a creek line and ridge south of Radio Hill Lookout Road. The habitat itself consisted of red rocky hillsides, spinifex and sparse eucalyptus. Conditions appeared dry, with many spinifex clumps looking stressed and dry. At first I found no grasswrens. Only after returning toward a large roadside turnout area near sunset did I finally hear them calling. At least three Pilbara Grasswrens were present, but the light was almost gone and only brief views were obtained. I'm sure my bright t-shirt did not help matters!

Originally I had planned to go to Tom Price and try an alternative site the next morning, but my baggage meant that I stayed in town at the Yurlu Caravan park. For this reason I returned to Radio Hill the following morning. I started very early in the hopes of locating more grasswren by call in the dark. It was windy and this was difficult, but eventually I relocated a group in a creek line below the track west of the telecommunications tower and obtained some distant photographs. Through further sessions I would learn that the birds were relatively easy to locate by listening before dawn, but their position shifted from day to day - staking out a specific spot was not a good strategy here.

This second session was abruptly cut short when I received a call from baggage staff stating that they had my bag, but also the airport would be closed in 25 minutes as there were no further flights so I had to come straight away. It was 20 minutes drive.

South to Austin Downs

After collecting my baggage from Newman Airport, I began the drive south toward Austin Downs Station. Permission had been obtained from the station to visit, which has become known among birders as a reliable location for Western Quail-thrush and Banded Whiteface.

The journey also further highlighted the industrial nature of inland Western Australia - oversized mining loads appeared regularly. Periodically I had to pull off the highway when a mining truck wider than both lanes was being hauled with a police escort. Road trains loaded with ammonium nitrate were also a common sight.

Bird activity along the route was generally lower than I had expected. Conditions remained dry and many areas appeared quiet. I stopped at one point and had a go in what looked like decent Western Quail-thrush Habitat, but I was unsuccessful.

Austin Downs presented a very different landscape from Newman. The habitat consisted of open gibber plains dotted with low saltbush and occasional mulga trees.

Almost immediately after beginning my search I heard Western Quail-thrush. Finding the birds proved much easier than photographing them.

The quail-thrushes consistently maintained separation from me, often remaining fifty to one hundred metres away across open country with very little cover available for an approach. During the first evening I heard several birds and eventually obtained views of a pair near sunset, although the closest encounter still produced only partially obscured views.

Compounding the difficulty was a back injury. I had a mild overuse injury from cycling before I started the trip, but this flared up in a major way after spending the first night sleeping in the vehicle without any sleeping mat. By the time I reached Austin Downs, a strained quadratus lumborum muscle made many movements extremely painful.

Walking back to the vehicle after the first evening's search was particularly difficult. Simple actions such as bending, turning or lifting the camera were triggering pain sharp enough to vocalise involuntarily.

The following morning I returned to the same drainage depression where the birds had been located previously. This strategy worked reasonably well. Initially I encountered two Western Quail-thrushes and later located a group of four birds together. Despite repeated encounters, the birds kept their distance and I only managed some habitat shots.

Mega!

With Western Quail-thrush photography proving difficult and a recent report of Forest Wagtail half way back - a really rare record for Australia, I elected to return toward Newman rather than continue elsewhere.

A stop at the Gascoyne River Rest Stop produced several enjoyable species, including Mulga Parrot, Western Bowerbird, White-plumed Honeyeater and Common Bronzewing, but I wasn't able to locate the Forest Wagtail from the previous day.

More Grasswren Attempts

The final morning was devoted entirely to improving my Pilbara Grasswren photographs.

This time I applied the lesson learned during previous visits. Rather than waiting where birds had been found earlier, I actively searched for calling birds before sunrise.

A group was initially located below a small rocky peak west of the telecommunications tower car park. The birds called freely in darkness before disappearing completely once dawn approached.

After failing to relocate them, I continued driving slowly between listening points and eventually found another group near the large turnout area where I had first encountered the species on arrival.

This encounter finally produced the photographs I had hoped for.

The birds used exposed rocks and elevated perches around the spinifex, providing significantly better opportunities than on previous attempts. While still not especially confiding, they remained visible long enough for a series of usable images.

Summary

Looking back, I would describe the trip as partially successful. Pilbara Grasswren was the primary objective and ultimately produced both excellent views and photographs. Western Quail-thrush was found repeatedly, but I wanted some portraits and not just habitat shots.

The experience also reinforced the importance of adaptability. Once the baggage failed to arrive, there was little value in dwelling on the problem. The available resources had changed and the task became one of optimising within those constraints. The same approach applied after the back injury. Whether driving, walking or operating the camera, many activities became more difficult, but the only practical option was to continue to try and make the best decisions possible with the circumstances available.

Another lesson is the importance of rainfall - much of the country appeared dry and bird activity was often subdued. Trying to go after a period of more rainfall might have made things easier.

For a bird and location list see my eBird trip report.

Australia and New Zealand Subantarctic Islands - Trip Report

Sat, 21 Feb 2026 14:34:28 +1100

I’ve wanted to visit the New Zealand and Australian Subantarctic Islands since around 2010. At the time, it was well beyond my means. I applied for an Enderby Trust Scholarship once or twice at the time but was unsuccessful. I had kept it on my bucket list ever since, and finally decided to commit around 18 months out. I looked at the three companies that offered itineraries in the region: Heritage Expeditions, Ponant and Aurora Expeditions.

Remote, tightly managed, and surrounded by cold Southern Ocean, places like The Snares, the Auckland Islands, Macquarie Island and Campbell Island and are famous for seabirds, penguins, and dramatic coastal landscapes. They are also difficult and expensive to reach, with strict rules about where you can go and how long you can stay.

Ultimately I settled on the Galapagos of the Southern Ocean: New Zealand and Australia's Subantarctic Islands itinerary with Heritage Expeditions based on my monetary and time budgets. This itinerary skipped the Antipodes, Bounty Islands and Chatham Islands, but at the time another shorter cruise was offered visiting these, and it's possible to fly to the Chatham Islands, so I figured that stuff could wait until a different trip in the future. The Ponant boat had twice as many passengers so I didn't think it'd go so well with the landing person count restrictions and the Aurora boat only did an Antarctic expedition that was substantially more expensive.

As always for me it was a photography trip and I spent a lot of time beforehand trying to do my homework and make decisions before being in the field with time pressure. In some respects this was easier than tropical birding trips - the species list to try and memorise was much shorter and actually not that many distinct locations would be visited on foot. I was also reasonably familiar with the seabirds that would be on offer. Preparation consisted of a island / landing specific notes: likely species, gear choices, a rough shot list, which excursion option I should pick and so on. I didn't have to worry about logistics at all - pretty much I paid my money, hoped for weather which permitted landings and showed up.

Fiordland: Dipping on some dipped targets!

I flew into Queenstown a day early as insurance against missed connections. I did not book my accommodation for the night of the 30th of December until approximately a month before. This was a mistake. The town was packed with young adventure tourism types for new years eve and the only available accommodation was a bunk in a youth hostel for $650 NZD/night.

I instead hired a car and opted to head back to Fiordland to try for a few targets that I dipped on photographically on a previous trip. The afternoon of arrival I went to Homer Tunnel and spent several hours looking for Rock Wren, but didn't get any good photos to show for it. In the last hour of daylight I returned to the car and checked many spots along the river for Blue Duck, including near Monkey Creek. Although I found some birds none were photographable. A pair of Paradise Shelduck were actually following my car as I went from spot to spot down the river. I think they were hoping to be fed.

I drove back to Kiosk Creek to sleep. On the way I did a lap of the Lake Gunn Nature Walk hoping to spot or hear a Kiwi. I mostly walked in the dark looking with my thermal, but it was really dead and I didn't hear anything. I also stopped at several spots on the side of the road on the way to the campsite but didn't have much luck. Kiosk Creek is not a scenic campsite but this minimised the number of people. I felt a bit guilty rolling in at about 11pm and most likely waking a few hikers if the Morepork was not doing the job already.

I didn't pack any sleeping bag or sleeping mat. This was deliberate - I didn't have the bag weight or space and I figured one night of discomfort would be fine. I just slept in my thermals and a synthetic jacket. Perhaps unsurprisingly I woke at 2am feeling cold, and after caffeination in the form of a no-doz tablet, I decided to spend more time looking for Kiwis. This time I drove to the trailhead of the Kepler track and started walking in the dark, listening, and looking with my thermal. There were many deer and quite a few Brush-tailed Possum. I could also hear Morepork. A sign early on in the track mentioning Kiwis also gave me some hope.

At maybe 4:30am I decided to turn around and start returning to the car, walking more briskly than the walk in - I wanted to have another go for Rock Wren. It was at this stage that I spotted a Kiwi on the track, but it quickly moved into vegetation and became hard to see. I observed it for a bit with some red light and the thermal and then eventually lost it in the ferns. A little disappointed I returned to the car, slightly bewildered by the number of introduced blackbirds and song thrush and headed back to the Homer Tunnel site where I searched again unsuccessfully for the Rock Wren until the light was bad.

After the light turned I returned to Queenstown. The traffic was terrible and I spent quite a bit of time bumper to bumper. I checked in to the hotel and with the cruise company and sourced a beanie and garbage bags - two items I had left at home. The next 24 hours was boring. We didn't leave on tour buses to Bluff until the afternoon and had several meals at the hotel. I think probably the cruise company did this to build in a buffer for delayed flights etc, and probably because 12 days looks like better value than 10 on an itinerary.

At Sea: Settling Into the Southern Ocean

After boarding the boat we were kept a little busy with customs and briefings and the like, but I used the time in the afternoon and evening to sit at the back of the boat and look for seabirds. As we approached Stewart Island the highlight was many Cook's Petrels and a few Mottled Petrels, plus Fairy Prions and albatrosses. I mostly used a 400 mm f/2.8 on deck, waiting for birds to come close. The light was very flat and overcast and I didn't end up with any of my favourite pictures that afternoon.

The Snares

Overnight we arrived at The Snares - the boat parked near North East Island. I got up in time for dawn and peered out the window to see a Salvin's Albatross in the dim light. Soon I was up on deck as there was plenty of activity around the boat. I spent some time taking photographs and managed some pretty decent Antarctic Tern shots and saw the first Light-mantled Sooty Albatross of the trip.

The Snares are strictly no-landing, so all observation is from zodiacs. Originally the plan was to send passengers out in their assigned groups for one and a half hours at a time. I had picked an "Albatross" group which was meant to go first. I was happy about this as the light would be better. Later groups were to do a lecture and then we'd come back and do the same thing whilst they were on the Zodiacs.

Because it was quite windy and there was some swell, the conditions were a little marginal and the company decided to send out the Zodiacs without passengers to test the conditions. This meant that everyone was to go to the lecture whilst they decide what to do. A bit rudely, I decided to walk out of the lecture when the "how to identify a Cape Petrel" slide came up - it didn't seem to be covering useful material from my point of view and I felt I'd rather be on the deck photographing the seabirds. At the time watching a slideshow inside over enjoying the place I was paying a substantial hourly rate to visit didn't make sense to me!

By 10 or 11am it was time to board the Zodiacs. Boarding was via a gangway, timing the step onto a moving inflatable. On my first attempt the zodiac lurched away as I stepped, and I stumbled on entry, but it was fine. All of my gear was in a Sea to Summit drybag backpack, so I had my hands free. The worst possible outcome would have been a cold swim and a missed ride I think. Once in the Zodiac we were on man-overboard procedure: swim to the stern, drop the motor, climb back in!

Once underway, the zodiac stayed in a single sheltered area due to swell, and one planned destination (the "penguin slide") was skipped. We were out for an hour and a quarter. Penguins were abundant as we approached the island, and Snares Penguins were porpoising close to the boat. I worked mostly with a 300 mm f/2.8, which was more than sufficient at the distances involved. Snares Snipe were audible but not seen, and Fernbirds passed briefly overhead. With more time the odds would improve, but permits and passenger count on the boat ultimately dictated the limits.

Backgrounds were often compromised by boat position and timing. I tried for a mix of portraits, environmental frames with kelp, and in-water behaviour. Some came together; others didn’t. Light shifted from flat to harsh as the late start pushed us toward midday. Pity about the delayed start. I also attempted to get some porpoising shots and got close but my shots were out of focus.

Enderby Island

Enderby Island was a morning landing. I chose the full circuit walk because it covered all habitats and offered the best chance for Subantarctic Snipe. The passengers that did the circuit walk also got to land first and spend the most time on the island. I'm confident that this option was the best choice for photography having covered the ground permitted on the other options.

I was on the first Zodiac out. We landed at the research huts, changed to hiking shoes and waited for the other groups. We had previously been briefed on the animals and told that knowingly approaching within 50 meters of Yellow-eyed Penguin was not permitted. This resulted in us waiting on the beach for around an hour and a half watching a group of them repeatedly approach the beach and retreat in response to the slightest movement by a Sea Lion.

The penguin induced delay created time pressure on the walk. We (meaning 50 people in two groups of 25!) marched up off the beach and along a boardwalk. I told the lead guide (Rachael Brown) of my snipe hopes and tried to stick near the front and we walked up over the island in maybe 20 or 30 minutes. This included a very close nesting southern royal albatross but it wasn't compositionally great so I opted to keep walking and not stop for more than a moment - I knew I'd be able to this again at Campbell Island with more time.

Once moving, the pace became uneven. The first few walkers flushed snipe from muddy creek depressions, and stopping even briefly for photographs meant losing ground. I stayed near the front, pausing only for seconds at a time. When a snipe appeared, Rachael gave me a wink before calling it I ran past several people and managed a single rear-view frame before it disappeared again. I think it'd be an easy bird in a small group or alone. The only challenge is dealing with other guests who all wanted to be at the front, presumably to hear what Rachael was saying. The creek depressions on the northern side of the island were the best for the snipes, and it's worth pushing ahead of the non-birders on that section of the walk if you want to see one.

The walk on the northern side of the island was really the highlight overall. Seeing courting and nesting Light-mantled Sooty Albatross was amazing and despite the group dynamics there were lots of photo opportunities, including nesting Brown Skua, Auckland Island Teal, Spotted Shag and more Yellow-eyed Penguin.

As we proceeded around the island, we ended up walking in tussock grass. Some of the guests struggled with this and a few fell over or went very slowly so our pace dwindled somewhat. At this point it also became sunny and I felt a bit overdressed! Once we reached the eastern side of the islands we stopped for lunch where a Pacific Swift was flying overhead. I was later asked to submit a rarities report for this observation.

The last part of the island had more of the same in terms of species, but the light wasn't amazing so I didn't fuss about most stuff, mainly just snapping some Auckland Islands Shag shots. The last part of the walk was a little longer than anticipated - we had to skip a section of Southern Rata forest due to nesting giant petrels, and make some penguin-related diversions as well.

Carnley Harbour

Carnley Harbour offered two zodiac cruises, the first departing early enough that the light was a genuine improvement on the previous day at the Snares. We entered through the eastern passage, flanked by tussock-covered cliffs, and headed first to a cave area on the northern wall where Auckland Island Shags were nesting on ledge formations. Antarctic Terns also perched on the exposed rock nearby. The light was flat but even, and with the 300 mm f/2.8, sometimes extended to 420 mm with a 1.4× converter, conditions were calm. A Light-mantled Sooty Albatross appeared close on the water at one point, it was great to be down at eye level in the zodiac.

The more significant sighting was a loose colony of Eastern Rockhopper Penguins on a rocky slope near the shore, some at water level, others picked out against vegetation higher up. Sooty Shearwaters were moving in numbers through the harbour entrance too, most likely accessing nest burrows in the steep ground above.

The second cruise, deeper into the harbour in the afternoon, was a different experience. Wind had strengthened considerably, spray was coming over the side of the zodiac, and photography wasn't viable. We received a briefing on the history of the harbour - wrecks, wartime coastwatchers, a German merchant ship that hid here in 1939 - and then turned back. A few buckets of cold water to the face in the wind on the return run served as a reminder of how quickly conditions change in these latitudes. Shortly afterwards, we departed south for Macquarie Island.

Macquarie Island

The first landing at Macquarie was at the Australian Antarctic Division research station at Buckles Bay - about an hour onshore, a guided march only, no access into the base itself. The wind was stronger than at the Auckland Islands but the lee of the island reduced the worst of it. A brief stop at a Gentoo Penguin colony offered a few minutes of shooting before the group was marched uphill to a lookout and then back to the zodiacs within the one hour time limit.

Sandy Bay was different. We had two landings there - one in the afternoon and one the following morning - with more freedom to roam. The first time I focused on the southern end of the beach, where King and Royal Penguins mixed near elephant seals. A larger Royal Penguin colony uphill was off limits due to a nesting Southern Giant-Petrel. I position myself strategically to allow some wide angle shots from passing penguins without breaching the 5 meter approach rule. They were curious overall and would come very close as long as you stayed still.

On the second landing I focussed on the King Penguin colony. It was interesting to observe the Voronoi-like structure of the nesting sites - the birds on eggs would peck at anything in range, and it was amusing watching birds occasionally running the gauntlet.

After visiting Sandy Bay on the second day the weather deteriorated somewhat, so we cruised down to Lusitania Bay to see the very big colony there and the southern tip of Macquarie Island before turning around and heading to our next destination.

At Sea: Light Finally Cooperates

The transit days between islands were seabirding days. I was on deck early and stayed late most days waiting for birds to pass within workable range. Most mornings were overcast and the light was unremarkable, but the days leaving Macquarie Island were different. Two evenings in succession brought clear skies and broken cloud at the horizon, and for the first time on the trip sunset light aligned with birds close to the ship.

Light-mantled Sooty Albatrosses were a standout: two pairs flew alongside, engaged in extended courtship display, calling as they tracked one another across the wind. The combination of low-angle backlight, the birds' pale undersides against a darkening sky, and the sustained duration of the display made these afternoons the most satisfying moments of any at-sea day on the trip.

Campbell Island: Mt Honey

Campbell Island was the final landing of the trip. The choices on offer included a boardwalk circuit and a zodiac-and-walk option to find Campbell Island Teal. I took the Mt Honey walk. Heritage staff had framed the walk as demanding during the briefing, but really I think moderate to easy would be a better description for an experienced walker - roughly seven kilometres return, with four creek crossings each way and a few hundred metres of elevation gain. Half of it was off track on tussock. I also went one knee in mud on the way back, but the waterproofs kept the mud out of my boots so that was fine.

The reasoning for choosing the walk was straightforward: the warnings about difficulty would thin numbers, the creek crossings offered genuine snipe habitat, and the elevation would give access to nesting and courting Southern Royal Albatross in open tussock with views behind rather than on boardwalk-adjacent scraps of ground.

Megaherbs were in full flower across the slope - the spectacle that the botanist Joseph Hooker called second to none outside the tropics, and the description holds. The vegetation was denser and more varied in colour than anything seen at Enderby Island or on the approach to Mt Honey's mid-slopes.

Southern Royal Albatross were nesting almost immediately once we cleared the lower tussock, and further up, groups of four or five birds were engaged in courtship, calling and spreading their wings, lifting into the wind above the ridge. They climbed to considerable height, then swept back down in slow arcs over the sea. I stayed approximately 100 to 150 metres below the summit, choosing to spend the time working compositions - landscape framings with the bay visible below, closer portraits of nesting birds, and the courtship groups in flight - rather than continuing to the top.

On the return we paused at the feral Sitka Spruce, reportedly one of the most isolated trees in the world and a notable artefact of the island's pastoral history, and briefly observed a Campbell Island Teal that had been spotted near the meteorology buildings. Campbell Island Shags were passed at pace on the zodiac return and not photographed, but missing any photographs of those was an acceptable trade for the great time I had on the hill.

Gear and Packing Notes

I spent a considerable amount of time planning what gear to bring for this trip. I wasn’t operating from direct Subantarctic experience, so I relied on research reading trip reports, analysing other photographers’ images. The conditions were more mild than winter in Tasmania, so I used that as a reference point for clothing.

From a photography gear perspective, it is useful to think in terms of four operational modes:

1. Photography from the Ship

There were always pelagic birds around the vessel, both offshore and near land, but they didn’t always approach closely. The largest lens you can comfortably handhold is the right choice here. I used my 400mm f/2.8 most of the time; it was my bread and butter. A 100-500mm or 200-600mm would also have been fine.

Wider focal lengths were occasionally useful. I made some “bird in landscape” frames with a 70–200mm, particularly when birds passed nearer the hull in good light. The fast aperture of my lenses was nice at sunrise and sunset.

2. Photography from the Zodiac

In zodiacs you’re often relatively close to the action, but not always - sometimes something interesting is a bit distant. I most frequently used a 300mm f/2.8, sometimes with 1.4× or 2× converters (420mm or 600mm equivalent). That combination worked well for individual portraits and small group compositions. Probably a zoom lens like a 100-500 would be easier to handle.

Short telephoto focal lengths were useful too. In my case I used a 70–200mm for wider frames of penguin colonies or environmental portraits. I had hoped to use wider angles more often, but my seating position in the boat generally made that impractical.

A selfie stick with a GoPro isn’t a bad idea, as penguins frequently porpoise close to the boat. I attempted this but didn’t succeed with any usable swimming shots. If you intend to carry multiple lenses, a second body is highly recommended - it's faster and less risk than changing lenses.

3. Photography on Guided Walks

Some landings involved structured group walks where stopping for extended periods wasn’t practical. For these I carried my 400mm f/2.8, as the reach allowed me to make images quickly without repositioning.

I also carried a 24–70mm and/or 70–200mm on a battle belt for rapid lens changes. To manage weight, I generally carried only one camera body on walking days. A workable system was one body with the long lens mounted and a second wide lens.

4. Photography on Self-Directed Landings

For the two Sandy Bay landings on Macquarie Island, I carried a 300mm f/2.8, 24–70mm, 70–200mm, and converters, along with two bodies. I used a molle battle belt, peak design clips and custom 3D printed carbon fibre nylon brackets to hold my gear and allow rapid switching. Honestly a third camera would have been good here (or a lens with a wider zoom range). I also used the battle belt to hold a spare lens on the hikes. For most photographers, a telephoto zoom and a wide zoom would suffice.

A large drybag with backpack straps is essential for zodiac ingress/egress. There was often significant salt spray until we reached sheltered water. I used a 50L Sea to Summit Big River drybag with foam cut to size in the base for added protection. It performed well. I also custom-printed carbon fibre nylon brackets to mount a GoPro and selfie stick externally to the bag.

Improvised Weather Protection

For additional protection I used garbage bags and hair ties, cutting a hole for the front element and stretching the plastic over the lens before taping it in place with electrical tape. A second hole allowed access to the viewfinder.

There were no commercial covers available at the time that fit my R1 and R3 properly, and I’ve used this method on pelagics for years. Ultimately, I didn’t need the extra protection due to relatively kind weather - but it only takes one rogue wave or heavy rain to create corrosion issues later.

Clothing

I wore offshore sailing gear (Gill OS/2) as an outer layer while on deck or off the boat. If buying specifically for this type of trip, I’d favour items with plastic zips - metal corrodes quickly in salt environments. Salopettes with shoulder straps were useful on hikes, as they stayed in place and didn’t require adjustment. Lighter bushwalking gear may be better in terms of bulk and weight travelling, but be aware of the corrosion issue. I run warm, and the interior of the ship was warmer than I prefer. Shorts and T-shirts were useful in the cabin and dining room and another passenger commented wishing they'd packed some too! Laundry turnaround was efficient, generally 24 hours rather than the 48 I had anticipated. As a result, packing excessive thermals and spare layers wasn’t necessary.

I packed a beanie and gloves but never used them. My jacket hood was sufficient. They’re still worth bringing in case conditions deteriorate or if you run cold. My Sealskinz gloves were acquired by someone else on the ship during biosecurity processing, but I had a spare insulated pair.

Conclusion

Overall, the experience was exceptional. Seeing nesting seabirds and a slice of the Southern Ocean in this context was deeply rewarding. Bird photography on a Subantarctic cruise is a constrained optimisation problem - limited access, imperfect light, crowd dynamics, and permit restrictions all shape what is possible. Despite those constraints, there were many moments that will remain vivid for years, and I’m very glad I made the trip.

For a bird list see my eBird trip report.

eBird Photographic Life List Tool

Wed, 10 Dec 2025 18:08:46 +1100

This tool generates a photographic life list from your eBird photo records. Simply drag/upload a CSV exported from your eBird profile and your life list will be instantly shown. Everything runs entirely in your browser. The CSV is processed locally and no data is uploaded or stored. You can refresh the list at any time by uploading a new export.

For each species, the tool shows its life-list position, common and scientific names, the date of your first photographed record, the locality, and direct links to the original eBird checklist and your full observation history for that species. If you have photographed a species multiple times, only the earliest photographic record is used.

To export the CSV from eBird and use the tool, follow these steps:

Go to the eBird gallery tool.
Click "Contributors" (or "Filter" then "Contributors" on mobile).
Click on "My Media" (and then "Show results" on mobile).
Click on "Export".
Use the CSV file that downloads with this tool.

Limitations:

Some sensitive species are not shown in eBird galleries - these will not be included in the list.
If you have uploaded more than 10000 photos then it isn't possible to export them in the way described above - you will need to do multiple exports based on e.g. date ranges and stitch them into a single CSV prior to using this tool.

Upload Image List

Follow the instructions above to export the photos from your eBird profile as a CSV, then upload it here to generate a photographic life list.

Upload eBird CSV

No data loaded yet. Upload your eBird photos CSV to see your photographic life list.

Sumba - Trip Report

Sat, 06 Dec 2025 16:31:16 +1100

Recently I published a trip report about birding for a few days in Timor. This was part a trip that involved travelling to both West Timor and Sumba in Indonesia. This blog post covers the Sumba part of the trip. See this previous post for the Timor part.

3 November - Waingapu

We landed in Waingapu at 4:30 PM and drove through town and open grassy country to the first site. The target was Sumba Buttonquail. The grass was about 50 cm high in the most fruitful spots, and though we flushed periodically birds at close range, the thermal (a mid-range hikmicro LYNX LH15) was nearly useless - the ground was dotted with sun-heated rocks - creating a lot of visual noise. At one point after sunset I was walking very slowly scanning through the long grass with the thermal, thought I heard a faint buttonquail-like vocalisation and then flushed two birds - I couldn't see them from two meters away even with the thermal.

In hindsight I think a better tactic would be to attend the site early morning or late at night after rain in the hopes that the environmental temperatures had become much more uniform and then that the birds might stick out temperature wise. Spotting birds by sight was very difficult too. I also tried playing some recordings of closely related buttonquails in the best spots, but there were no responses to this.

After giving up on the buttonquail we made our way to Lewa where we stayed in a homestay.

4 November - Langgaliru

The next morning was spent birding near the village of Langgaliru. The traffic was pretty light so it wasn't too unpleasant. Initially we focussed on the roadside. Initially it was foggy enough to make good photos impossible But before long the sun was out and it cleared. This netted decent photos of Sumba Flowerpecker and Yellow-spectacled Heleia and some record shots of other species.

Once the sun was too high we drove down the hill to a hairpin bend and walked a short way into the forest. Several Elegant Pitta were calling in this area, and we were able to see Sumba Jungle Flycatcher as well. I spent a few hours attempting to photograph the pitta here and got a passable photo through vegetation, but ultimately I wanted to do better so would try again in later days. It was challenging because of a thick understory consistent with secondary forest.

In the evening it was time to focus on nocturnal birds. Daris had sites for both birds and both were photographed pretty easily for this reason. The usual method was used to photograph them - observe and line things up in the dark with the thermal with Daris holding my flash attached to a BeamMount Pro with a small torch mounted and turned on a few moments before one or two low power flash pops.

5 November - Taman Nasional Manupeu Tanah Daru

This day we headed a bit further west relative to the day before focussing on Tanah Daru National Park. We started the day roadside, trying for Sumba Green-Pigeon, Red-naped Fruit-dove and Black-naped Fruit-Dove with modest success.

By about 9am we moved on and I put in more effort for the Elegant Pitta and Chestnut-backed thrush. I succeeded with the Pitta basically by very carefully stalking two calling birds in two locations and got something passable for the thrush.

We finished the daylight back near Umbu Ratu Nggay on the side of the road. The focus here was some roadside flowering shrubs. They were periodically attracting very cooperative Sumba Myzomela and Apricot-breasted Sunbird. White-eyes and Broad-billed Flycatchers also moved through occasionally and some Marigold Lorikeet were present up in the taller trees.

That night we did a little more nocturnal birding. I didn't bother with a checklist on eBird, but mostly we just saw more Sumba Boobook.

6 November - Manurara and Manupeu Tanah Daru National Park

At Manurara we positioned ourselves on a grassy hilltop overlooking forest, hoping for Sumba Hornbill or Citron-crested Cockatoo to pass near enough for photography. Both species appeared but remained distant. The ridge was open, so you could see a long way, and probably a perfect spot to sit with a scope, but the morning didn't really yield many photographs.

In the afternoon we moved into Manupeu Tanah Daru National Park. Here there was a nesting Tenggara Paradise-Flycatcher at a fairly busy trailhead. We waited in the car park nearby hoping for a visit from the male but didn't have any luck with that!

In the afternoon we headed to a top secret site where I was told there would be a tree with Eclectus Parrot nesting in the hollow. To get there we walked about 20 minutes through new slash-and-burn agriculture to find a solitary large tree with a number of hollows. Short-tailed Starling occupied some of these and there were some visits from Citron-crested Cockatoo. More slashing was going on on the next hillside and there was fresh smoke, so I had pretty mixed feelings about the whole affair about staking out what felt like the one tree left behind. We didn't see the Eclectus, and we did see some Short-tailed Starling checking out the same hollow without an argument. So I think perhaps it had finished using it for the year. At least I got a flyover the day before!

7 November - Final Birding: Umbu Ratu Nggay, Yumbo Bridge, Pandawai

We returned to Umbu Ratu Nggay at dawn for one more attempt at Sumba Green Pigeon, a species that had remained photographically difficult.

Some rice paddies Pandawai in the late afternoon produced large flocks of Pale-headed Munia, Scaly-breasted Munia with a few Five-colored Munia, moving between feeding on rice paddies and some trees nearby. We got permission to stake them out in the field, but a local was semi-active chasing them off his crop which didn't help!

Afterward we revisited the buttonquail site (Yumbo Bridge). With the sun already up, the rocks were warm again, and thermal detection remained ineffective. The sandflies were really active this time, but I had covered up better so just got a few bites on the backs of my hands. This was really the end of the trip. The next morning was an early flight back to Denpasar and eventually home.

If you'd like a species list or more location detail then see the eBird trip report (which covers Timor as well).

Timor - Trip Report

Fri, 28 Nov 2025 17:31:52 +1100

I recently spent ten days away from my home in Sydney travelling to Timor and Sumba in Indonesia via Bali. These are two islands in Nusa Tenggara in Indonesia (the eastern part of Timor is independent from Indonesia) and represented a part 2 for this region after a short stay in Lombok earlier in the year. I used Daris Pradikatama to organise the trip. He engaged a local guide on Timor and drivers in both locations. This blog post covers the Timor part of the trip - my intent is to publish separate posts covering Lombok and Sumba.

Most days in Timor were spent birding without large amounts of time stuck in a car. The weather was generally pleasant - a little cooler and a little less humid than many other locations in Indonesia. The birds showed some wariness (with more in the lowlands), but overall they were not as difficult as Papua, though still noticeably harder than Australia.

Timor

31 October - Kupang to Soe: First Night in the Forest

After flying Sydney to Denpasar the night before, I slept at the airport hotel in Bali and took a daytime flight to Kupang where I met Daris. We immediately drove towards Soe. The roads were good and there seemed to be various shiny government buildings, but the locals themselves didn't appear to be particularly wealthy compared to other parts of Indonesia.

The first birding site was Mollo Selatan, working a small patch of forest for the Timor near endemic Orange-banded Thrush. The lighting was really poor because an afternoon thunderstorm was building. We saw the thrush and a few other things like Fawn-breasted Whistler and Supertramp Fantail. I took some photos but nothing amazing - the thrush mostly stayed pretty high up in the trees.

We called it a day when the thunderstorm started and went and checked into a hotel in Soe and had dinner. After dinner we returned to a nearby site on private land for some nocturnal work. Timor Boobook was straightforward and we heard several calling after a short walk into the forest. I had some initial success with photos and we also heard Timor Nightjar, so we switched to focussing on that pretty quicky. We successfully got quite close with the lights off using the thermal but when we turned on the lights it was occluded by vegetation and flushed immediately.

1 November - Fatumnasi: Ridge Forest, Camo, and a Rare Flycatcher

We left Soe at 4:30 AM, arriving at Fatumnasi about fifteen minutes after sunrise. It was mild, dry, and bright, with the first birds being Yellow-eared Honeyeaters moving actively through the eucalypt forest. It almost felt like being somewhere on the east coast of Australia apart from some weird asian birds mixed in with the honeyeaters and whistlers! For most of the day we worked the ridge and the fire trail above the village, walking forest edges and then setting up long camo sessions near small streams. I was told that this area will be gazetted as a national park some time soon.

At one point I sat with a ghillie poncho and a face mask and gloves motionless near thicker vegetation hoping for a Timor Stubtail. Whilst waiting motionless a Black-banded Flycatcher landed unexpectedly close. It was a tight, clean opportunity and not a species frequently recorded at this site.

I spent approximately half the day laying prone under my camo hoping for Mount Mutis Parrotfinch - an undescribed form with only scattered records. This resulted in a sighting of two birds and quite a few Scaly-Breasted Munia, but I was not so lucky as to be able to take a photograph!

Other photographic highlights from this site included Timor Blue Flycatcher, Timor Stubtail, Plain Gerygone, Cinnamon-banded Kingfisher, Black-breasted Myzomela, Timor Leaf Warbler and some fairly average photos of quite a few other things. I think with an extra day and a bit less time trying for the Parrotfinch I certainly could have walked away with more photographs as it was a productive location.

In the late afternoon we headed back towards Soe and the site where we had seen the Timor Nightjar. We camped out the previous perch in the hopes that it would return and instead I saw it hawking for insects along the trail. We followed it for a bit but it was moving pretty quickly. It then proceeded to start calling somewhere deep in the forest. So we decided to wait back at the perch. After significant patience it returned, we lined everything up in the dark with the thermal, turned on the light and got the shot. Daris held my Canon EL-5 using a BeamMount Pro to hold the torch and flash in alignment.

2 November - Jalan Batu Putih and Bipolo: Lowland Targets

Dawn at Jalan Batu Putih was spent trying for species of drier open forest: Timor Friarbird, Timor Cuckoo-Dove, and others typical of the foothills. Very little came close but I scored quite a few lifers!

Later in the day we went to Bipolo Forest. This location was hotter than the highlands and more altered - large trees and tracts cleared, teak being processed at roadside sawmills on the way in, and extensive rice paddies which had replaced woodland in the decades prior. The rice paddies did result in Timor Sparrow and Five-coloured Munia though, and we spent some time there after unsuccessful Flame-breasted Sunbird, Orange-banded Thrush photographic attempts.

3 November - Noelbaki and Flight to Sumba

Our final Timor morning at Noelbaki focused on Flame-breasted Sunbird, but although we located the birds, none allowed close photography. I did photograph a Pale-headed Munia and had some luck photographing a Red-backed Buttonquail.

After this morning session went back to the hotel for a shower and flew to Waingapu on Sumba. Stay tuned for another blog post covering that part of the trip!

If you'd like a species list or more location detail then see the eBird trip report (which covers Sumba as well).