This diminutive flowerpecker (total length is ca. 4 inches) is common in most Philippine islands, except Mindoro and the Palawan group.
That said, although easily found or heard, it is quite difficult to observe well due to its active nature, minute size and preferred habitat (canopy of trees). Photographing it on a good perch, with a clean background and frame-filling detail, is even more challenging especially when shooting in low light under the canopy.
I was very lucky to catch the bird in the first photo just as it landed on a branchlet. In my haste to shoot before it moves on, I erred on the manual exposure and I had to push the brightness by 1.5 to 2 stops in post process. The 40D's RAW file held up pretty well to the extreme exposure adjustment - shadow details were recovered but noise is well controlled.
The second photo shows a bird nesting under the canopy of a coffee tree at the foothills of Mt. Makiling. The scene was so dark and I needed a fast shutter speed for the handheld Bigma so I was forced to use a flash and Better Beamer, among the rare times I use artificial lighting at wild birds.
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Red-keeled
Flowerpecker (Dicaeum australe, a Philippine endemic)
Habitat - Canopy of
forest and edge, usually in fruiting and flowering trees.
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