The Friendly Tits of Engadin

Canon EOS 350D, Sigma 180mm f/3.5 EX APO Macro HSM, 1/800 f/5.6, iso 400, handheld. Engadin, Switzerland.

It was a cold day of December 2005 when my good friend Luigi Ziotti invited me to join a trip to Roseg Valley, in Engadin, Switzerland. Luigi is a very skilled photographer and he knows well the best places to photograph birds and wildlife, so I was glad to accept his proposal.

We arrived at Pontresina at 9 a.m. Pontresina is a small village (nearly 2000 persons) in Roseg Valley, near St. Moritz. This is one of the most beautiful areas of the Swiss Alps - you might be tempted to stop in every moment, along the road that leds to Pontresina, to photograph the beauty of the scenery. There are even many lakes, near St. Moritz, Silvaplana and Sils Segl that are covered by ice during the winter, when the temperature is well under 0 Celsius degrees.

As soon as I came out from the car, I was stunned by how cold the temperature was. There were nearly -20 Celsius degrees! After a short walk in the snow, we stopped near the trail. Luigi's hairs were literally frozen and my hands were already painfully cold. At that time I was using the Canon 350D and my longest lens was the Sigma 180 Macro...the 350D, as the new 400D, is a very small camera and it is impossible to use it with heavy gloves, so I had to photograph without any protection on my hand - what an experience!

Luigi and his wife, walking in the snow.

The equipment was well out of its "operative range" - Canon states the operative environment of the 350D is from 0 to 45° Celsius, and we were at -20°, but I was glad to see that both camera and lens worked perfectly. There were mainly two difficulties, other than the already mentioned dimensions of the camera. It was extremely easy to fog the viewfinder, since at this temperature every breathe quickly created small droplets on the cameras. Other than that, it was not easy to focus on the fast moving birds with my Sigma 180 Macro - even though it has an HSM (ultrasonic) motor, the AF is very slow.

The distance from the subject was not a problem. The woods near Pontresina have become famous for their easyly approchable wildlife: you can photograph a great variety of birds (Coal Tits, Crested Tits, Great Tits, etc.) and other animals without hides or camounflagings, you just need few seeds or peanuts to attract many friendly animals. The birds of this area have become used to people that bring them food and they are unbelievably "tame" - they even take food from yours hands: in this photo, a couple of Coal Tits are landing on the hand of my fiend Luigi to take few peanuts. I've choosen a wide aperture (f/5.6) to get enough shutter speed to froze the motion, and to get a pleasing background (here, the background is out of focus snow). I selected the center AF area and I toke some burst of 3-4 shots every time that a tit landed on Luigi's hand, trying to place the AF point on the eye of the subject.

I think that this photo captures well the essence of Roseg Valley - a place were man and nature coexist in peace and harmony.

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