I upgraded my digital camera this year to the canon S5-IS. It's an 8 Megapixel camera with a 12X optical zoom. I've been experimenting with it since the NFL play-offs last season, but have still not taken the time to read how to use it. Maybe I should do that some day. The picture at left is about 1/600 second exposure. Any faster and the hummingbird's wings appear stopped in flight... not what I wanted, so I slowed it down.

The photo to the right was taken through window while it was snowing outside. The feeder is probably 30-40 feet away, so I used some of the optical zoom to get this one. The shutter speed was set to "auto" so I let the camera do the work. If you'd like to view more from my collection, check out wisconsinwildlife.shutterfly.com and use the password "hummer".

Another hummingbird shot with the 1/600 shutter speed. I was able to get quite close to these guys after earning their trust over the summer. Each day or two I'd move my chair a little closer to their food, and by the end of the summer they hardly cared if I was there. Sometimes they'd buzz right up to my face to see their reflection in the camera lens.

The geese in this shot are almost a quarter mile away, taken through the window again. The zoom was all the way out. This one was taken minutes after I took the camera out of the box, without reading the directions. I love a fool-proof camera!

The bee in the picture on the left menu was taken using "super-macro." I got so close on a couple of these that I almost knocked the bee off the flower.