Show your Bird Portraits
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serendipidy said:2n10 said:Krob78 said:Wow! Like night and day from just a few weeks back! Great job Serendipity! These images stand out! Now to find this bird a nice lake background! Keep up the great work and congratulations!serendipidy said:
Bump your shutter speed to 1/2000 or 1/2500 and you should get even more keepers.
Thanks. I'll give it a try when the light is good. I don't like going over ISO 800 on my 7D.
I have used 1600 and even 3200 on mine. Very usable shots. Just make sure you ETTR.
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Krob78 said:AI Servo tracking on slow or "1" does make a difference. It enables the AF system to track the bird more efficiently and to ignore things that may pop into view or slight alterations in course. Auto select for BIF usually results in less keepers with my findings after 3 years with my 7D. Back button focus is excellent as I've suggested previously.CTJohn said:serendipidy said:CTJohn said:serendipidy said:Thank you AmbientLight for your kind advice. I think you are right about FF since I was having a lot of trouble with the 7D obtaining focus and also keeping the whole bird in the frame. One day I hope to upgrade to the 5D3 or something similar in the future.
What lens are you using? I use a 70-300L with a 7D for birds in flight and would just use less zoom than buy a new full frame body. The auto focus of the 7D is more than adequate for sharp birds in flight when used with a fast enough shutter speed. If birds are flying laterally, it's hard to get a high percentage of keepers, but with the 7D's frames/second, you should get some. Do you use back button focus in servo? That change helped my "keep" rate a lot.
Hi CT John,
I started out using my 100-400L but I was usually shooting in the late afternoon and often it is overcast and cloudy then. The light was not bright and so I had low shutter speed and large apertures to keep ISO <800. The focus and IS on the 100-400 was not great. So I started using my recently purchased 70-200L f/2.8 ii for the f/2.8 focusing speed. I also was often too high on the focal range on the 400mm and the 200mm made me not zoom in so much which helped like you suggested. I have never tried back button focus (I'm an old guy who is very timid or slow to try new things) but I know I should learn that technique. Also, I need to practice panning skills. The heron was flying both laterally and towards me at the same time. I was using AI servo, expanded or manual select center zone AF, high speed continuous shutter, and AI Servo tracking sensitivity on "slow". Are those the correct settings to use? Thanks everyone for any advice.
Those settings look fine - I use auto select for auto focus most of the time, and my Servo tracking sensitivity on normal....not sure it that makes a lot of difference. I would recommend trying back button focusing because I think it's easier to keep that depressed while panning rather than half depressing the shutter release button.
Also, I've found that once I MFA'd my 100-400mm the sharpness and accuracy went through the roof! Have you MFA'd you're lenses yet Serendipity? It made mine like getting a brand new lens for about an hours worth of work...
Thanks again Ken for all your excellent advice. I haven't AFMA any lens yet (I don't know how, but I will buy that Focal software I read about on CR and try it). I did send my 7D and 100-400L from HI to CA Canon Service center about a year ago for them to calibrate. When I got it back, it did seem a little sharper. Also, I need to set up my camera and try back button focus. I have been using my recently purchased 70-200L f/2.8ii for BIF since it can capture focus using the f/2.8 and also not so tele since the herons are close (fly between my house and the neighbors house).
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Click said:MRLinVA said:
MRLinVA said:
I love your bird pictures MRLinVA. Nice and sharp. Looking forward to see more of them.
+1, very nice. Is it me or does that BCN Heron only have one leg?
Perhaps a pirate..aarrrgghh
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2n10 said:serendipidy said:2n10 said:Krob78 said:Wow! Like night and day from just a few weeks back! Great job Serendipity! These images stand out! Now to find this bird a nice lake background! Keep up the great work and congratulations!serendipidy said:
Bump your shutter speed to 1/2000 or 1/2500 and you should get even more keepers.
Thanks. I'll give it a try when the light is good. I don't like going over ISO 800 on my 7D.
I have used 1600 and even 3200 on mine. Very usable shots. Just make sure you ETTR.
OK...will give it a try.
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We had a Blue Tit in the garden which we thought only had one leg, it would lean against things.serendipidy said:Click said:MRLinVA said:
MRLinVA said:
I love your bird pictures MRLinVA. Nice and sharp. Looking forward to see more of them.
+1, very nice. Is it me or does that BCN Heron only have one leg?
Perhaps a pirate..aarrrgghh
And on the ground hop about on one leg, using a wing to steady itself if it was in danger of falling over.
Sometime later we did see the leg a few times, so it must have been injured somehow.
Obviously we called her "Eileen" 8)
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Yesterday went out to see my Heron in my side yard next to the ditch. He was there and then the other mature heron appeared. They chased each other around and settled 15' apart. Then this brown juvenile BCN heron appears and very aggressively chases the other 2 mature herons far away and returns. The other 2 never came back. So I try to help this "juvenile delinquent" catch some fish. He is terrible with big fish (never catches even one) but seems to be good at the tiny fish(catches 5 or 6 but gulps them down quickly). I finally get a shot of him with an appetizer.
7D, 70-200L 2.8ii @200, f/6.3, 1/250s
7D, 70-200L 2.8ii @200, f/6.3, 1/250s
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Today my heron friend, as usual, is waiting on the chain link fence staring at my front door. He often sits there at suppertime for several hours till I get home or come out to help him get dinner. This time he scores another big one very quickly within several minutes.
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Nice pic, but if the focus was on the eye of the bird it would have been much more nicer.Darlip said:
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Jack Douglas said:
Jack, nice photo.
Did you use the 300 f/2.8 II and extender (1.4 or 2.0) ?
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serendipidy, nice pics of the Heron. We do get the Nankeen Night-Heron (looks similar to yours) out our way, but rarely (although I did see one flying through the city of Melbourne - Aust. a month or so ago, which surprised me a little). Plus, when we have had the Nankeen Night-Heron, it's been very shy and easily frightened off.
Keep up the pics
Keep up the pics
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