Dark-eyed Junco

AlanLichty

AlanLichty

Moderator
I normally never use auto-focus for almost anything unless there is some reason why I can't focus manually but after watching Steve Perry's video I decided to break out my manual and figure out the many ways my camera actually can do what I never trusted it to do. It appears to work a whole lot better than I expected but then again it's been over 10 years since I used auto focus on any kind of regular basis and the technology is a whole lot more reliable now.

Shooting birds is not my usual venue for photography but I decided to try something different and wandered into my backyard to try shooting some of the birds and critters my wife is always feeding. This is a shot of a dark-eyed junco that ventured within range of my lens. I used manual exposure with 1/1000s f/5.6 and auto ISO with a 100-400mm f/4-5.6 at 400mm.

Junco.jpg


C&C always welcome.
 
Jeffrey

Jeffrey

Well-Known Member
Oh my, what as sweet bird portrait. The pose and lighting are great. My nits (not big ones) are the strong blue background can be desaturated a bit and you can clone out that distracting branch left of the bird.

About auto-focus, I mostly agree with what you said. Was always the craftsman myself, manually focusing and then using live view. I invested in four Zeiss MF primes that did a lot for me. Over the years, I found auto focus and focus point selection to be more reliable and faster. Can't use it on those MF primes but I own many AF lenses and now have very good results with them and AF. Take a little time to get confident and you'll benefit in most situations. One of them is certainly birding. I can't imagine shooting wildlife, BIF or street photography without it.
 
AlanLichty

AlanLichty

Moderator
Jeffrey said:
Oh my, what as sweet bird portrait. The pose and lighting are great. My nits (not big ones) are the strong blue background can be desaturated a bit and you can clone out that distracting branch left of the bird.

About auto-focus, I mostly agree with what you said. Was always the craftsman myself, manually focusing and then using live view. I invested in four Zeiss MF primes that did a lot for me. Over the years, I found auto focus and focus point selection to be more reliable and faster. Can't use it on those MF primes but I own many AF lenses and now have very good results with them and AF. Take a little time to get confident and you'll benefit in most situations. One of them is certainly birding. I can't imagine shooting wildlife, BIF or street photography without it.
Click to expand...
Thanks for the words of encouragement. This morning's effort was basically a training run after wading through Canon's manual with my camera in hand. Last time I cared about auto focus the choices were pretty basic. Now there's 149 pages in Canon's manual just for auto-focus - definitely a lot to absorb. Pretty clear a lot of what is happening with autofocus development is focused on sports but we certainly benefit from it. No way I could have gotten the junco shot without it.
 
Mike Mancil

Mike Mancil

Well-Known Member
Beautiful portrait! At 10 years of age my old dog learned to fetch the paper for me every morning. I don’t know why that came to mind :rolleyes:... Mike
 
ckcarr

ckcarr

Founding Member
Very nice!

I like those birds. First time I didn't know what they were. The Cornell Lab of Merlin Bird ID free app is a great tool...
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top Bottom