This is a new species for me to photograph. I finally took a day off of work and was able to go somewhere other then the backyard blind and take some shots. Just looking for some input on this one. I generally use a single point for focusing but this time I used a center point expanded setting. To me the head area seemed a little soft. I believe the center of the focus point was on the birds chest and one of the smaller areas was on the head. I did not use a tripod and was lying on rocks and sand resting on elbows. As always I was using the Canon 7D and 100-400mm @400mm ISO 100 (probably should have been at 200 at least) 1/500 hand held at F5.6. It was taken at about 9am. This is uncropped and I did apply some sharpening. I do have frame filling shots of these guys. They were very cooperative.
Looks very good to me. I'd like to see the bird's feet, but that seems impossible from your position without raising the camera and losing the eye-level point of view.
Very nice, and well exposed with good detail in darks and lights. A little more room at the bottom, for the virtual feet would be nice. I would crop a little off the too, and clone out the crescent-moon shaped object below the tip of the beak.
When I use expansion points with the 5D3 I find one of them can lock onto a texture it likes rather than giving precedence to the center point (as it is supposed to do). So you may have missed focus on the eye somewhat. I'll usually try going to center point only in a situation like this, with a cooperative subject, and try to hit the eye, and do several focus bumps, in case the camera is a little undecided.
Although it may have been on a slope, the narrow plane of focus constitutes a sort of horizon, and reads as though the camera may not have been level. But the bird does look balanced, vertically. Maker's choice how to deal with such a situation.
Thanks Bill and Diane. I took a look at the other shots in the series. All of them even from the ones taken from higher up you can not see the feet, they are hiding under the weeds. Diane does it appear that the focus was off on the eye on this shot? I was taking family shots the day before and forgot to change the settings back to single point selection.
I don't think I can judge where the focus was, or how adequate it was, from this small JPEG. You're the best judge, by looking at the image at 100% in your raw converter. It's not far off if at all -- that's really all I can tell. There seems to be a Murphy's Corollary that a face or eye will appear soft when everything else that should be in the same focal plane appears sharper.
For me, small differences are important. Producing a sharp final image depends on getting a sharp capture, and the eyes should be the sharpest point. But sharpness is about shutter speed as well as focus. A small amount of lens or subject motion can cause a lack of sharpness. Sharpness is also a characteristic of the lens, involving both focus and contrast. And the sensor plays a role, as does processing. A lot of factors are involved.
David, this is a cool image. got my first oyster catchers this year as well-unfortunately they are nothing more than orange specks in a flock of shore birds. (took the pic just so I identify them later in post.) Think you've gotten what you can from the file given the angle of light. If you feel the eye isn't as sharp as it should be relative to surrounding detail, one subtle trick is to locally sharpen and increase contrast or clarity on the eye. Then ever so slightly reduce clarity or sharpness on the surrounding areas to bring them in a bit.
Doug; When using point expansion, DPP will show the focus point used -it doesn't necessarily mean the area under that point is actually critically focused, or in focus at all, especially since the expansion points can and often do override the desired spot. It is helpful in determining that the user put the point where they intended, beyond that (especially with a 7D in AI Servo) it's up to the focus gods. I often wonder if the system is using an RNG process like those found in video games. As for the eye being critically focused-tough to tell but it seems to be sitting nearer the rear of the focus cirlce here, with the leg and part of the bill being critical based on the sharper areas on the ground.
Last edited by Randall Farhy; 04-28-2014 at 06:12 AM.
I went back over the images I had in this set (about 75 images). This one is definitely not sharp enough for me around the head/eye when viewed at 100%. I know what the lens is capable of producing and I think only 4 of the images pass muster. So I learned a few lessons here. 1) never use center point expansion for autofocus unless I absolutely have too and 2) try not to get too excited and forget everything I have learned about photography when shooting a new species.
Odd -- I saw this on my iPhone this morning and replied but it's not here. (Just now on the computer.)
LR does not show the focus points, but to expand on what Randall said: I will sometimes go to DPP to see them but that only shows which "main" point was active -- it is often significantly overridden by helper points. Even with the 'square" point, there are invisible helpers. And if there is any focus hold and recompose in AI Servo (even with a brief shutter button hold) it will only show which point was active at the time of the half-press.
David -- good lessons. I'm still working on learning them!
Oyster Catcher
