Sony A700~Sony70-400G@400mm~1/1250sec~f5.6~ISO1250~Sony HVL-F56AM~8:03PM, yesterday, at Surfside,Texas
I've placed this in"Eager to Learn" because of the ISO. ISO 1250 is unchartered territory for me, and the shot would have been impossible otherwise.
Although the exposure was OK, and even though fill-flash effects might have been diminished by the 1/1250sec shutter speed, it was at least partially effective. Slower shutter speeds would have made the flash more effective, but slower, and its effects on image sharpness, isn't an option here. Not surpirsingly noise became an issue, and Topaz Denoise was necessary(I have Noise Ninja as well, but Topaz is betterIMO).
So the question is: is this about as good as could be expected under the conditions? regards~Bill
Some flash did reach the bird since it has a bit of a red eye ... I'm surprised.
Didn't see the exposure compensation so I'm guessing it was a little under exposed? Some of the detail loss has to be due to noise reduction the other the base image but the end result is not very sharp.
One alternative at this time is to go the other way and do pan blurs and it is possible to have a sharp head area .... sort of going with the flow !! Is it the best image you could have made? Hard to tell Bill not sure there is much more you could have done except the exposure !!!
Thanks Alfred. It was strictly manual exposure, basically wide open with the slowest shutter speed I could get away with. The red eye I atributed to the sun (which was appearing somewhat red as it approached the horizon). The red eye caused by flash, at least in my images, seems to be circular and correspond to the retinal area exposed by the opened iris. Could be wrong.
Maybe a half stop underexposed, not much. Although noise reduction certainly caused a lack of detail, the image before noise reduction didn't fair too well either. I was surprised how well the image turned out, even with its limitations. As far as similar circumstances? Crank up the ISO more and get some good overexposure going. I'll see what that does. regards~Bill
Hi Bill The sun could explain the eye I just don't see the flash doing much in that circumstance.
Shutter speed wise it does seem to make the image look mushy as you increase it so I don't think it was possible to make it any more detail. Some birds do need good light to reproduce well ... and this is not one of them !!!!
Black Skimmer
