Alex, your ss looks fast enough but I'm seeing some softness throughout the face and wings...not sure if this is from a large crop, a missed focal point or just that the final needs more sharpening. Any ideas?
Composition seems good - just enough room all around for me. I wonder if you could bring up the shadows on the back a bit more?
Hi Jules and thanks for the feedback. Here are some possible culprits:
1. Yes, it is a big crop (I have LLL [long lens lust]), but for now the combination I used is my longest reach :'(. With that limitation in mind, do you suggest that I only submit images with more moderate crops?
2. Also, when uploading, I follow the 1024 x 800 BPN guidelines, but in this case I wasn't close to the 200kb maximum, it was only 98kb (because of the big crop?). I tried some combinations to try and fool the system, but was unable to do so. Would the 98kb have some impact on the IQ you see?
3. Missed focal point? I use auto-select 19 point AF as Artie suggests for BIF. Looks like I had the bird covered, but...
4. Yes, I'll sharpening more and see what happens.
5. Regarding bringing up the shadows on the back, would it be best to brush in Dodge, or what?
hey James - I had the good fortune to be able to go to one of Artie's workshops, and was using the 2.0 tc with my 7d and 70-200 and 300mm lenses ---- Artie said that the older 2.0 tc (the one I had) slows the ability of the lens to acquire focus. He strongly recommended only using the 1.4 tc for BIF because of that.... saving the 2.0 to use for more sedentary birds. I noticed that when I was using the 2.0 I had a lot of pictures that showed a focus point on the bird when i looked at them on the back of the camera, but looked soft to me when i pulled them into LR and thought perhaps it was related to that.
I agree with Jules about the sharpening, and was wondering how it would look if you ran another 2 or 3 rounds of USM on the selected bird at 125/0.2/0
you got him at a wonderful position, before he went past you, with great detail and light
Thanks for the feedback, it is much appreciated and your rationale is probably spot on. Just for clarification, were you using the 70-200mm 2.L IS version I or version II? Also, I'm assuming that the 2.0 TC you were referring to was the II version? Thanks for taking the time to respond.
the 70-200mm lens we use is version II and the 2.0 TC is version II --- sorry for the ambiguity! (I am lusting over the newest version tc (III) and those incredible lenses they've announced but its going to be a long, long time before we have the money for them!)
James, my husband said I need to be more precise. Artie said he had never recommended using the 2.0 tc for flight. He most definitely did not say do NOT use it for BIF - just that it will be slower to acquire focus and to be aware of that issue. This picture is definite proof that you can get awesome photos with the combination.
That is most likely part of the problem. Also, some TC combos don't tend to get as good a focus as a lens used alone.
2. Also, when uploading, I follow the 1024 x 800 BPN guidelines, but in this case I wasn't close to the 200kb maximum, it was only 98kb (because of the big crop?).
That will do it! More crop = less pixels and less pixels is less data which is a smaller file size.
3. Missed focal point? I use auto-select 19 point AF as Artie suggests for BIF. Looks like I had the bird covered, but...
Then this is probably not the problem although I can't help but wonder why the feathers below the head are sharper than the head itself if all was in focus?
4. Yes, I'll sharpening more and see what happens.
5. Regarding bringing up the shadows on the back, would it be best to brush in Dodge, or what?
I always start with a shadow/highlight adjustment layer (and then masking out what I don't want corrected) in PS or I use the adjustment brush in Camera Raw (gets a more specific area without touching the rest of the image) but that's just me. Use what you know. That's the good thing about Photoshop...eighteen ways to do the same thing!
Reddish Egret
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