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ZEISS DTI thermal imaging cameras. For more discoveries at night, and during the day.

Oly 300mm F4 - My First Pics (1 Viewer)

PaulZr

Active member
It was overcast yesterday, and I was trying to get a photo of this Golden-Crowned Kinglet in the woods. With my 75-300, I would have had either a pretty high ISO, or too low of a shutter speed for these hyper-active birds. I was able to get shutter speed to 1/320, @ ISO400, f4.5. I think I'm going to like this lens!

I've attached the significantly cropped image (941x706), the original SOOC JPG is here: https://flic.kr/p/Tk8LcX. I'm pleased with the sharpness given the crop. Once I have RAW support for my Mac, I should be able to get a bit more sharpness on crops like this.
 

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Nice. What camera body? I have RAW support on my Mac in Light Room from my OM-D E-M1 Mark II. They have a .dng
The resolution reduction requirements to post here suck the pop out of any picture.
 

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The resolution reduction requirements to post here suck the pop out of any picture.
I normally associate "pop" with color/saturation/vividness, which is a function of the original photo, not this site. So I'm going to assume you're talking about the very real problem of image sharpness.

The trick is to resize them yourself to fit (don't let the site do it for you) and make sure to resharpen the photo after resizing (use Smart Sharpen if you have it, otherwise Unsharpen Mask...do not use the generic Sharpen filter).

Actually the forum size restrictions can work for you in some circumstances, increasing apparent detail in otherwise so-so photos.
 
This photo of an Eastern Meadowlark isn't anything to write home about, but given the dreary day, requiring ISO 3200 at 1/500, cropped from about the center 3rd of the image, it's OK. The noise seems pretty high, perhaps I should turn the noise filter back on to the low setting? I had the 1.4x converter on, probably should have taken it off given the available light.
 

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Especially at high iso, I am pretty sure it would pay to shoot raw and do the noise reduction on a computer.

Niels
 
This photo of an Eastern Meadowlark isn't anything to write home about, but given the dreary day, requiring ISO 3200 at 1/500, cropped from about the center 3rd of the image, it's OK. The noise seems pretty high, perhaps I should turn the noise filter back on to the low setting? I had the 1.4x converter on, probably should have taken it off given the available light.

I would consider a slower shutter speed as active birds do sit still for very short periods. This would allow for a lower ISO.

This Canada Warbler was taken handheld at ISO200 1/40s on a GH3 with the 300mm f4. If I shot it at 1/500s like your Meadowlark I would have been at ISO2500.
 

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I'm really enjoying this lens, despite the fact that I'm stuck on crutches a few more days. This Pileated Woodpecker visited our yard yesterday, and was taken at 300mm, 1/1000, f4, ISO250. When I was using 1/500, his head was moving so fast while hammering it was tough to get a crisp shot. This is cropped, about 25% of the full frame. Bright sun helped, but I certainly couldn't have achieved this speed & ISO on my 75-300. Of course, this lens cost 5x my old one! This pic was taken with fully electronic shutter, which I've been trying out. I'm pleasantly surprised how well that's working. I had stopped using it on my EM5/II, due to weird artifacts sometimes. Still using SOOC JPG, as OSX doesn't yet support RAW.
 

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I'm curious about this statement, could you explain?
Last time I checked, RAW for the OMD EM1 Mark II wasn't supported. I just looked again, and as of 3/27/2017, it is now supported. Of course, I'm forced to upgrade to Sierra, which will break other applications that don't yet support Sierra. There doesn't appear to be a way to just update Photos for the new RAW support.
 
Will your PP program handle DNG files,if so you can get a free DNG converter from Adobe,bit of a faff converting but its still like using raw.
 
Last time I checked, RAW for the OMD EM1 Mark II wasn't supported. I just looked again, and as of 3/27/2017, it is now supported. Of course, I'm forced to upgrade to Sierra, which will break other applications that don't yet support Sierra. There doesn't appear to be a way to just update Photos for the new RAW support.
Ah, so you're talking about Apple's apps.

Personally, I'd move over to Lightroom at minimum, or Photoshop if you're inclined. That will untie your RAW support from the operating system, since Adobe Camera RAW is just a plugin component and they often update it separate from the master app it works with. I ran into that with my SX60...when I bought it, the RAW files were not supported in Adobe Creative Suite 6 out-of-box, but Adobe had an Adobe Camera RAW updater eventually.

Of course, I'm not keen on Adobe's subscription model either, and am glad I get access through work. Otherwise I'd hunt-down the last stand-alone Lightroom or Adobe Creative Suite 6. :eek!:

As someone else said, getting a RAW-to-DNG converter is another option if Photos supports DNG.
 
Ah, so you're talking about Apple's apps.

Personally, I'd move over to Lightroom at minimum, or Photoshop if you're inclined. That will untie your RAW support from the operating system, since Adobe Camera RAW is just a plugin component and they often update it separate from the master app it works with. I ran into that with my SX60...when I bought it, the RAW files were not supported in Adobe Creative Suite 6 out-of-box, but Adobe had an Adobe Camera RAW updater eventually.

Of course, I'm not keen on Adobe's subscription model either, and am glad I get access through work. Otherwise I'd hunt-down the last stand-alone Lightroom or Adobe Creative Suite 6. :eek!:

As someone else said, getting a RAW-to-DNG converter is another option if Photos supports DNG.

And I prefer ACDSee to the adobe products. However, RAW support is often slower with that program, and I cannot remember if the mark 2 is supported yet.

Niels
 
AcDSee supports the EM1 MII, but their MAC product doesn't look currently available, except in beta, perhaps that's worth a look. The subscription model for lightrooom is really unappealing, this is just a hobby for me. For what I do, OSX Photos works great, easy to use, and very fast (just slow to release RAW updates). I tried the Olympus provided software, but it was extremely slow. I'd never heard of darktable, perhaps I'll look into that too.
 
Really good is RawTherapee and it is free, but it is not for the faint hearted, at least at first. If you know what you are doing it is really powerful. I still don't have a clue about half the features it offers. But, it can be customized and trimmed down to make basic raw editing a snap. Worth spending some time with it. Lightroom is much easier to work with, but RT does a lot of things better, and is usually the first to incorporate new cameras into the software. Constantly being updated.
 
I have been using the trial version of DxOptics for 2-3 weeks now and I am very positively impressed. But it's a bit pricey.
 
The Adobe subscription service is very good. I think for $19 or $20 a month I'm getting LR and PS for my MacBook Pro as well as my iPad Pro. I subscribe for my MS Office as well.
 
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