• Welcome to BirdForum, the internet's largest birding community with thousands of members from all over the world. The forums are dedicated to wild birds, birding, binoculars and equipment and all that goes with it.

    Please register for an account to take part in the discussions in the forum, post your pictures in the gallery and more.
ZEISS DTI thermal imaging cameras. For more discoveries at night, and during the day.

Canon SX60HS in Action (3 Viewers)

I think that's what I've done Kevin except allocated it to C1/C2. I'll have a scroll through to double check. Was always happy with the t/c on the sx50.

Rich
 
Looking for advice from the SX60 users, if you had the option to change to the Nikon P900, would you? Really torn at the moment, like the idea of the P900 but it is huge! (although not too heavy) I use a DSLR and 150-500 lens at the moment and it is a bind carrying that kit around. My pictures are used for my blog and web page so do not need to be "perfection" So SX60 or P900. (PS you are getting some great pictures folks :) )
 
Looking for advice from the SX60 users, if you had the option to change to the Nikon P900, would you? Really torn at the moment, like the idea of the P900 but it is huge! (although not too heavy) I use a DSLR and 150-500 lens at the moment and it is a bind carrying that kit around. My pictures are used for my blog and web page so do not need to be "perfection" So SX60 or P900. (PS you are getting some great pictures folks :) )
Hi Mike. I can't give a comparison but recently when watching a Woodchat Shrike, 3 birders all from London had P900's. They were happy with them. As you mentioned, a possible downside is the size of the thing. The SX60 fits snugly in my coat pocket.

I also got chatting to a birder in Slimbridge a while back. He mentioned it was a little bulky but still smaller than his DSLR set up. He was certainly impressed with it.

I'll be up in your neck of the woods in a couple of weeks. You're welcome to try out the SX60.

Rich
 
Sx60

Hi all, after many years(3 cameras and 2 sent for repair) my last SX50 finally "gave up the ghost" on Monday,with no SX50's available anymore and as I find it almost physically impossible to bird without a camera I took the plunge and immediately ordered the SX60 despite having reservations . Obvious concerns were mainly from this thread and the SX50 thread where many experienced users found the results from the SX60 were not matching their expectations and not even matching the performance of the SX50.

Took an hour inputting the settings and familiarising myself with camera and then had a couple of hours at my local patch today. Some of the changes to the camera will take some getting used to(especially the "Exposure Bias", used to be easy to change on SX50 , but now it's a bit of a pain)

Anyway have attached a few example shots from today and am generally pretty happy for a 1st day, certainly I was almost expecting the results to be atrocious but they're look ok and with a bit of tweaking of settings hopefully will be able to get some decent results.

Ian
 

Attachments

  • 27622Ruff#.JPG
    27622Ruff#.JPG
    135.9 KB · Views: 280
  • 27628Ruff.JPG
    27628Ruff.JPG
    187.4 KB · Views: 120
  • 27632Ruff#.JPG
    27632Ruff#.JPG
    213.1 KB · Views: 134
  • 27639Close.JPG
    27639Close.JPG
    166.6 KB · Views: 195
  • 27613MiHa.JPG
    27613MiHa.JPG
    267.7 KB · Views: 140
By "exposure bias" do you mean "exposure compensation"?

If so, what's the issue? I don't fiddle with mine much, but it's just a button push away...
 
By "exposure bias" do you mean "exposure compensation"?

If so, what's the issue? I don't fiddle with mine much, but it's just a button push away...

Yes Kevin, Exposure Compensation. It's not a major issue, but on the SX50 it was all controlled on the dial on the back, As far as Ii can see(and what I was doing yesterday) is that you press the button on the back of the camera and then have to spin the wheel on the top. When doing this yesterday it meant bringing the camera away from the shooting position to adjust. As I said not major and hopefully with practise it will become easy to do while keeping viewfinder to the eye.

Ian
 
Last edited:
How do I ungroup my photos so I can preview them on the camera

I have recently joined the ranks of the SX60 owners. I have had a 50 since 2014 but have worn them out having birded and traveled extensively in the past four years taking about a half million pictures. (mostly deleted :)

I have been reluctant to get a 60 because of many comparison reviews and experiences of Crazyfingers and many others. I ended up with one sent to me from Canon because they said they had no parts to repair my 50. But I digress.

I am finding that for the most part I am as happy with the results as I was with the 50 and in some cases actully finding better results. I agree that there seems to be a bit more "softness" ie noise in photos taken past 1200mm but I believe this to be the result of cramming four more megapixels onto the same small chip. I think this is very poor design from a company that should know better.

I am having one problem that I find very troubling however and am hoping someone here can give me a solution.

It appears that to ungroup picture sets in preview, you have to hit FUNC/SET then press the UP button, and this is supposed to ungroup the sets. However when I do this I am presented with a situation that only allows me to scroll between every tenth photo. In other words, they are still grouped it sets of 10. If there are more than ten but less then twenty it goes back and forth between the first shot of the first 10 images and the first shot of the next set then back to the first shot of the first 10 again. If there are less than 10 images, you only get a preview of the first shot. This is just so ridiculously cumbersome. Is there a way to further break these photos up? I am very frustrated that I can't review my pictures. Anybody have a solution?

I have included some shots from last week at the Oregon Coast taken in various situations I encounter and I am more than satisfied that the results are as good or better than the SX50
 

Attachments

  • 02 IMG_3947.jpg
    02 IMG_3947.jpg
    167.8 KB · Views: 318
  • 03 IMG_4243.jpg
    03 IMG_4243.jpg
    191.2 KB · Views: 296
  • 09 IMG_5321.jpg
    09 IMG_5321.jpg
    121.7 KB · Views: 247
  • IMG_4686.jpg
    IMG_4686.jpg
    128.3 KB · Views: 298
  • IMG_4278.jpg
    IMG_4278.jpg
    306.7 KB · Views: 242
I finely found the section in the manual for my problem

However, It reveals that there is no solution. On page 106 of the manual it shows my options and the option I need is not there. So the way I read it I cannot shot multiple images and then review them. I only have an option of reviewing every 10th or every 100th image. This ludicrous and totally unacceptable! If I am shooting a bird in the filed I want the multiple image option to get the most shots of a moving bird and then I want to review the photos to be sure I got a good shot. This camera apparently will not allow that. (I could do this with my SX50) This really diminishes my ability to function in the field and the only way I can survive is shoot hundreds of shots and HOPE I get a good one. Why would any camera engineer take away the ability to review pictures in the field. The same idiots that put four more megapixels on the same small chip thus decreasing image quality. I would never buy an SX60, I revived one from Canon Repair because they had no parts for my broken SX50.
 
Not sure what you're doing......turn the preview off and then when u want to view pictures just press the play button and scroll through them individually.....always worked for mine
 
Still finding the SX60 a solid replacement for the SX50. The only downsides I have found so far are BIF shot are not so good on the sports mode. The other gripe that has been mentioned by others is that when you pull the Zoom back using the button on the side why does the FOV screen diminish.

Anyway pic of a Kestrel today at RSPB Lytchett Fields

Ian
 

Attachments

  • 28495Kes.JPG
    28495Kes.JPG
    227.7 KB · Views: 308
I'm still getting to grips but loving the portability of it.
 

Attachments

  • IMG_0994.JPG
    IMG_0994.JPG
    442.6 KB · Views: 253
  • IMG_0992.JPG
    IMG_0992.JPG
    344.4 KB · Views: 250
  • IMG_0988.JPG
    IMG_0988.JPG
    184.8 KB · Views: 325
Nice ones!

Need to find time to go out photographing, Tammy and I have both been so busy we're missing the best time for bird photography...winter!
 
Still finding the SX60 a solid replacement for the SX50. The only downsides I have found so far are BIF shot are not so good on the sports mode.
I would recommend Shutter Priority (Tv) mode instead. Set your ISO limit to 400 to avoid undue noise, go with burst mode shooting (I use high-res, low-compression and a decent camera card), and use shutter speeds between 1/400 and 1/1000 (as high as the lighting will allow). Spray-n-pray once you find your subject; may not seem very artful, but it works. This may require a bit of post-processing because small sensor cameras aren't fond of having their light reduced like this.

I know common advice for birding with a DLSR is to go with Aperture Priority (Av) but I found more than a few buried tidbits of advice that Shutter Priority is better for prosumer cameras with smaller sensors.

The other piece of advice I oft-repeat is: if you are willing to post-process, use -2/3 exposure compensation to avoid blowing out highlights on any small-sensor consumer or prosumer camera. These sensors are notorious for clipping highlights, always have been. Decades of digital cameras behind us, and I still have no idea why camera makers still allow the logic of their Auto modes to clip highlights; even the expensive and supposedly up-market cameras.
 
Some close-range photos of the near-threatened Ridgway's Rail:


Just as a point of reference, this was headed towards sundown through winter skies, hence the contrasty-ness...that's just what the area looks like that time of day. |:D|
 

Users who are viewing this thread

Back
Top