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Is this a pretty normal unedited photo? (1 Viewer)

Is it possible there might be something wrong with my image stabilization or am I still not close enough? This was an image I took from the car and rested my elbows on myself and the car was running. I was about 10-15 feet from the bird maybe more.

I have a slew of images just like this. The ISO was 320, 1/2000th shutter speed, f5.6, 400mm. I also cannot for the life of me get a sharp image out of the camera when hand holding within 10 feet and under of a bird. I had some great opps today that were blown. I held my breath and did my absolute best to keep the lens steady. I also was using very high shutter speeds 1/2000th and up.
 

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I always make a point of switching of fthe engine too, often coasting a few feet up to the bird. From the car I rest the lens on a bean bag on the open window or sometimes the lens on the glass - so any vibration from the engine would be transferred to the lens - IS won't help much with that.

I'd be inclined to give it another go with the engine off.

With those sorts of shutter speed you should be able to hand hold and get sharp photos even without IS! Try the lens at f6,3 or 7,1 or even f8. I find results are much better even with the aperture just slightly shut down.
 
nigelblake said:
You won't get sharp images from the car with the engine running.
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The thing is I can't get sharp shots hand holding either. I have a goldfinch I was less then 10 feet from, had 1/1000th shutter speed, etc and I still could not get a sharp clear shot it always looks a tinge blurry.
 

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IanF said:
I always make a point of switching of fthe engine too, often coasting a few feet up to the bird. From the car I rest the lens on a bean bag on the open window or sometimes the lens on the glass - so any vibration from the engine would be transferred to the lens - IS won't help much with that.

I'd be inclined to give it another go with the engine off.

With those sorts of shutter speed you should be able to hand hold and get sharp photos even without IS! Try the lens at f6,3 or 7,1 or even f8. I find results are much better even with the aperture just slightly shut down.
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Just so I get a better grasp on things hopefully, why would going to f6,3, 7,1 or 8 help things? I am not questioning your wisdom, just wanting to know why so I might be able to remember to do this in the future. Thanks.
 
If you are using JPEG what settings (sharpness and contrast) are you using in camera? Also, what post-processing are you applying?

These don't look too bad to me - if I was to be really critical, the point of focus appears to be on the bird's wing or the seed head rather than the eye but don't see much wrong otherwise.
 
CCRII said:
Just so I get a better grasp on things hopefully, why would going to f6,3, 7,1 or 8 help things? I am not questioning your wisdom, just wanting to know why so I might be able to remember to do this in the future. Thanks.
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Shooting at a smaller aperture (larger f number) will increase the depth of field and thus increase your chances of getting the critical parts of the bird sharp. Most lenses will perform better stopped down to around f8, though th e100-400 can produce good sharp shots when used wide open at f5.6.
 
CCRII said:
Just so I get a better grasp on things hopefully, why would going to f6,3, 7,1 or 8 help things? I am not questioning your wisdom, just wanting to know why so I might be able to remember to do this in the future. Thanks.
Click to expand...

By closing down the lens slightly you're increasing the aperture and so depth of field or 'zone of sharpness'. A 400mm lens at f5,6 has a very narrow depth of field - a few mm - so by increasing aperture slightly you can greatly increase the amount of the subject actually in focus. The trade off is shutter speed. As you increase aperture by one whole stop e.g f5,6 to f8 you halve the shutter speed. Mostly I'm happy with f6,3 with this lens so it's a slight trade off but I do find using it at f5,6 at 400mm can give softer results.

Whenever possible if shooting at 400mm I try to brace myself against something solid such as a tree or fence and preferably use a monopod. I find it worthwhile to use the camera on continuous shooting as well as you can take six or seven photos in sequence whilst trying to keep still - usually most of them are pin sharp but always a few aren't.

The cropped Goldfinch looks pretty good to me as well - feather detail is there. If this is straight out of the camera then it's just post processing that's needed.

If you're concerned whether the lens is sharp or not then it needs to be mounted on a sturdy tripod and a few test photos taken with IS on and off. Most likely it's jsut a question of getting used to using the lens at 400mm.
 
mw_aurora said:
If you are using JPEG what settings (sharpness and contrast) are you using in camera? Also, what post-processing are you applying?

These don't look too bad to me - if I was to be really critical, the point of focus appears to be on the bird's wing or the seed head rather than the eye but don't see much wrong otherwise.
Click to expand...

Shooting in Raw. The thing is if I focus on the eye it seems that the tail and wing are out of focus. But then again it is a bit hard looking through the viewfinder. Criticism is welcome!
 
IanF said:
By closing down the lens slightly you're increasing the aperture and so depth of field or 'zone of sharpness'. A 400mm lens at f5,6 has a very narrow depth of field - a few mm - so by increasing aperture slightly you can greatly increase the amount of the subject actually in focus. The trade off is shutter speed. As you increase aperture by one whole stop e.g f5,6 to f8 you halve the shutter speed. Mostly I'm happy with f6,3 with this lens so it's a slight trade off but I do find using it at f5,6 at 400mm can give softer results.

Whenever possible if shooting at 400mm I try to brace myself against something solid such as a tree or fence and preferably use a monopod. I find it worthwhile to use the camera on continuous shooting as well as you can take six or seven photos in sequence whilst trying to keep still - usually most of them are pin sharp but always a few aren't.

The cropped Goldfinch looks pretty good to me as well - feather detail is there. If this is straight out of the camera then it's just post processing that's needed.

If you're concerned whether the lens is sharp or not then it needs to be mounted on a sturdy tripod and a few test photos taken with IS on and off. Most likely it's jsut a question of getting used to using the lens at 400mm.
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I will admit that I have skinny, puny biceps and wrists, and this may be preventing me from keeping the lens still enough. I wonder if I will adapt soon though and if so how long? Because honestly I do not see myself getting 10feet from a bird with a tripod.

All good pointers! Very appreciated! You guys are wonderful! I wish I lived near you I would buy you all a pint of your favorite Ale! ;) B :)
 
I would be pleased if I got an image like that, but the first one does look a tiny tiny bit blurred, recently my dad had a problem where the camera was on a tripod, he was photographing something totally inanimate ( a rock ) and it was slightly blurred. He later found the lens was loose!
I don't think this is your problem but its always worth checking the lens. My dad took a whole holidays worth of photos, all slightly out of focus because of the lens problem.
 
CCRII said:
Shooting in Raw. The thing is if I focus on the eye it seems that the tail and wing are out of focus. But then again it is a bit hard looking through the viewfinder. Criticism is welcome!
Click to expand...

As with most portraits, we tend to look at the eye of the subject first and therefore getting this critically sharp can immediatly improve an image. As Ian mentions above, these long lenses have very shallow depth of field wide open (f5.6). As you have found, this means that if you focus on the eye, the rest of the bird is unlikely to be sharp as well.

For your Goldfinch shot I would be looking for about f8, with your set-up, to increase depth of field to bring the bird and perch into reasonable focus...but that would also give extra definition to those potentially distracting leaves behind - welcome to the photographer's juggling game ;) If I couldn't move to minimise the impact of the leaves, I would go back to f5.6 and focus on the eye.

How do you know if the background will become distracting for a given aperture? Use the depth of field preview button on your camera (a very useful but under used tool). Once you get used to the dimmer view, you can see how the photo will 'look' and if there is anything distracting in the frame. It won't do anything if you are at f5.6 (your lens' maximum aperture) but will show you how other apertures look when you dial them into the camera.

Hope that makes sense...
 
CCRII said:
Shooting in Raw. The thing is if I focus on the eye it seems that the tail and wing are out of focus. But then again it is a bit hard looking through the viewfinder. Criticism is welcome!
Click to expand...

When you focus the lens will always be wide open (f5.6).It only stops down to your chosen aperture setting a fraction before the photo is taken.As has already been said try getting used to the depth of field button.

Mike.
 
Okay so this one was with the car engine off and I even was able to get out of the car and plant my elbows on the car roof. As you can see it is not tack sharp. f7.1, 1/1600 shutter speed, ISO 200, 400mm. I had the camera set to continuous shooting, AI Servo, Spot metering. It is weird but there is quite a bit of noise in the image which really there should be close to none with that ISO right? BTW, this is a 100% crop. I have roughly 20 of the same image that are roughly the same or slightly different trying different f-stops ranging from f6.3-8 and they are all like this.

Tomorrow I will try the tripod test as suggested. BTW I did not know about the Depth of field preview button when I took this shot and the other today.
 

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Check the settings on your camera, you can adjust the sharpness setting, don't go above 4 though or you will probably introduce too much noise in low light situations. Also, are you shooting raw or jpeg? Raw is a lot sharper and gives you much better end results. Use the software that came with the Canon to convert them to jpeg and watch the amount of compression as it will deteriorate the sharpness. Once you have resized your images use a high pass, soft light sharpen at about 60% to restore some of the loss the jpeg causes. You should be able to hand hold the 100-400 with no problems at the speeds you are using. Hope this helps.
 
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aussietrev said:
Check the settings on your camera, you can adjust the sharpness setting, don't go above 4 though or you will probably introduce too much noise in low light situations. Also, are you shooting raw or jpeg? Raw is a lot sharper and gives you much better end results. Use the software that came with the Canon to convert them to jpeg and watch the amount of compression as it will deteriorate the sharpness. Once you have resized your images use a high pass, soft light sharpen at abour 60% to restore some of the loss the jpeg causes. You should be able to hand hold the 100-400 with no problems at the speeds you are using. Hope this helps.
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Yes I am shooting Raw.
 
aussietrev said:
Check the settings on your camera, you can adjust the sharpness setting, don't go above 4 though or you will probably introduce too much noise in low light situations. Also, are you shooting raw or jpeg? Raw is a lot sharper and gives you much better end results. Use the software that came with the Canon to convert them to jpeg and watch the amount of compression as it will deteriorate the sharpness. Once you have resized your images use a high pass, soft light sharpen at abour 60% to restore some of the loss the jpeg causes. You should be able to hand hold the 100-400 with no problems at the speeds you are using. Hope this helps.
Click to expand...

I was under the impression there is no difference between raw or jpeg other then raw having better or more color information. Otherwise they are identical? I think Tanin has stated this a few times. I'm no expert but his results speak for themselves.
 
aussietrev said:
Check the settings on your camera, you can adjust the sharpness setting, don't go above 4 though or you will probably introduce too much noise in low light situations. Also, are you shooting raw or jpeg? Raw is a lot sharper and gives you much better end results. Use the software that came with the Canon to convert them to jpeg and watch the amount of compression as it will deteriorate the sharpness. Once you have resized your images use a high pass, soft light sharpen at abour 60% to restore some of the loss the jpeg causes. You should be able to hand hold the 100-400 with no problems at the speeds you are using. Hope this helps.
Click to expand...

Looking at your gallery you seem to be having the same problems I am having.
 
The images in my gallery have been migrated over from another site that only allows quite small files unfortunately. Only found birdforum a couple of days back but will rework and replace the images from the raw files once I get a chance. As to raw and jpeg being the same, set your camera to Raw + Large and then compare the two shots and see if you can't see a difference.
 
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