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Message: <blockquote data-quote="kitefarrago" data-source="post: 3305628" data-attributes="member: 91670">Are you using a shutter speed of 1/100? This is much too short for picures taken at focal lengths you are using, in particular for bird photography. Birds move, your hands move, and it is very, very hard to get sharp images it these speeds. There's a rule of thumb which says that when hand-holding a camera one should aim to have at least 1/<focal length> as the shutter speed. But this is a rule that comes from the days of film, and so applies to cameras with a full size sensor. With smaller sensors, one should increase the speed even further.As you are discovering, light is the most precious commodity to a photogrpaher. If there isn't much light then one has to compromise by using higher isos and lower shutter speeds than one would like. What the right compromise is will depend on the camera and the exact circumstances. But dawn/dusk photography on subjects that have a lot of detail (like the feathers on birds) will bring out the worst in any camera.As you can see, for your first two pictures I told you to bring up the shutters speed, and Chris told you to bring down the iso, which are contradictory. But certainly when light is scarce, do move down to the lowest F stop that is available at the given focal length - you don't have any light to waste on using a higher one.You might want to experiment with using shutter rather than aperture priority to ensure that your shutter speed is high enough. The conditions you had for the ifrst two shots may have been beyond your camera. Technically speaking it is not a DSLR but a superzoom. It has a smaller sensor which makes images even more vulnerable to any kind of movement.I would keep experimenting with the camera, shooting a next series with (significantly) higher shutter speeds. Try your camera out when the light is good (harder to do in winter) so that you get to see its best side as well, and let us know how you get on.Andrea</blockquote>

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