So is the Canon R5 a bird photography body? (1 Viewer)

[mike nesbitt]

Nice shot Mike ,

What is your impression to use the combo on a pelagic , i,ve make some tries already from the coast but still losing quite a lot of shots and getting myself to use often the single point focus instead of zone or eye detect. ( This is only when the subject have the sea behind and is at a certain distance ) as soon as i,ve it in sky no problem.
Heard that some persons are struggling to get decent shots in pelagic under this circumstances.

Hi Rogerio.

For use on Pelagics the combination can be excellent, but not if you use eye af or zone. imho on the last set of Pelagics I did - and I've done many, the lens provided a more significant improvement than the R5 did.
On my pelagic, the 100-500 bare as opposed to a 500 f4 or 300 f 2.8 + Tc was a game changer for me. it's a fraction of the weight and can be hand held all day long with powerful IS plus great IQ.

As good as the eye detect is reported to be on the R5 and it's excellent for some flight stuff, there are situations that for me it's not that good at all. Shooting hirundines is one, it just can't keep up - end of!
Pelagic stuff I've found out is another situation where eye af doesn't cut the mustard, Petrels etc sweep from side to side whilst the boat is up and down, it's a job sometimes just to keep a subject in the viewfinder and eye af was pretty useless for this type of photography.

I used Zone af quite a bit but it comes with a huge a caveat. I don't know how the arrangement of focus points work in zone af but it's as if they average the focus out over the zone and a huge percentage of images are 80 or 90% focused others are not focused at all, a small percentage are. I opted for a small percentage of zone af images rather than virtually nil from eye af. Eye af is great but not in this scenario.

I quite agree with you that single point af is the best bet and it's the method I've always used on previous Pelagics.
I used these pelagics as a test of the af system and for future trips it will be single point for me.
I also agree that against the sky you can nail the shot a lot easier.

Cheers

 

[Barred Wobbler]

Yesterday.

 

[mike nesbitt]

Plain Swift. Apus unicolor
A tricky subject, smaller than our standard Swift and a lot more random in it's flying pattern.
R5 + 100-500. ISO 2000, f7.1, 1/2500 sec @500mm

 

[RogerioRodrigues]

Hi Rogerio.

For use on Pelagics the combination can be excellent, but not if you use eye af or zone. imho on the last set of Pelagics I did - and I've done many, the lens provided a more significant improvement than the R5 did.
On my pelagic, the 100-500 bare as opposed to a 500 f4 or 300 f 2.8 + Tc was a game changer for me. it's a fraction of the weight and can be hand held all day long with powerful IS plus great IQ.

As good as the eye detect is reported to be on the R5 and it's excellent for some flight stuff, there are situations that for me it's not that good at all. Shooting hirundines is one, it just can't keep up - end of!
Pelagic stuff I've found out is another situation where eye af doesn't cut the mustard, Petrels etc sweep from side to side whilst the boat is up and down, it's a job sometimes just to keep a subject in the viewfinder and eye af was pretty useless for this type of photography.

I used Zone af quite a bit but it comes with a huge a caveat. I don't know how the arrangement of focus points work in zone af but it's as if they average the focus out over the zone and a huge percentage of images are 80 or 90% focused others are not focused at all, a small percentage are. I opted for a small percentage of zone af images rather than virtually nil from eye af. Eye af is great but not in this scenario.

I quite agree with you that single point af is the best bet and it's the method I've always used on previous Pelagics.
I used these pelagics as a test of the af system and for future trips it will be single point for me.
I also agree that against the sky you can nail the shot a lot easier.

Cheers

Hi Rogerio.

For use on Pelagics the combination can be excellent, but not if you use eye af or zone. imho on the last set of Pelagics I did - and I've done many, the lens provided a more significant improvement than the R5 did.
On my pelagic, the 100-500 bare as opposed to a 500 f4 or 300 f 2.8 + Tc was a game changer for me. it's a fraction of the weight and can be hand held all day long with powerful IS plus great IQ.

As good as the eye detect is reported to be on the R5 and it's excellent for some flight stuff, there are situations that for me it's not that good at all. Shooting hirundines is one, it just can't keep up - end of!
Pelagic stuff I've found out is another situation where eye af doesn't cut the mustard, Petrels etc sweep from side to side whilst the boat is up and down, it's a job sometimes just to keep a subject in the viewfinder and eye af was pretty useless for this type of photography.

I used Zone af quite a bit but it comes with a huge a caveat. I don't know how the arrangement of focus points work in zone af but it's as if they average the focus out over the zone and a huge percentage of images are 80 or 90% focused others are not focused at all, a small percentage are. I opted for a small percentage of zone af images rather than virtually nil from eye af. Eye af is great but not in this scenario.

I quite agree with you that single point af is the best bet and it's the method I've always used on previous Pelagics.
I used these pelagics as a test of the af system and for future trips it will be single point for me.
I also agree that against the sky you can nail the shot a lot easier.

Cheers

Thanks Mike ,

I will get there eventually , still this is a impressive set a game changer.

 

[mike nesbitt]

Thanks Mike ,

I will get there eventually , still this is a impressive set a game changer.

It looks like your already there to me! Nice one.

 

[colincurry]

Some great shots on this thread. I don't live in or have access to such target-rich sites as shown previously but I have managed to get out with my R5 and 100-500 on a couple of occasions. I have to say that I am impressed even when using the 1.4 tc.

Here is an unprocessed jpeg with the bare 100-500



The following are with the 1.4 tc but processed



It is also prime insect time and combination is great for close-ups of these

 

[Russ P]

.....I have managed to get out with my R5 and 100-500 on a couple of occasions. I have to say that I am impressed even when using the 1.4 tc.

Lovely varied set Colin - I particularly like the dragonfly in flight. I too think the R5 + RF 100-500mm is a great lightweight combo, and I love the minimum focusing distance for shooting butterflies and other insects.

Russ

 

[petemorris]

Lovely varied set Colin - I particularly like the dragonfly in flight. I too think the R5 + RF 100-500mm is a great lightweight combo, and I love the minimum focusing distance for shooting butterflies and other insects.

Russ

Totally agree... Here's a few from my wanderings in Norfolk recently

 

[Russ P]

I have started to experiment with the inbuilt x1.6 crop mode on my R5 in conjunction with my RF 100-500mm lens + 1.4 TC for photographing distant birds. I calculate this gives me the equivalent maximum "reach" of (500 x 1.4 x 1.6)mm = 1120mm.

Here's an example of a distant Greenshank taken with that set-up:

R5; Raw; F10; ISO 640; 1/1000s handheld


Original shot before cropping:


Clearly good light is necessary, but I'm pleased with the IQ the R5 produces at that long focal length.

Anyone else using the x1.6 crop mode?

Russ

 

[Barred Wobbler]

Viz-mig. Pre-focussing with the camera on a tripod and pressing the shutter release cable when something appeared. Electronic shutter.

 

[MalR]

Fantastic images.

Malcolm

 

[colincurry]

Viz-mig. Pre-focussing with the camera on a tripod and pressing the shutter release cable when something appeared. Electronic shutter.

Super. Signs of a misspent retirement

 

[Barred Wobbler]

When I saw at the weekend that after a dry spell lasting locally for ages there was significant rain forecast for Monday and Tuesday followed by sun yesterday, I was off down to the River Tyne for some pics of the salmon & sea trout run. It was spectacular! Many hundreds of fish taking advantage of the first extra water in the river for some time. I was there for two and a half hours and the action was constant.

 

[mike nesbitt]

Viz-mig. Pre-focussing with the camera on a tripod and pressing the shutter release cable when something appeared. Electronic shutter.

Thats, good. I went for these myself on our local river and didn't see one.


Last week I used the same tactics on Chaffinches and the DOF was very shallow but eventually one passed at the right distance.
iso 6400,1/5000, f5.6, 283 mm R5 + 100-500

 

[mike nesbitt]

Not bird related but nonetheless of interest to R5 users is the improvement in recovering underexposed Canon files.
Myself and Dave Williams had ruled out using flash on nocturnal animals and had only a rudimentary LED set up, initial images were heavily underexposed and destined for the bin.
I guess the software helps but I was surprised how much latitude there was for saving some stuff.
R5 + 500f4 mike

 

[Mark Jarrett]

I was recently on the same pelagic as Mike. It was only my second pelagic. My first pelagic was Scilly in 2017 when my set up was an EOS 760D with Canon’s EF 400mm f5.6 prime plus 1.4 extender.

I now have an R5 and am awaiting the 100-500 which has been on back order for over three months. For the recent pelagic, I took the R5 plus the 400mm prime (which I have agreed to trade in for the 100-500 if it ever arrives!).

I have the R5 on back button focus, covering eye detect, single point and, thirdly, zone. As Mike mentions, eye detect doesn’t really work for the reasons he outlines. Whilst I experimented with all three methods, I mainly used zone for the birds in flight. They are quick! Any birds sat on the water, you can change easily to eye detect.

Joe Pender, who jointly runs the Scilly pelagics, is a superb photographer of long standing. When I met him in 2017 he advised me to use single point, saying that it’s difficult but, with practice, you get the best results.

Cory’s Shearwater photo attached using ‘zone.’

 

[Mark Jarrett]

Black-browed Albatross, recently at Bempton, using ‘zone.’ Same set up as on recent pelagic (R5, 400 f5.6 with 1.4 ext). Bird was always very low and, even though it came close the the cliffs, was distant because of that. Shows the cropping capabilities of the R5. Photo not pin sharp by any means but not too bad. Other photos shows ‘real distance’ of bird without cropping.

 

[Mark Jarrett]

Other photo won’t load for some reason.

Forgot to mention, I don’t shot in Raw and don’t use Photoshop or Lightroom. I have an Apple Mac and just do whatever I can with that.

 

[Dave Williams]

Nice shots Mark!
As for your 100-500, they are in stock at E-infinity ( and Panamoz too) and would probably arrive within a couple of days. Probably cheaper than your trade in deal too and you get a better warranty too!!

 

[Mark Jarrett]

Thanks Dave and thanks for the info. I have the lens on order from Wilkinsons in Warrington and they’ve always been very good with me. If it drags on indefinitely, I may just give Panamoz some consideration. They seem to have continual 5 star reviews whilst that doesn’t always appear to be the case with E-infinity!