Chestnut tailed Starling & Wild Berries

[Anil Kumar Verma]

Dear Friends,

It was a tree full of wild berries near Kolshet creek. Lot many birds , Mynas, Starlings , enjoying the fruits.

Difficult to shoot , only access against the morning rising sun. Bit of positive EV helped capture this frame.

EXIF : Canon 550D, Tamron 100-400mm, FL: 400mm, f/8, Tv :1/500, ISO :800, EV +2, Evaluative Metering, Full Frame, PP in LR 5.7

Hope you like & enjoy it.

Regards/ Anil Kumar Verma

[Saktipada Panigrahi]

Nice composition with braches full of berries. Nice eye contact. Sometime comes to our place. Thanks for sharing. SaktiWild

[Mrudul Godbole]

The branches with the berries and the long leaves give a nice artistic kind of feel to the image. Its difficult to photograph against the sun, the +ve exposure has helped here. I am not sure, but the bird looks a bit soft to me. Is the AF point locked on the branch infront? Thanks for sharing.

[Deepak Mistry]

I like the framing. +1 Mridul. I think the focus is on the berries ?

[Anil Kumar Verma]

Thanks Sakti-da, Mrudul & Deepak.

Trying to figure out reason for subject softness, got same comment on earlier crested lark image. So, surely not doing something right..

Here are my thoughts & would like to hear from this forum on improvements/ change in technique required :

1. Using center AF point for focus & recomposing, Could this be the issue..
2. Using back button focusing to avoid hunting of focus, Am I missing something here..
3. Hand holding & at 400 mm, there is some movement in field of view, could this be the reason..
4. Could there be some issue with the lens in locking focus, before or after AF point..

Look forward to hear from you ..

Regards/ Anil Kumar Verma

[Sabyasachi Patra]

In case of 550D the central AF point is both horizontal and vertical and is better than the peripheral points. Shouldn't be a problem It doesn't matter if you are using back button focusing or using shutter button half pressed.

Handholding at 400mm will result in some drop in sharpness depending on technique and shutter speed. It shouldn't be an issue regarding the focus point.

To check the lens front focusing, just tape a newspaper on your wall and then click. You can then see if the focus point is fine or not.

However, the reason why the critical focus is on the leaves and not on birds is that your camera locks focus based on higher contrast. The AF is based on contrast detection.

If you had set an aperture of f11 or so, then the bird would have been more in focus due to higher depth of field. Thanks for sharing.

Cheers,
Sabyasachi

[Anil Kumar Verma]

Thanks Sabyasachi Da for inputs. Let me try on it.

Another point is , shooting was in "One Shot AF" . Does this need to be changed in this scenario.

Also ,carried out a focus test with online available chart at approx. 45 Deg , both at 400mm/f6.3 & 100mm/f 4.5, wide open. Result enclosed & seems to be OK.

Regards/ Anil Kumar Verma

[Abhishek Jamalabad]

Hi Anil ji,

I'm not familiar with the lens, but f8 and 1/800 would usually be enough for a sharp shot as far as hand-holding goes. The berries look perfectly sharp to me, and the eye looks reasonably sharp.
I am wondering if it is the +2 EC that has caused the issue here. I have a 760D, and I do not expect great details when shooting at high EC values - I use it only for record images.
Also, you have shot at ISO 800. In case your camera has any level of high-ISO noise reduction turned on, it might wash out some of the shadowed details (such as the bird's underparts) and appear to reduce sharpness.

For your other points -
1. Even I use the central point + recompose technique, I find it to work well (especially for the entry-level bodies).
2. Back button focus - I avoid that as it causes me to miss way too many shots. I am not aware of it reducing focus-hunting(?)
3. & 4. I doubt these are causing the issue.