Incoming! (warning, large image)

[greybeh]

Hi, everyone! I recently got a wonderful chance to sit in front of a (large!) oncoming Eurasian Eagle owl as part of the outdoors free-flight show at the National Aviary in Pittsburgh, PA. I set the camera on sports-mode... focused the camera and shot four frames before getting this last one...



Sorry for the large image, but it was necessary to show the blur on the owl. Any ideas on what I could have done better?! I have a Nikon D50 and I was using a Sigma 28-90mm lens.

Previous photo in the series is seen here:
http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1071/...6eb4db49_o.jpg

[underexposed]

JMHAmateurishO:I somehow feel it would've been better if the owl was in focus, but I realise that it can be difficult to focus on a moving target. On the bright side, you get to see the expression on people's faces clearly.

But otherwise it's a nice catch. Wonderful bird, too!

[JJthethird]

I probably would have tried to get the owl in focus and blurred the crowd, although some of the peoples expressions are great I feel that the focal point would have to be that magnificent bird. JMHO.

After looking at your shot in Flickr you asked about the focusing on the owl, has your camera got C-AF or continuous autofocus?, this may have helped a lot in keeping the owl in focus.

John.

[Sime]

I do love how the Owl is looking straight at you... very cool - the people and their expressions are also pretty ace. be interesting to try a few shots (like we get the chance to shoot a charging Owl that often..tee hee) with the bird in focus..etc.. anyways, cool bird.

[NaturesPixel]

yep real shame the Owl is not in focus... switch the focus and ya would have a stunner

[greybeh]

I guess I'm asking more for help with how to focus the owl... I'll check for the C-AF. I hope that would have worked for me. I may get another shot sometime. If not this year, then if they fly the bird next year. Yeah, I was pretty crushed not to see this bird in focus... but still have a soft-spot for the image.

OK, if you're in sports-mode, the camera automatically sets the focus mode to AF-A, which apparently didn't do the trick. I am not knowledgeable enough to set the ISO & Aperture myself. Whenever I tried experimenting, all my shots came out DARK, so I was pretty discouraged and went back to the pre-programmed modes (and "AUTO" if I was totally clueless as to what to do).

Not sure where to start.

[NaturesPixel]

this is hard ... to focus on something moving fast and comming towards you ... a prime lens would help some since they focus pretty quick

the AF-C should work but ya need good light and a fast lens

[Saralonde]

Very cool pic, even with the oof owl. Just the fact that you had your wits about you to take the shot when it looked like he was coming right at you! I would have been in awe, then thought, "Oh crap! I forgot to shoot!"

[Farkled]

Maybe I'm missing something here, but when I expected action shots in the days of film, I just ran the shutter speed up as high as I could get it given the lens I had. That way, subject motion was most likely stopped at speeds of over 1/250. Since those were the days of manual focus that's all one could do.

Your picture looks to me as if it was subject motion, not a complete misfocus but then I've been known to wrong before. The whole autofocus thing throws me. It gets the easy stuff right most of the time and makes the difficult stuff more difficult. My camera won't focus on an object in bright water or on a bright white object or in the dark or .....

[matthewchj]

Originally Posted by Farkled

Your picture looks to me as if it was subject motion, not a complete misfocus but then I've been known to wrong before.

It's the AF, not subject motion, because if you notice the person in the background is sharp, but he's using an aperture of f/5. Additionally, his shutter speed is 1/1000, which would have been more than enough to stop subject motion. It looks like the camera focused on the background instead of the subject (owl). This has happened quite a few times to me before.