shooting birds in flight.
Jul 23, 2014 07:05:03 #
at the zoo the other I was trying to shoot some bif's. I had trouble keeping them centered to auto focus. I hear about zone focusing , would that apply? how does it work? would that and burst shooting help? I know I piled it on, but any help would be appreciated.
Jul 23, 2014 07:19:33 #
oldmalky
Loc: West Midlands,England.
Can i suggest you pop along to BIF and on water and read what birdpix has posted, I found it very helpful.
Jul 23, 2014 08:07:41 #
I found a lot of good info and will try some of it at my first opportunity. all the info was for dslr's with auto focus. can anyone tell me how you did it with film and manual focus???
Jul 23, 2014 08:23:11 #
bull drink water wrote:
I found a lot of good info and will try some of it at my first opportunity. all the info was for dslr's with auto focus. can anyone tell me how you did it with film and manual focus???
Well, I have been known to get lucky. Not often. Of course, I set the lens on infinity, the mark, not the symbol, and the birds were a pair of Merganzers stepping across the water on their way into the air.
Jul 23, 2014 08:29:28 #
It requires studying your subject and patience.
Greatly simplified example follows:
Assuming you want a side view of the bird.
1) Pick a spot where the birds will by flying across your line of sight
2) Set your focus distance so that the most likely path the bird will take is about 1/3rd of the way into the area that will have acceptable sharpness
3) When a bird enters your predetermined zone:
Start panning
Shoot
Throw lever to advance film :lol: :lol: :lol:
Repeat until bird leaves the zone
Jerry
Greatly simplified example follows:
Assuming you want a side view of the bird.
1) Pick a spot where the birds will by flying across your line of sight
2) Set your focus distance so that the most likely path the bird will take is about 1/3rd of the way into the area that will have acceptable sharpness
3) When a bird enters your predetermined zone:
Start panning
Shoot
Throw lever to advance film :lol: :lol: :lol:
Repeat until bird leaves the zone
Jerry
Jul 23, 2014 13:44:57 #
jgitomer wrote:
It requires studying your subject and patience. ... (show quote)
thanks, a lot of that sounds like it would work with digital and auto focus.
Jul 24, 2014 06:30:07 #
Jul 24, 2014 06:33:06 #
bull drink water wrote:
at the zoo the other I was trying to shoot some bif's. I had trouble keeping them centered to auto focus. I hear about zone focusing , would that apply? how does it work? would that and burst shooting help? I know I piled it on, but any help would be appreciated.
What gear are you using? (lens, camera, tripod, head)
Jul 24, 2014 07:43:55 #
Jul 24, 2014 08:18:14 #
bull drink water wrote:
I found a lot of good info and will try some of it at my first opportunity. all the info was for dslr's with auto focus. can anyone tell me how you did it with film and manual focus???
First step is to go to the bank and withdraw a small king's ransom - you'll need that for film since you are likely to get less than 5% keepers. This is really hard to do without autofocus. You have to be very very very very good, and you will need to keep you finger on the focus ring and constantly tweak and adjust.
Back in the day, Novoflex had a follow focus system that was very fast to focus. But it could easily take 500 rolls of film before you will start getting reliable results. You will get better results with large birds or those that hover, and you can just about dismiss getting really small birds like swifts, finches, warblers, etc. Few photographers are fast enough for those.
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