Curmudgeon Loc: SE Arizona

Exhibit 1.
This morning I took Murphy for his morning walk when a small flock of Lesser Goldfinches landed in a tree about 30 feet away. Without moving I dropped the leash, brought up the trusty D7200 with the 70-300 VR lens and fired off 23 shots in short bursts. Feeling confident that one of the shots would be a keeper, or could be turned into a keeper in PP we went on our way. None of them could.

Exhibit 2.
Earlier this year Murphy and I found a bright red male Cardinal in an Ocotillo plant. I fired off about 50 shots in short bursts from where I stood. About 10 of them could be called keepers except the Ocotillo stem was growing right out of the top of the Cardinal's red crest. No problem, I took them out in PP.

There are many more instances of careless and laziness I could catalog. I have become a "Spray and Pray" photographer all because in digital photography "pictures are free"! Back in the film days, I don't remember exactly because I'm old and forgetful, but buying and processing a 36 roll of Kodachrome was between $10 and $15, and you had to wait a week to ten days to get your pictures back from Kodak. I was careful in my stalk, bracketed my shots and each set of 3 cost me about $1.

Conclusions
I am not as good a photographer as I once was! Free pictures and improving PP skills have encouraged me to become sloppy. The only thing I can't fix is focus and I would not be surprised if that coming soon.

Linda From Maine Loc: Yakima, Washington

It takes a lot of willpower, but one can overcome the spray and pray tendency. One way is to allow yourself only 10 shots in an outing. When you get to #11 you have to delete, right there in camera, one of the previous.

I did this exercise once and it gave me a lot of anxiety, but it was kind of fun too to remember back to film days

donrent Loc: Punta Gorda , Fl

I still have my very first 35mm Camera (a Mercury 11, F2.7 lens) that took super great Kodakchromies . Got in in 1952......... You know, think I'll try and find out where to buy film and check the ole girl out....... Bet she still performs.............
I'd go back to Kodachrome tomorrow if possible.......................................................

Scruples Loc: Brooklyn, New York

I’m surprised that your dog didn’t bark. My Bentley is rambunctious. He will bark his brains out at anything. Squirrels, birds, raccoons and people are usually frightened. Worst of all he will try to chase them and try to climb a tree if he has too. He is a hysterical mix of Labrador and Dalmatian.

Curmudgeon Loc: SE Arizona

Thanks Linda, you have the ability to put things back in prospective. I only have problems with wildlife. I know that Saguaro Cactus is not going to move and I can take my time setting up the shot and wait for the light, but that flitty little bird...

kpmac Loc: Ragley, La

I am guilty of the same at times. I try to control myself. Birds in flight don't lend themselves to calm composures, though so those are mostly spray and pray.

Curmudgeon Loc: SE Arizona

I still shoot film from time to time. Nikon F and Bronica S. Not Kodachrome of course. To keep my blood pressure down I only shoot fixed targets with film.

Curmudgeon Loc: SE Arizona

As soon as I raise the camera he just lays down. He has a kind of 'wake me when you're through' attitude about cameras.

Curmudgeon Loc: SE Arizona

Thanks for commenting. I didn't get a DSLR until about 3 years ago because I was afraid I would be captured by the spray and pray mentality and sure enough I was. My first day out with it I took over 100 shots of only four different hummingbirds in less than an hour. I realized then I had been seduced by the force.

Ourspolair

I have only used the rapid shooting mode once in my life - first day out with the new A7c. I quickly learnt that it was a waste of space on the memory card (16-bit raw + fine jpeg) and that the result was more non-keepers in one session than ever before. I was trying to capture butterflies in flight (already a mad idea) in a small butterfly conservatory with uneven lighting. Auto-tracking focus was on but it was just too hard to keep the butterflies in the viewfinder. I got some decent shots of butterflies on flowers or feeders, but the rest were not worth keeping. I could have used it usefully during a feeding frenzy of pelicans one time, but did not have adequate hardware for that at the time. I have found that using manual lenses on the A7C brings me back to the "good old days" of carefully framing, focusing and composing the shot. I still come away with about a shot a minute, but my "keepers" constitute over 90% of what I capture. I think that it is best for me to continue honing my technique. I shall probably only use more automation for filming with the Sony. Guess that makes me more of a curmudgeon than Curmudgeon!

rook2c4 Loc: Philadelphia, PA USA

Avoid using burst mode unless there is no other way to capture the shot you want. Concentrate on anticipating the right moment to press the shutter button. I so rarely ever use burst mode, I often forget that feature is even there.

Curmudgeon Loc: SE Arizona

All I can say is wow, a keeper rate of 90% is amazing. I knew a guy back in the 60's Frederick Kent Truslow, who shot for NatGeo who considered 1 in 100 an acceptable for a NatGeo submission and some of them were rejected. He shot two Nikon Fs with motorized drives manual focus of course and no TTL metering. One of his NatGeo published portfolios was called Eagles of the Everglades or something like that. Some of the pros here claim 1:10 keeper rate on wildlife shots using TTL metering and manual focus. I have no reason to doubt them but an order of magnitude increase in keeper rates between film and digital?

Curmudgeon Loc: SE Arizona

Remember we are talking wildlife photography here, not static landscapes. If I avoid the technology that is available to me am I denying myself the ability to produce better images and aren't better images the target of all conscientious photographers?

LCD

I like photographing more than post-processing, it limits my picture count.

hcmcdole

I used burst mode for the Stanley Falls Flume splash down at Busch Gardens (Tampa) a few years ago. I was waiting for my daughter and her husband and his sister to come roaring down. While waiting I watched the previous riders and the kids standing near the rail waiting for the splashdown so I started taking a few shots here and there but could not capture the exact moment of all the excitement so burst mode to the rescue. To see the kids standing there and the car coming down and then all disappearing in a fog or water is hard to capture any other way (well movies would be best).