Geegee Loc: Peterborough, Ont.

It looks like, either a shallow DOF problem or the autofocus of your lens suffers from back-focus. You can check this by carrying out an autofocus check.

Try http://regex.info/blog/photo-tech/focus-chart

and if that is the problem you can make an in-camera correction which will apply the required correction every time you put that lens on the camera.

CatMarley Loc: North Carolina

On second look, the entire bird is out of focus. There is no texture to the feathers. You were shooting with the lens at maximum aperture, and max tele. Your DOF is going to be very shallow to begin with, and then any movement will be noticeable (VR, wind moving the feathers, etc.)

Feiertag Loc: British Columbia, Canada

Live and learn. The next time it's cold outside, I will not make the same mistake twice. Freeze frame! B^)

Btw, thank you for the compliment, Ron.

Harold

Feiertag Loc: British Columbia, Canada

Gee wiz, thank you very much for the link and guidance. I haven't checked the auto focus for correct calibration but I will. It will be my first time.

Harold

Feiertag Loc: British Columbia, Canada

Thank you for the two posts, Cat. Cheers.

Smudgey Loc: Ohio, Calif, Now Arizona

Did you shoot it through the window glass of the car ?

Feiertag Loc: British Columbia, Canada

No. I shot out the open driver's side window. while resting it on the car frame.

sergiohm

Did you use lens correction in Lightroom?

Feiertag Loc: British Columbia, Canada

Yes, I use LR lens correction, on each capture.

PHRubin Loc: Nashville TN USA

Looks to me like bird feathers/fuzz!

sergiohm

Can you share the RAW file? It does look like the finest detail was not captured, usually try f8 or f9 where the lenses tend to be sharper, also try continuous mode and get a couple of shots, sometimes the little movement birds make can translate into shakiness.

Feiertag Loc: British Columbia, Canada

I would love to but I deleted all the defective original RAW files. I have a bad tendency to get of any capture I am not happy with. Especially the Snowy Owl shots because I have so many that did turn out from the days before and after this particular day. I started this topic as an after thought.

amfoto1 Loc: San Jose, Calif. USA

I wish it were that simple!

To me it looks like:

1. A "cheap filter" problem... HOWEVER, AFAIK the Nikkor 200-40mm f/4 uses drop-in filters and is unlikely to have that sort of problem (unless you've replaced the original filter with an incredibly cheap, junk filter).

2a. Image stabilization issue. I've seen this sort of effect on rare occasion when stabilization screws up.... either due to lack of any movement when the stabilization in certain lenses can go "wonky" and create movement itself, sort of like an audio feedback loop. Or, because stabilization simply doesn't work properly. That I've usually only ever seen with my stabilized Canon lenses when I've shot too fast, didn't allow IS the time to do its job.... my fault, not the camera or lens'. Can't say for certain about Nikon VR, though. It's a different system.

2b. A focus issue, also possibly related to shooting too quickly, before the lens had fully achieved focus, was still adjusting itself. Many Nikon users feel that turning off VR speeds up AF a little... and there seems to be some evidence to support that. After using IS lenses for 15+ years, with my Canon gear I feel the opposite is true. I think it speeds up and helps AF, which seems logical to me that an optically stabilized object would be easier to focus upon.... don't know why Nikon would be the opposite, but each stabilization system will have it's own nuances, is bound to be somewhat unique since I'm sure they're each patented by their manufacturer.

2c. Focus accuracy problem.... as others mentioned already. Perhaps lens is just not quite fully focus calibrated on your particular camera, causing it to slightly front-focus or back-focus. If that occurred, it would be amplified when the image is cropped, too. The fix would be to simply use the camera's focus adjustment feature to fine tune focus accuracy.

3. A similar effect might be possible by shifting the zoom ring slightly during exposure. Did you bump it?

4. 1/1000 should have overcome any sort of camera shake to a large extent, but was your car or truck's engine running? You mention resting the lens on a bean bag on the window sill of the vehicle. A running engine causes a lot of low frequency vibrations that might cause an effect like that. You mention cropping the images fairly heavily, which is like using a much longer focal length lens in that it greatly amplifies any "camera shake blur". The more I think about it, the more I am inclined to think this is what happened here.

5. Loose element or group of element or similar fault in the lens itself.

6. Immobile subject and stationary photographer pretty much rules out another possibility: wrong focus mode. With neither subject nor photographer moving in this case, it should have been "doable" using either AF-S or AF-C mode.... so I'm pretty sure this isn't what went wrong here. Doesn't really look like a "missed focus" issue the wrong focus mode usually causes, either.

Often when I take a shot like that I'll fire a short burst.... just to increase the odds that at least one of them will be nice, sharp and well focused.

bennydnut Loc: Phila, Pa.

was just the camera body rest on the bean bag or the lens rest on the bean bag or the whole camera and the lens rest on the bean bag? if only the camera body set on the bean bag there may still be possible some movements!

Steve Perry Loc: Sylvania, Ohio

How far was the bird? The 200-400 is not very good at a long distance. If you combine that with heat distortion (which looks to be at play here as well), then you have the perfect mix for a result like this. If you were shooting out of a warm car into cold air, you defiantly had a heat-related issue. I also find heat distortion amazingly common when shooting across fields like that. A lot of people don't understand how hot and cold air mixing refracts light, so they dismiss this cause and always end up chasing the wrong thing. However, I'm 99% sure that's what happened - combined with a lens that isn't overly sharp at long distances. More on heat diffraction / distortion:

https://backcountrygallery.com/long-lens-heat-distortion/