Mr.Bee

[Netskimmer]

I was chillin' on the porch and had a visitor. I know they are a little soft but I couldn't get auto focus to dial in on him and manual focus isn't easy on something this small and fast. They are also cropped a good bit.

 

[Netskimmer]

No thoughts?
He was darting around so much that I was constantly playing with the focus ring and he was so small that I couldn't be sure if I had him in good focus or was just close. For some reason I completely forgot about adding more focus points. I usually have the camera set to a single focus point and on such a small, fast target trying to put a focus point on it was virtually impossible. If I get another oportunity I will enable all my focus points and set the auto-focus to area mode and see if that works. Any other suggestions or thoughts would be welcome.

 

[jriepe]

You did good with a very difficult subject.

Jerry

 

[Netskimmer]

Thanks Jerry,

Still kicking myself for not trying area mode but he/she has a nest under or near my front porch so I'll get another chance soon. I may try getting closer to him as well. I was concerned that I'd run him off (or piss him off) if I got too close but he seemed pretty tame.

 

[J_T]

I think #1 is the better one out of the set
What shutter speed did you use?

 

[Netskimmer]

I agree that the first one is the best, the white railings on the porch weren't helping me. All were shot at 200mm with a shutter speed of 1/1000s.
Here are the ISO and aperture settings:

	#1	#2	#3	#4	#5
ISO	100	250	220	220	100
F-stop	2.8	5.6	5.6	5.6	2.8

 

[Dubaiian]

All credit for catching the shots that you did!! I have tried this before and never had a picture that I could use. Well done!

 

[Netskimmer]

Thanks Dubaiian, I was mostly getting the focus as close as I could then shooting in high speed bursts while adjusting the focus ring. I think I will also try a smaller aperture next time. A wider DoF could help.