Question and c&c on a long distance pic.

[soods]

Ok, so I am just a wee bit curious. I was down at the river and a friend decided to come visit. However, he was about 300-400 feet away, and I don't feel that the bird is quiiiiite in focus. I could just be analyzing it too far. idk. lol.

I was shooting with a Rebel xti and the canon 75-300. While standing in the river with no tripod.

Does anyone care to share their secrets, other than changing your aperture, that will help with focusing on the bird? It was overcast and late in the day, so I didn't have much wiggle room.

Any comments are appreciated!
Thanks!
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[j-digg]

If the bird was that far away I think it would've been relatively easy to hit your focus ( check out the DoF Calculator if you haven't already, pretty nifty ). I assume you were at the very long end, close or at 300. You also have to take into consideration that this is a pretty low quality lens, and the IQ will be lower at the longest lengths of it. The first one looks pretty good I might add.

 

[Samanax]

What shutter speed were you using? I'm guessing you shot this at f/5.6.

If you were zoomed all the way out to 300mm then camera/lens shake becomes a factor, especially if your shutter speed isn't fast enough (in this case you want a shutter speed of at least 1/320 or faster).

 

[j-digg]

What shutter speed were you using? I'm guessing you shot this at f/5.6.

If you were zoomed all the way out to 300mm then camera/lens shake becomes a factor, especially if your shutter speed isn't fast enough (in this case you want a shutter speed of at least 1/320 or faster).

Oh yes, and then there's that.

 

[soods]

That is true j-digg. I don't remember what f-stop I was at, but it was fairly wide open. So that's where my problem was coming from. (and I was getting pretty wet. lol) But hey, I am trying my best with a college budget. hahaha.

The DoF caluator is great. That is pretty fun to play with. Thanks so much j-digg.

 

[Dmitri]

What they said. 1/100 is too slow to hand hold at 300m.

If you don't want to deal with a tripod (and who does for nature photography?), buy a monopod. You'll wonder how you survived without one.

 

[soods]

thanks for that piece of information. im slowly grabbing more stuff off this site.

and yeah it probably was 5.6, it had to be. and im sure i was at ISO 1600 or 800.
i think it's time to upgrade...it would make this a little easier. lol.

 

[soods]

i have been interested in those dmitri... i now think i will give it a shot based on your awesome nature gallery. youve got some great pics in there.

 

[ANDS!]

You can handhold a lens of that length at 1/100th of a second. If the subject is moving quickly, sure you might have a problem, but proper handholding techniques are what you should be focusing on. Also there is nothing wrong with that lens - upgrading isn't going to get you anything exponentially different than what you are working with.

 

[Phranquey]

You can handhold a lens of that length at 1/100th of a second. If the subject is moving quickly, sure you might have a problem, but proper handholding techniques are what you should be focusing on. Also there is nothing wrong with that lens - upgrading isn't going to get you anything exponentially different than what you are working with.

You could shoot this @ 1/100th, but your technique had better be spot on. I am an experienced competition rifle shooter, which translates very well to hand-holding a camera, and I would have had trouble with that one.
Ideally, you want your shutter speed to be the inverse of your focal length (300mm = 1/300th sec), but most people don't take into account the crop factor. Your field of view with a 300mm on a crop sensor digital is roughly equal to the field of view of a 450mm on an FX or film, so this will accentuate hand-held jitters even more....so at 300mm, you are really looking for 1/450th sec or faster.
You are not using a bad lense, but it is known to be a little soft at full zoom. In order to maximize it's potential, you will want a monopod at the very least.