Birds and Long Lenses

milster

milster

Messages
2,438
Name
Gary
Edit My Images
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Hi all, I've recently acquired a Sigma 150-500mm os version but I'm having loads of trouble getting any handheld shots of birds that I'm happy with. Out of all the shots I've taken this is about the best I've managed to get, but to me the head seems out of focus, I'm thinking this is down to movement? This is happening in pretty much all the photos I've taken even when I've had the shutter speed up to 1250/1. Is this just down to bad technique? I'm pretty sure the lens is all right. The picture below was taken I'd say between 10-15ft away from the bird, I was getting better pictures from my 70-300mm Nikon from the same sort of distance.

Exif:

500mm
iso 400
Shutter Speed 800
os on.

Am I expecting too much. Will a decent tripod or monopod help? I have a cheapo tripod but it's certainly not man enough for the job of this lens.

Thanks for any help. :help:


Long Tailed Tit by the milster, on Flickr

This is straight out of camera by the way. Thanks.

Sorry, meant to say it was f7.1
 
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can't see the pic but are you shooting wide open? I have a 400 5.6 and the depth of field is pretty shallow wide open when trying to fill the frame. Have you tried stopping down a bit? :)

Edit: I can see it now lol

just had a quick type in on a depth of field calculator on my phone and at 500mm f7.1 at 15 feet your depth of field is 2cm
 
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I loved my 150-500mm, i do miss it.
Id up the shutter speed, try to have it above 1000 if handheld. As said above, step it down a bit. Have a go on some this still for practice and try different f stops and see whats the shrapest.
 
First thing I thought was "the twig is in focus"...
So what focussing are you using? For birds I usually stick to spot focus... If thats what youre doing it might be that the lens is slightly forward focussing (or is it back focussing? Lol), and you could dial in some micro adjustment into the camera for that lens.
 
Looking at the original size shot on flickr it looks uniformly soft so I would guess that it's down to lens movement. Try upping the iso to give a higher shutter speed. Also make sure your technique is solid.
 
Yeah, I use spot focus. I don't know how scientific this is but I've just done this little test.


009 by the milster, on Flickr

This was done 17ft from the lens and the tape measure was well angled, well over 45 degrees. The focus is supposed to be bang on the 6. What do you think? I've only cropped this to try to see it better.
 
ynot said:
I loved my 150-500mm, i do miss it.
Id up the shutter speed, try to have it above 1000 if handheld. As said above, step it down a bit. Have a go on some this still for practice and try different f stops and see whats the shrapest.
Click to expand...

Bondy said:
Looking at the original size shot on flickr it looks uniformly soft so I would guess that it's down to lens movement. Try upping the iso to give a higher shutter speed. Also make sure your technique is solid.
Click to expand...

Shutter speed has nothing to do with it :bang:
Practise your technique (y)
 
milster said:
Yeah, I use spot focus. I don't know how scientific this is but I've just done this little test.


009 by the milster, on Flickr

This was done 17ft from the lens and the tape measure was well angled, well over 45 degrees. The focus is supposed to be bang on the 6. What do you think? I've only cropped this to try to see it better.
Click to expand...

Which 6 ?
 
milster said:
Yeah, I use spot focus. I don't know how scientific this is but I've just done this little test.


009 by the milster, on Flickr

This was done 17ft from the lens and the tape measure was well angled, well over 45 degrees. The focus is supposed to be bang on the 6. What do you think? I've only cropped this to try to see it better.
Click to expand...

Measuring a ruler/tape at 45 degrees is not a good test, as there are a lot of different things for the camera to lock onto there. Due to the size of the camera focus points you could easily find it will focus on something different, it will not automatically lock onto what is slap bang in the middle of the focus point.

Get something high contrast that you can have the camera lock onto, then put the tape measure next to the object (or leaning on it) so you can accurately measure where the focal plane is.
 
ynot said:
Really?

Even handheld?
It's a heavy lens and your always going to get camera shake.
Click to expand...

Then the answer if it is that heavy, is to put it on a Tripod (y)
 
I shoot hand held at less than 1/400th sec and get good results using the Sigma 150-500mm ( or so I think) maybe a tripod is the solution, until you get a better understanding of this lens

Les (y)

Ps I find f8 is the sweet spot on mine
 
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Gary, my advice would be to pull back a bit on the lens, at 15ft there is no need to be at 500mm as you should still have plenty of detail to crop and it will also give you a faster shutter. Did a quick crop of your larger image. The beak and eye look pretty good to me, top of the head looks a little softer but that may well be down to the feathers ruffed up a bit giving it that look. You also say it is straight out of the camera, sorry Gary but you need to start thinking about editing imho. Did a quick crop and sharpen up. Not sure what you think but it is not a million miles off for detail.



7931377534_c529df7882_o by Richard Venn, on Flickr
 
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Thanks for all the advise guys, I'm thinking it's more down to technique than the lens. I don't particularly find the lens that heavy (I'm a scaffolder so if I was finding it heavy I'd be in trouble) I'll have a go at everything that's been suggested. I'll try it on my tripod, I know it's not man enough for the job but it might give me a slight idea.



u8myufo said:
You also say it is straight out of the camera, sorry Gary but you need to start thinking about editing imho. Did a quick crop and sharpen up. Not sure what you think but it is not a million miles off for detail.
Click to expand...

Cheers Rich, I'd be more than happy with your edit. I do normally try to edit a bit but I'm really just stumbling my way around pp at the moment. I think that was one of the reasons I was feeling a bit disheartened as I couldn't get it to look anything like that. Do you mind me asking what software you used and what you done?

Cheers, Gary.
 
Thanks Neil, I'll have a look in a bit. Missus is making me give up the computer for a bit now :shrug:

On the plus side I've managed to get this today, he only stayed around long enough for me to get three shots (typical, as you normally can't get rid of him) but I'm much happier with this (obviously not the background etc :)) I think there's a slight bit of movement in the eye still but like I say, much happier. A minimal attempt a pp with a slight crop. This was shot at about 20ft, had the lens resting on the van.

1/800
f 8
500mm
iso 400

Cheers


Sigma Test by the milster, on Flickr
 
That looks a lot better Gary, a slight bit of movement on the subject as you say. Regards to software, I use Photoshop Gary. If you are not already aware after doing any adjustments and resizing down to say 1024 give your image a final sharpen.Then post this up on Flickr instead of posting the full size image up.

PS. Those Putlogs need a coat of paint :D
 
The birds in the garden aren't playing with me much at the moment but I've been trying a bit more, I think I'm slowly getting there. I think I've found this lens is at it's sharpest around f/10 so I really do need good light. The first two are taken on my cheapo tripod and the third is hand held bracing on the kids slide.

Exif:
1/640
F/10
450mm
iso 800

1.
009 by the milster, on Flickr

Exif:
1/250 (shows you can get reasonble results with a pretty slow SS)
f/10
450mm
iso 400

2.
004 by the milster, on Flickr

Exif:
1/500
f/8
500mm
iso 400

3.
044 by the milster, on Flickr
 
Gary, did you know that the 150-500 OS is a tad soft at full zoom ? Not mega soft but its sweet spot is to back off slightly from 500 to about 450 indicated.

I've had some good success with this lens, ( i still own one ) but there are compromises as already posted, like the sweet spot of f8 aperture. And if you shoot on that tripod eventually, turn OS off
 
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Yeah, thanks Peter. I'm finding this lens really hard work at the moment but I'm gonna persevere with it for a bit.
 
Yup Gary - well done fella. Dont give up. They can produce some good pics, its just that you have to work harder for them. It loves light, and more light and forget teleconverters :cool:

Here's some of my own samples that i think are fairly ok. See what you think

sp99hclrs0.jpg


wx88r852ck.jpg


j5wyvbiue8.jpg


q3l3o6hut9.jpg
 
Yeah, nice one Peter, I'd be very happy with those. Been practising in the garden and I'm definitely beginning to see better results even at slower speeds. Like everone says, got to learn how to get the best results from the lens :)
 
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