E-M1.2 CAF: Focus Prediction Appears to be Based on Previously Exposed Images

[nick779]

Amazing timing, I’ve just come back from a full day shooting BIF, 720 images in total and out of those 3 in focus, yes just 3 and the detail on those 3 is frankly poor

i was so frustrated and annoyed with the focus acquisition and accuracy today, I,ve ordered the D500 and tamron 150-600 G2, I know I’ve threatened to do this before but this time I’ve done it

enough is enough, I’m just wasting my time , energy and frankly my mind on this , the Olympus omd em1 ii and PL 100-400 Is just not capable period.consistency with birds in flight, some days reasonable other days appalling, my photographer friend today nailed all the critical moments, every single one with his DSLRs ( D500 and 300 PF), I got none

my olympus kit will be retained for perched birds only and general photography but any serious wildlife and especially BIF will now be the Nikon,s domain

wildlife camera system ? Olympus? Dream on, it’s currently night and day the difference between the D500 and EM1ii, maybe the next iteration but not this version.Ah, I feel better

Rant over

Im on the fence with this for any action shooting right now.

Based on what ive seen between the EM10 Mark 2, the EM5 Mark 2, and the EM1 Mark 2. Theyre perfectly good for stills and some light action, but C-AF is just poor. On the EM1.2 its definitely better, but nowhere near what I would expect for phase detection. Especially when Panny bodies seem to get better results with DFD, but even the RX10 and RX100 1" sensors have better hit rated with PDAF. I just dont get it.

Ive been half tempted to sell certain long lenses and pick up a RX10 III for something "cheap" I like the idea of the D500 more for everything, but the glass is just big, expensive and I was having a hard time tracking down shorter lenses made for the crop sensor.

 

[Stejo]

Amazing timing, I’ve just come back from a full day shooting BIF, 720 images in total and out of those 3 in focus, yes just 3 and the detail on those 3 is frankly poor

i was so frustrated and annoyed with the focus acquisition and accuracy today, I,ve ordered the D500 and tamron 150-600 G2, I know I’ve threatened to do this before but this time I’ve done it

enough is enough, I’m just wasting my time , energy and frankly my mind on this , the Olympus omd em1 ii and PL 100-400 Is just not capable period.consistency with birds in flight, some days reasonable other days appalling, my photographer friend today nailed all the critical moments, every single one with his DSLRs ( D500 and 300 PF), I got none

my olympus kit will be retained for perched birds only and general photography but any serious wildlife and especially BIF will now be the Nikon,s domain

wildlife camera system ? Olympus? Dream on, it’s currently night and day the difference between the D500 and EM1ii, maybe the next iteration but not this version.Ah, I feel better

Rant over

What kind of birds are you shooting? I'm sorry to say, but 3 keepers out of 720 shots suggest user error. Either in shooting technique or camera settings. Probably both.

Even with swallows in terrible light, my keeper rate with the GH5 and 100-300ii has never dropped below 25-30%. With large birds my keeper rate is consistently over 80%.

The EM1ii with the PL100-400 should be doing even better.

 

[glassoholic]

Amazing timing, I’ve just come back from a full day shooting BIF, 720 images in total and out of those 3 in focus, yes just 3 and the detail on those 3 is frankly poor

i was so frustrated and annoyed with the focus acquisition and accuracy today, I,ve ordered the D500 and tamron 150-600 G2, I know I’ve threatened to do this before but this time I’ve done it

enough is enough, I’m just wasting my time , energy and frankly my mind on this , the Olympus omd em1 ii and PL 100-400 Is just not capable period.consistency with birds in flight, some days reasonable other days appalling, my photographer friend today nailed all the critical moments, every single one with his DSLRs ( D500 and 300 PF), I got none

my olympus kit will be retained for perched birds only and general photography but any serious wildlife and especially BIF will now be the Nikon,s domain

wildlife camera system ? Olympus? Dream on, it’s currently night and day the difference between the D500 and EM1ii, maybe the next iteration but not this version.Ah, I feel better

Rant over

What kind of birds are you shooting? I'm sorry to say, but 3 keepers out of 720 shots suggest user error. Either in shooting technique or camera settings. Probably both.

Even with swallows in terrible light, my keeper rate with the GH5 and 100-300ii has never dropped below 25-30%. With large birds my keeper rate is consistently over 80%.

The EM1ii with the PL100-400 should be doing even better.

Yes... I must concur. If a D500 was "nailing" everything and the EM1.2 and PL 100-400 got "nothing" then something (technique?) is very wrong. I am sure my keeper rate with a D500 and PF300 would go up (based on some DSLR experience and everything I have seen shown by others) but zero vs 100%... even if exaggerated by angst this is still wrong. If my swallows BIF were zero success I would say so but I have shown several times my success here in this forum. Swallows keeper rate is about 5% when against background scenery but about 40% when against a clear blue sky. Other BIF (larger slower birds) with the same two backgrounds) is about 15% and 85% for me (I also use the dot sight as drj3 does and for swallows it is basically indispensable and without it for swallows my keeper rate is zero and maybe 15% for the two backgrounds mentioned). My EM1.1 and 75-300 without a dot sight for swallows was zero keepers no matter what background and all other BIF was between 5 and 10%... so the EM1.2 and PL 100-400 had given me much enjoyment (my technique certainly didn't suddenly vastly improve).

I do lay blame at Olympus feet that they don't explain further the differences in many settings and that the menu doesn't offer a setting (call it "Swallows BIF" for want of a better title) where they as the manufacturer who should know their product best do not simply put all the tweaks into place for the photographer the same way as we end up through discussions like this (and much time and trial and error) building a C Set for use.

 

[drj3]

Amazing timing, I’ve just come back from a full day shooting BIF, 720 images in total and out of those 3 in focus, yes just 3 and the detail on those 3 is frankly poor

i was so frustrated and annoyed with the focus acquisition and accuracy today, I,ve ordered the D500 and tamron 150-600 G2, I know I’ve threatened to do this before but this time I’ve done it

enough is enough, I’m just wasting my time , energy and frankly my mind on this , the Olympus omd em1 ii and PL 100-400 Is just not capable period.consistency with birds in flight, some days reasonable other days appalling, my photographer friend today nailed all the critical moments, every single one with his DSLRs ( D500 and 300 PF), I got none

my olympus kit will be retained for perched birds only and general photography but any serious wildlife and especially BIF will now be the Nikon,s domain

wildlife camera system ? Olympus? Dream on, it’s currently night and day the difference between the D500 and EM1ii, maybe the next iteration but not this version.Ah, I feel better

Rant over

Im on the fence with this for any action shooting right now.

Based on what ive seen between the EM10 Mark 2, the EM5 Mark 2, and the EM1 Mark 2. Theyre perfectly good for stills and some light action, but C-AF is just poor. On the EM1.2 its definitely better, but nowhere near what I would expect for phase detection. Especially when Panny bodies seem to get better results with DFD, but even the RX10 and RX100 1" sensors have better hit rated with PDAF. I just dont get it.

Ive been half tempted to sell certain long lenses and pick up a RX10 III for something "cheap" I like the idea of the D500 more for everything, but the glass is just big, expensive and I was having a hard time tracking down shorter lenses made for the crop sensor.

CAF is not poor. For situations where a bird moves consistently (speed and direction) it is quite good as long as the photographer keeps the focus points on the bird. If the bird changes direction or speed, then the camera will loose focus, but so will a D500 or any other camera with blackouts. There would be differences in how quickly the camera regains focus, but I have seen no posts with other cameras evaluating this.

Based on others reports, I would expect the D500 to be better for BIFs for photographers who don't keep the focus points on the target or for birds that fly very close to a patterned background, unless the Electronic AF Limiters are used on the Olympus.

I have never used a Panasonic with DFD, but I have little doubt that I would be able to shoot BIFs with one. I have lots of BIF photographs using the Olympus E510 from 10 years ago (3 focus points) and the slow external focusing FTs 70-300, so I am certain the Panasonics would be better.

 

[phil from seattle]

Please excuse my lack of knowledge but I can't find anywhere low sequential 15 fps. Only 10. Even in Wrotniak customisation article, 15 fps low sequential does not exist.

Please what to do to aquire this?

What camera?

This is strictly for the EM1 Mark 2

I'm on FW 2.1 (Olympus update app says I'm current) on my EM1.2. Just tried and it limits Low Seq FPS to 10.

 

[nick779]

Please excuse my lack of knowledge but I can't find anywhere low sequential 15 fps. Only 10. Even in Wrotniak customisation article, 15 fps low sequential does not exist.

Please what to do to aquire this?

What camera?

This is strictly for the EM1 Mark 2

I'm on FW 2.1 (Olympus update app says I'm current) on my EM1.2. Just tried and it limits Low Seq FPS to 10.

Mech shutter is limited to 10fps in regular, and 8fps in anti shock. E shutter will go to 18fps in "low"

 

[Bob657]

Thanks for doing this Denny. From the time of release Oly said there was predictive focusing going on, they didn’t mention though that as far as I know it only works with all points active.

I’d love to know why some people have a difficult time with CAF while others don’t, I’m sure part of the issue is the ability to keep focus points on the subject though. For whatever reason Oly hasn’t made it easy, I’m lucky I have fairly high hit rates but I’ve shared settings with some others who try them and still struggle.

Where Canikon does better is providing various expansion modes where the system choses the closest focus point among some options (I think) and have more sophisticated algorithisms driving the choice. Time for our next firmware update Oly!

 

[CliffWales]

Amazing timing, I’ve just come back from a full day shooting BIF, 720 images in total and out of those 3 in focus, yes just 3 and the detail on those 3 is frankly poor

i was so frustrated and annoyed with the focus acquisition and accuracy today, I,ve ordered the D500 and tamron 150-600 G2, I know I’ve threatened to do this before but this time I’ve done it

enough is enough, I’m just wasting my time , energy and frankly my mind on this , the Olympus omd em1 ii and PL 100-400 Is just not capable period.consistency with birds in flight, some days reasonable other days appalling, my photographer friend today nailed all the critical moments, every single one with his DSLRs ( D500 and 300 PF), I got none

my olympus kit will be retained for perched birds only and general photography but any serious wildlife and especially BIF will now be the Nikon,s domain

wildlife camera system ? Olympus? Dream on, it’s currently night and day the difference between the D500 and EM1ii, maybe the next iteration but not this version.Ah, I feel better

Rant over

What kind of birds are you shooting? I'm sorry to say, but 3 keepers out of 720 shots suggest user error. Either in shooting technique or camera settings. Probably both.

Even with swallows in terrible light, my keeper rate with the GH5 and 100-300ii has never dropped below 25-30%. With large birds my keeper rate is consistently over 80%.

im sorry I,m struggling to accept what you say, both myself and my friend have been using the em1 ii and 100-400 now for roughly 9 months , we go out once a week all day, we shoot wildfowl including swans and small birds like finches, using pro capture I did on a few occasions achieve around 20-25 per cent but the images suffer with rolling shutter but when I use low burst, or high burst with the well documented best practice settings this drops to between less than 1 per cent to a max of 5 per cent, my friend in fairness does do slightly better but never greater than 10 per cent.im not afraid to admit his BIF skill set is superior to mine

now, we are both fairly experienced wildlife photographers, with great successes with DSLR kits, with my previous kit of a D7200 and 200-500 my keeper rate was around 50-60 per cent, for birds in flight why ? Because the focus system both CAF and SAF actually worked and locked on, consistently, with the Olympus it simply Does NOT period, no arguments , it fails and it fails mostly every time, not only for me but for my friend , who incidentally gave up a few weeks ago and now only uses his Nikon kit, and we are not the only ones either, people we meet regularly at www and rspb sites say exactly the same thing, they gave up and went back to canon or Nikon, the D500 is light years better than the D7200 and the D7200 is light years ahead of the Olympus em1 ii for birds in flight, anyone who thinks otherwise either has not used such equipment so can’t compare, or is blinkered frankly.

now for still photography, that’s a different matter, the Olympus excels and is wonderful, but for action it sucks.

sorry to counter your response in this way, no offence meant, I’m sure your skills must be superior to mine if you can consistently get good results, however myself and quite a few others cannot meet your apparent high success rate with this combo and if we are to continue to enjoy our days out shooting BIF then we have to go back to what we know will work, but more importantly work consistently, If I was presented with a golden opportunity to photograph a set of bird in flight shots for a publication and I needed to guarantee success , the camera of choice would not be the current iteration of the EM1, it’s not good enough

I mentioned earlier that I ordered the D500 and tamron 150-600, well, I paid a combined total of £1830,00 for both from e-finity.com , brand new but grey market, from Hong Kong that’s less than the retail price of the Olympus 300 f4 pro, Currently £1899, and I have confidence that whilst heavy it will deliver something the Olympus cannot

olympus omd em1 ii + PL100-400 cost roughly £2600 and fails miserably at BIF

olympus omd em1 ii+ 300 f4 pro costs roughly £3200 and still does not fully deliver apparently ( have tried it and was slightly better granted)

nikon D500+tamron 150-600 cost me £1830.00 - system proven

You do the math, as the Dacia advert says

the Olympus is still a beautiful camera but for still life and perched birds only.

://www.flickr.com/photos/43301211@N03/41877961280/in/photostream/

The EM1ii with the PL100-400 should be doing even better.

 

[bigsambwfc]

i forgot to mention that along with the dot site, the biggest improvement in keepers for bif was by switching OIS & IBIS off on anything above 1/1000 sec shutter speed.but keeping the focus points on the subject is the name of the game at the end of the day.if it was easy the fun factor would be lost maybe,the mk3 will probably do stills off movies better than the mk2 stills if rumours are true (fat chance)

 

[CliffWales]

Nonsense , pure and utter , I’m sorry to say

 

[CliffWales]

Amazing timing, I’ve just come back from a full day shooting BIF, 720 images in total and out of those 3 in focus, yes just 3 and the detail on those 3 is frankly poor

i was so frustrated and annoyed with the focus acquisition and accuracy today, I,ve ordered the D500 and tamron 150-600 G2, I know I’ve threatened to do this before but this time I’ve done it

enough is enough, I’m just wasting my time , energy and frankly my mind on this , the Olympus omd em1 ii and PL 100-400 Is just not capable period.consistency with birds in flight, some days reasonable other days appalling, my photographer friend today nailed all the critical moments, every single one with his DSLRs ( D500 and 300 PF), I got none

my olympus kit will be retained for perched birds only and general photography but any serious wildlife and especially BIF will now be the Nikon,s domain

wildlife camera system ? Olympus? Dream on, it’s currently night and day the difference between the D500 and EM1ii, maybe the next iteration but not this version.Ah, I feel better

Rant over

Im on the fence with this for any action shooting right now.

Based on what ive seen between the EM10 Mark 2, the EM5 Mark 2, and the EM1 Mark 2. Theyre perfectly good for stills and some light action, but C-AF is just poor. On the EM1.2 its definitely better, but nowhere near what I would expect for phase detection. Especially when Panny bodies seem to get better results with DFD, but even the RX10 and RX100 1" sensors have better hit rated with PDAF. I just dont get it.

Ive been half tempted to sell certain long lenses and pick up a RX10 III for something "cheap" I like the idea of the D500 more for everything, but the glass is just big, expensive and I was having a hard time tracking down shorter lenses made for the crop sensor.

CAF is not poor. For situations where a bird moves consistently (speed and direction) it is quite good as long as the photographer keeps the focus points on the bird. If the bird changes direction or speed, then the camera will loose focus, but so will a D500 or any other camera with blackouts. There would be differences in how quickly the camera regains focus, but I have seen no posts with other cameras evaluating this.

CAF is poor, very poor for fast moving targets I have many examples from today where the focus point is bang on the bird, green rectangle covers part of the birds body or head as seen on the screen when reviewing and the image is soft and when downloaded those images are soft out of focus, I’m not saying they are unrecognisable but the images are unusably soft.

Based on others reports, I would expect the D500 to be better for BIFs for photographers who don't keep the focus points on the target or for birds that fly very close to a patterned background, unless the Electronic AF Limiters are used on the Olympus.

even with a D500 using 25 focus point box you need to centre the subject if possible but it’s easy to do this, in fact it’s child’s play

used focus limiter 4m to 49m, used CAF , tried all point and 5 point, CAF with +2 for clear skies and 0 for busy backgrounds all to no avail, camera shows locked on to target but the resultant image soft, oh and the shutter speed set at 1/2500 in all cases at f6.3 auto ISO.

only success was when using pro capture in one burst, single point

I have never used a Panasonic with DFD, but I have little doubt that I would be able to shoot BIFs with one. I have lots of BIF photographs using the Olympus E510 from 10 years ago (3 focus points) and the slow external focusing FTs 70-300, so I am certain the Panasonics would be better.

 

[drj3]

Amazing timing, I’ve just come back from a full day shooting BIF, 720 images in total and out of those 3 in focus, yes just 3 and the detail on those 3 is frankly poor

i was so frustrated and annoyed with the focus acquisition and accuracy today, I,ve ordered the D500 and tamron 150-600 G2, I know I’ve threatened to do this before but this time I’ve done it

enough is enough, I’m just wasting my time , energy and frankly my mind on this , the Olympus omd em1 ii and PL 100-400 Is just not capable period.consistency with birds in flight, some days reasonable other days appalling, my photographer friend today nailed all the critical moments, every single one with his DSLRs ( D500 and 300 PF), I got none

my olympus kit will be retained for perched birds only and general photography but any serious wildlife and especially BIF will now be the Nikon,s domain

wildlife camera system ? Olympus? Dream on, it’s currently night and day the difference between the D500 and EM1ii, maybe the next iteration but not this version.Ah, I feel better

Rant over

What kind of birds are you shooting? I'm sorry to say, but 3 keepers out of 720 shots suggest user error. Either in shooting technique or camera settings. Probably both.

Even with swallows in terrible light, my keeper rate with the GH5 and 100-300ii has never dropped below 25-30%. With large birds my keeper rate is consistently over 80%.

im sorry I,m struggling to accept what you say, both myself and my friend have been using the em1 ii and 100-400 now for roughly 9 months , we go out once a week all day, we shoot wildfowl including swans and small birds like finches, using pro capture I did on a few occasions achieve around 20-25 per cent but the images suffer with rolling shutter but when I use low burst, or high burst with the well documented best practice settings this drops to between less than 1 per cent to a max of 5 per cent, my friend in fairness does do slightly better but never greater than 10 per cent.im not afraid to admit his BIF skill set is superior to mine

Could you show examples of the rolling shutter problem. I get rolling shutter far less than 1% of the time with birds like swallows. I compared flying pintail ducks with Electronic Shutter and Mechanical and found rolling shutter only when a birds wings were very close, largely filling the frame diagonally (one wing upper corner the other opposite lower corner). I do get rolling shutter more frequently with hummingbirds, but the mechanical shutter also sometimes shows rolling shutter with hummingbirds (the 1/250 scan is not fast enough). It occurs far more frequently with bees or hummingbird moth wings.

While I am interested in ProCapture low as a possible way to reduce the number of out of focus frames at the beginning of a burst, I have not found it to be particularly useful for birds, but admit I have rarely used it after the first week.

I would think you should get a very high percentage of sharp images with swans unless the 100-400 does not focus as well as the Olympus 300mm.

I personally get a low percentage of sharp images with finches, that sign wave like flight always leaves me chasing where the bird was, not where it is. However, this is definitely a photographer problem, not a camera problem.

I cannot comment on performance with the Panasonic lens, I have no problem with most birds (other than finches and other birds with the up/down while going forward flight).

now, we are both fairly experienced wildlife photographers, with great successes with DSLR kits, with my previous kit of a D7200 and 200-500 my keeper rate was around 50-60 per cent, for birds in flight why ? Because the focus system both CAF and SAF actually worked and locked on, consistently, with the Olympus it simply Does NOT period, no arguments , it fails and it fails mostly every time, not only for me but for my friend , who incidentally gave up a few weeks ago and now only uses his Nikon kit, and we are not the only ones either, people we meet regularly at www and rspb sites say exactly the same thing, they gave up and went back to canon or Nikon, the D500 is light years better than the D7200 and the D7200 is light years ahead of the Olympus em1 ii for birds in flight, anyone who thinks otherwise either has not used such equipment so can’t compare, or is blinkered frankly.

I have not recently used a DSLR, but my hit rate will vary with the bird and the situation. That was the purpose of my post. If I shoot a swallow flying toward me at 6 fps for 1 second, I will probably only get 1 or at most 2 acceptable sharp images. However, I discovered researching for this post that shooting for the same 1 second interval at 15 fps will give far more well focused images as long as the bird maintains its speed/direction of flight.

now for still photography, that’s a different matter, the Olympus excels and is wonderful, but for action it sucks.

sorry to counter your response in this way, no offence meant, I’m sure your skills must be superior to mine if you can consistently get good results, however myself and quite a few others cannot meet your apparent high success rate with this combo and if we are to continue to enjoy our days out shooting BIF then we have to go back to what we know will work, but more importantly work consistently, If I was presented with a golden opportunity to photograph a set of bird in flight shots for a publication and I needed to guarantee success , the camera of choice would not be the current iteration of the EM1, it’s not good enough

I mentioned earlier that I ordered the D500 and tamron 150-600, well, I paid a combined total of £1830,00 for both from e-finity.com , brand new but grey market, from Hong Kong that’s less than the retail price of the Olympus 300 f4 pro, Currently £1899, and I have confidence that whilst heavy it will deliver something the Olympus cannot

Please post your images after you get the D500. I have seen some very good images taken with the 150-600 Sigma, but also many that should have been deleted (a photographer, not camera problem). The D500 would have been much more tempting to me, had Nikon had a 400mm f4 at a reasonable cost and weight. The in development 500mm f5.6 light weight PF lens could be very interesting, but the cost will probably be very high.

olympus omd em1 ii + PL100-400 cost roughly £2600 and fails miserably at BIF

olympus omd em1 ii+ 300 f4 pro costs roughly £3200 and still does not fully deliver apparently ( have tried it and was slightly better granted)

nikon D500+tamron 150-600 cost me £1830.00 - system proven

You do the math, as the Dacia advert says

the Olympus is still a beautiful camera but for still life and perched birds only.

://www.flickr.com/photos/43301211@N03/41877961280/in/photostream/

The EM1ii with the PL100-400 should be doing even better.

 

[CliffWales]

Amazing timing, I’ve just come back from a full day shooting BIF, 720 images in total and out of those 3 in focus, yes just 3 and the detail on those 3 is frankly poor

i was so frustrated and annoyed with the focus acquisition and accuracy today, I,ve ordered the D500 and tamron 150-600 G2, I know I’ve threatened to do this before but this time I’ve done it

enough is enough, I’m just wasting my time , energy and frankly my mind on this , the Olympus omd em1 ii and PL 100-400 Is just not capable period.consistency with birds in flight, some days reasonable other days appalling, my photographer friend today nailed all the critical moments, every single one with his DSLRs ( D500 and 300 PF), I got none

my olympus kit will be retained for perched birds only and general photography but any serious wildlife and especially BIF will now be the Nikon,s domain

wildlife camera system ? Olympus? Dream on, it’s currently night and day the difference between the D500 and EM1ii, maybe the next iteration but not this version.Ah, I feel better

Rant over

What kind of birds are you shooting? I'm sorry to say, but 3 keepers out of 720 shots suggest user error. Either in shooting technique or camera settings. Probably both.

Even with swallows in terrible light, my keeper rate with the GH5 and 100-300ii has never dropped below 25-30%. With large birds my keeper rate is consistently over 80%.

im sorry I,m struggling to accept what you say, both myself and my friend have been using the em1 ii and 100-400 now for roughly 9 months , we go out once a week all day, we shoot wildfowl including swans and small birds like finches, using pro capture I did on a few occasions achieve around 20-25 per cent but the images suffer with rolling shutter but when I use low burst, or high burst with the well documented best practice settings this drops to between less than 1 per cent to a max of 5 per cent, my friend in fairness does do slightly better but never greater than 10 per cent.im not afraid to admit his BIF skill set is superior to mine

Could you show examples of the rolling shutter problem. I get rolling shutter far less than 1% of the time with birds like swallows. I compared flying pintail ducks with Electronic Shutter and Mechanical and found rolling shutter only when a birds wings were very close, largely filling the frame diagonally (one wing upper corner the other opposite lower corner). I do get rolling shutter more frequently with hummingbirds, but the mechanical shutter also sometimes shows rolling shutter with hummingbirds (the 1/250 scan is not fast enough). It occurs far more frequently with bees or hummingbird moth wings.

While I am interested in ProCapture low as a possible way to reduce the number of out of focus frames at the beginning of a burst, I have not found it to be particularly useful for birds, but admit I have rarely used it after the first week.

I would think you should get a very high percentage of sharp images with swans unless the 100-400 does not focus as well as the Olympus 300mm

hmmm you may have something here, this could be the main culprit, as both my friend and I have experienced the same issues using the same lens for BIF, along with others we have talked to who have moved on to canon or Nikon,

but then I did try the 300 pro, and was thinking to buy another copy this month but, following today and at £1900 does not make sense when I’ve just ordered both a D500 and tamron 150-600 grey market for £1830 combined

.

I personally get a low percentage of sharp images with finches, that sign wave like flight always leaves me chasing where the bird was, not where it is. However, this is definitely a photographer problem, not a camera problem.

I cannot comment on performance with the Panasonic lens, I have no problem with most birds (other than finches and other birds with the up/down while going forward flight).

now, we are both fairly experienced wildlife photographers, with great successes with DSLR kits, with my previous kit of a D7200 and 200-500 my keeper rate was around 50-60 per cent, for birds in flight why ? Because the focus system both CAF and SAF actually worked and locked on, consistently, with the Olympus it simply Does NOT period, no arguments , it fails and it fails mostly every time, not only for me but for my friend , who incidentally gave up a few weeks ago and now only uses his Nikon kit, and we are not the only ones either, people we meet regularly at www and rspb sites say exactly the same thing, they gave up and went back to canon or Nikon, the D500 is light years better than the D7200 and the D7200 is light years ahead of the Olympus em1 ii for birds in flight, anyone who thinks otherwise either has not used such equipment so can’t compare, or is blinkered frankly.

I have not recently used a DSLR, but my hit rate will vary with the bird and the situation. That was the purpose of my post. If I shoot a swallow flying toward me at 6 fps for 1 second, I will probably only get 1 or at most 2 acceptable sharp images. However, I discovered researching for this post that shooting for the same 1 second interval at 15 fps will give far more well focused images as long as the bird maintains its speed/direction of flight.

now for still photography, that’s a different matter, the Olympus excels and is wonderful, but for action it sucks.

sorry to counter your response in this way, no offence meant, I’m sure your skills must be superior to mine if you can consistently get good results, however myself and quite a few others cannot meet your apparent high success rate with this combo and if we are to continue to enjoy our days out shooting BIF then we have to go back to what we know will work, but more importantly work consistently, If I was presented with a golden opportunity to photograph a set of bird in flight shots for a publication and I needed to guarantee success , the camera of choice would not be the current iteration of the EM1, it’s not good enough

I mentioned earlier that I ordered the D500 and tamron 150-600, well, I paid a combined total of £1830,00 for both from e-finity.com , brand new but grey market, from Hong Kong that’s less than the retail price of the Olympus 300 f4 pro, Currently £1899, and I have confidence that whilst heavy it will deliver something the Olympus cannot

Please post your images after you get the D500. I have seen some very good images taken with the 150-600 Sigma, but also many that should have been deleted (a photographer, not camera problem). The D500 would have been much more tempting to me, had Nikon had a 400mm f4 at a reasonable cost and weight. The in development 500mm f5.6 light weight PF lens could be very interesting, but the cost will probably be very high.

olympus omd em1 ii + PL100-400 cost roughly £2600 and fails miserably at BIF

olympus omd em1 ii+ 300 f4 pro costs roughly £3200 and still does not fully deliver apparently ( have tried it and was slightly better granted)

nikon D500+tamron 150-600 cost me £1830.00 - system proven

You do the math, as the Dacia advert says

the Olympus is still a beautiful camera but for still life and perched birds only.

://www.flickr.com/photos/43301211@N03/41877961280/in/photostream/

The EM1ii with the PL100-400 should be doing even better.

 

[User5456214890]

Excellent piece of investigation.

As others have mentioned, I have never understood why I should set my camera to take an exposure before anything is in focus. I have always opted for half shutter press to establish focus first before burst shots . Your homegrown research helps explain why this option is even in the menu but the phraseology of the thing still baffles me.

But I wonder, while taking things to the limit re BIF's is instructive, most of us won't be trying to photo supersonic birds. I've tried and have given up. What can the rest of us take away from your research in the average encounter w/ BIF's? For example, you mentioned frame rates and frame counts including those of pro-capture, mechanical vs. electronic shutter etc. Any insights re this in your discussion will help me or others get a better handle with the M1 mk2 with moving subjects.

Thanks again for your contribution to this subject.

Jim

 

[Stejo]

What kind of birds are you shooting? I'm sorry to say, but 3 keepers out of 720 shots suggest user error. Either in shooting technique or camera settings. Probably both.

Even with swallows in terrible light, my keeper rate with the GH5 and 100-300ii has never dropped below 25-30%. With large birds my keeper rate is consistently over 80%.

im sorry I,m struggling to accept what you say, both myself and my friend have been using the em1 ii and 100-400 now for roughly 9 months , we go out once a week all day, we shoot wildfowl including swans and small birds like finches, using pro capture I did on a few occasions achieve around 20-25 per cent but the images suffer with rolling shutter but when I use low burst, or high burst with the well documented best practice settings this drops to between less than 1 per cent to a max of 5 per cent, my friend in fairness does do slightly better but never greater than 10 per cent.im not afraid to admit his BIF skill set is superior to mine

now, we are both fairly experienced wildlife photographers, with great successes with DSLR kits, with my previous kit of a D7200 and 200-500 my keeper rate was around 50-60 per cent, for birds in flight why ? Because the focus system both CAF and SAF actually worked and locked on, consistently, with the Olympus it simply Does NOT period, no arguments , it fails and it fails mostly every time, not only for me but for my friend , who incidentally gave up a few weeks ago and now only uses his Nikon kit, and we are not the only ones either, people we meet regularly at www and rspb sites say exactly the same thing, they gave up and went back to canon or Nikon, the D500 is light years better than the D7200 and the D7200 is light years ahead of the Olympus em1 ii for birds in flight, anyone who thinks otherwise either has not used such equipment so can’t compare, or is blinkered frankly.

now for still photography, that’s a different matter, the Olympus excels and is wonderful, but for action it sucks.

sorry to counter your response in this way, no offence meant, I’m sure your skills must be superior to mine if you can consistently get good results, however myself and quite a few others cannot meet your apparent high success rate with this combo and if we are to continue to enjoy our days out shooting BIF then we have to go back to what we know will work, but more importantly work consistently, If I was presented with a golden opportunity to photograph a set of bird in flight shots for a publication and I needed to guarantee success , the camera of choice would not be the current iteration of the EM1, it’s not good enough

I mentioned earlier that I ordered the D500 and tamron 150-600, well, I paid a combined total of £1830,00 for both from e-finity.com , brand new but grey market, from Hong Kong that’s less than the retail price of the Olympus 300 f4 pro, Currently £1899, and I have confidence that whilst heavy it will deliver something the Olympus cannot

olympus omd em1 ii + PL100-400 cost roughly £2600 and fails miserably at BIF

olympus omd em1 ii+ 300 f4 pro costs roughly £3200 and still does not fully deliver apparently ( have tried it and was slightly better granted)

nikon D500+tamron 150-600 cost me £1830.00 - system proven

You do the math, as the Dacia advert says

the Olympus is still a beautiful camera but for still life and perched birds only.

://www.flickr.com/photos/43301211@N03/41877961280/in/photostream/

The EM1ii with the PL100-400 should be doing even better.

I totally get your angst. And I assure you my skills are quite poor; I'm no wildlife photographer. What I did however, was experiment heavily after the initial inevitable failures. And I did so, on my own, without any pressure for results.

Turned out in my case, that the UV filter, IBIS, shutter speed, AF area choice and panning were all contributing to the abysmal keeper rates. Once I got rid of any filters, turned IBIS off and started shooting at 1/2500 with a steadier hand and a large central AF area, success rate went significantly up.

There's quite a few wildlife experts around here that have stunning shots taken with the gear you're using. Maybe it's easier with the D500. I wouldn't know; never tried it. But it's certainly consistently doable with the EM1ii as well. Check out this album for example on flickr (not mine) that showcases what's possible.

Either way, I hope you have better success with your new toys and I'd love to see a comparison when you get the chance.

 

[drj3]

Amazing timing, I’ve just come back from a full day shooting BIF, 720 images in total and out of those 3 in focus, yes just 3 and the detail on those 3 is frankly poor

i was so frustrated and annoyed with the focus acquisition and accuracy today, I,ve ordered the D500 and tamron 150-600 G2, I know I’ve threatened to do this before but this time I’ve done it

enough is enough, I’m just wasting my time , energy and frankly my mind on this , the Olympus omd em1 ii and PL 100-400 Is just not capable period.consistency with birds in flight, some days reasonable other days appalling, my photographer friend today nailed all the critical moments, every single one with his DSLRs ( D500 and 300 PF), I got none

my olympus kit will be retained for perched birds only and general photography but any serious wildlife and especially BIF will now be the Nikon,s domain

wildlife camera system ? Olympus? Dream on, it’s currently night and day the difference between the D500 and EM1ii, maybe the next iteration but not this version.Ah, I feel better

Rant over

Im on the fence with this for any action shooting right now.

Based on what ive seen between the EM10 Mark 2, the EM5 Mark 2, and the EM1 Mark 2. Theyre perfectly good for stills and some light action, but C-AF is just poor. On the EM1.2 its definitely better, but nowhere near what I would expect for phase detection. Especially when Panny bodies seem to get better results with DFD, but even the RX10 and RX100 1" sensors have better hit rated with PDAF. I just dont get it.

Ive been half tempted to sell certain long lenses and pick up a RX10 III for something "cheap" I like the idea of the D500 more for everything, but the glass is just big, expensive and I was having a hard time tracking down shorter lenses made for the crop sensor.

CAF is not poor. For situations where a bird moves consistently (speed and direction) it is quite good as long as the photographer keeps the focus points on the bird. If the bird changes direction or speed, then the camera will loose focus, but so will a D500 or any other camera with blackouts. There would be differences in how quickly the camera regains focus, but I have seen no posts with other cameras evaluating this.

CAF is poor, very poor for fast moving targets I have many examples from today where the focus point is bang on the bird, green rectangle covers part of the birds body or head as seen on the screen when reviewing and the image is soft and when downloaded those images are soft out of focus, I’m not saying they are unrecognisable but the images are unusably soft.

Did you miss the following in the post?

"The focus confirmation box seen in the EVF, when reviewing images of fast moving targets, will rarely be of any value..."

The focus point is placed during Live View after focus is confirmed. LV ends, the image is exposed. The image you see in reviewing the image is the one at exposure, not the one where the green rectangle was placed in LV. You will never see the bird where it was at exposure until you look at the exposed image. The primary reason I want to see a global shutter is to get rid of this delay.

Flying swallows move at 34-60 feet per second. The swallow can easily move well out of the DOF of an uncropped image in the delay between focus confirmation in LV and exposure. If they change direction in that interval, they will not even be in the frame. It is not unusual to have a green square where the bird was in LV, but have a completely empty sky with a green square in the exposed image.

My flying swallows (other than ones flying parallel to the camera) needed 3-5 exposed images in order for the camera to predict focus. There really is no focus lock with any camera with a blackout. The camera uses past information about movement and the most recent focus to predict were the target will be at exposure. If you did not keep the swallow in the frame for more than the 3-5 frames, then you are unlikely to get any images in focus.

No camera with blackout can maintain focus with an erratically moving target. The camera needs predictable movement to predict and maintain focus. The Olympus apparently predicts focus primarily on previously exposed images and not dynamically when the shutter is half pressed, thus exposed images are apparently needed.

Based on others reports, I would expect the D500 to be better for BIFs for photographers who don't keep the focus points on the target or for birds that fly very close to a patterned background, unless the Electronic AF Limiters are used on the Olympus.

even with a D500 using 25 focus point box you need to centre the subject if possible but it’s easy to do this, in fact it’s child’s play

used focus limiter 4m to 49m, used CAF , tried all point and 5 point, CAF with +2 for clear skies and 0 for busy backgrounds all to no avail, camera shows locked on to target but the resultant image soft, oh and the shutter speed set at 1/2500 in all cases at f6.3 auto ISO.

If you can continually keep the five focus points on a flying swallow then you have exceptional skill at panning and extremely fast reaction times, since the bird can fully exit the frame in far less than 1/15 second. I use all points and the focus limiter unless the bird is flying with a very close detailed background. I keep the five points as home on the 300mm lens button, so I can quickly switch to it when the bird is approaching a nest or landing. Set a high frame rate, so that you can maintain the bird in the frame for more than the required 3-5 frames.

I assume you have the latest firmware (2.1) for the Olympus, while that update specified the 200mm f2.8, it may have improved the other Panasonic lenses.

only success was when using pro capture in one burst, single point

I have never used a Panasonic with DFD, but I have little doubt that I would be able to shoot BIFs with one. I have lots of BIF photographs using the Olympus E510 from 10 years ago (3 focus points) and the slow external focusing FTs 70-300, so I am certain the Panasonics would be better.

 

[GBC]

I'm curious, is there parts of the photo that are tack sharp where it is in focus, or is the whole image soft.

Could be IBIS, not focus issues.

 

[GBC]

i forgot to mention that along with the dot site, the biggest improvement in keepers for bif was by switching OIS & IBIS off on anything above 1/1000 sec shutter speed.but keeping the focus points on the subject is the name of the game at the end of the day.if it was easy the fun factor would be lost maybe,the mk3 will probably do stills off movies better than the mk2 stills if rumours are true (fat chance)

Fully agree about the IBIS setting, presume the OIS is similar.

 

[Bob657]

Also the comment on not using a filter is spot on, there have been numerous reports of a big improvement without a filter on the 100-400.

 

[glassoholic]

i forgot to mention that along with the dot site, the biggest improvement in keepers for bif was by switching OIS & IBIS off on anything above 1/1000 sec shutter speed.but keeping the focus points on the subject is the name of the game at the end of the day.if it was easy the fun factor would be lost maybe,the mk3 will probably do stills off movies better than the mk2 stills if rumours are true (fat chance)

Fully agree about the IBIS setting, presume the OIS is similar.

+1 on this for me as well.