Playing with Old Mates

dav wrote:

Gotta love those Jumbo pelicans eh Ian......a real test on any af system

...chuckle..... I hear ya, they're like a large slow moving bus in the sky, not too hard to track. But such a good looking bird, whether floating around in the water or in the air.

The cormorants and smaller birds were more of a challenge. I found I could follow them in a shooting burst for a second or two, maybe, and then I would miss changes of direction or would bugger up my panning speed and lose the bird from the focus points I had selected. A blackout free viewfinder is a superb thing to have and I'm getting used to it, that's why I thought I needed to keep my hand in making it just that little bit harder  

The first and second photos are samples of the focus system not jumping off the bird quickly when a tree is in the foreground and trees in the background are present. The second photo, of the pied cormorant in front of the tree is the 4th photo of a 5 shot sequence that started in front of a tree, then 2 shots in open sky, then the photo in front of the trees (shown) and then one in open sky and then I lost it because of a slight direction change. All 5 are in focus nicely. I have CAF sensitivity turned down low now and provided you get a good lock on the subject the old EM1mkii hangs on pretty well. For the most part I find it really is a matter of being able to follow the action and not lose the subject.

Regards  Ian Colley