R7 fly-by

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For some reason, my signature line did not appear in my original post. I shall invoke it here;

I may not respond to your post if you have not posted photos to your Gallery or entered any Challenges. Nothing personal, I just like to have a sense of my correspondent.

BlueRay2 wrote:

itsallBb2me wrote:

For some reason, my signature line did not appear in my original post. I shall invoke it here;

I may not respond to your post if you have not posted photos to your Gallery or entered any Challenges. Nothing personal, I just like to have a sense of my correspondent.

LOL, fair enough, Dude. i have been shooting birds and wild life since 2006, so here are a few sampls:

hope this will satisfy your invocation

Something about glass houses and throwing stones comes to mind.

BlueRay2 wrote:

i am sorry to say that the focus is horrid and under the body is way too dark. not ready for show time. no offense intended.

You might want to book an appointment at an optician. No offense intended.

Adult bald eagles are hard in blue sky situations particularly if the sun is high in the sky. You get a bit more contrast with juveniles:

Admittedly still a little soft around the eye.

I got this osprey in good light with my R7 but it still isn't pin sharp:

I strangely had a bitter hit on the eye focus with this heron taking off in the early morning light:

Missed the final point I was trying to make, I'm still not sure of the AF on the R7. It locks on fine but the sharpness is still in question. I also fully admit that I'm using pretty slow shutter speeds but that is to avoid the noise. Still trying to get the balance right.

BlueRay2 wrote:

itsallBb2me wrote:

For some reason, my signature line did not appear in my original post. I shall invoke it here;

I may not respond to your post if you have not posted photos to your Gallery or entered any Challenges. Nothing personal, I just like to have a sense of my correspondent.

LOL, fair enough, Dude. i have been shooting birds and wild life since 2006, so here are a few sampls:

hope this will satisfy your invocation

Very nice. Why not post them to your gallery occasionally, or even enter a Challenge?

Your choice of course. Anyway, now that we are corresponding, here is my response to your post:

1. The primary focus in both shots is on the flying eagle . The stationary eagle is intended to be recognized as background , i.e. behind , i.e. OOF, I.e. the sacrificial victim of intended bokeh intensification. Call it a creative choice, both in terms of the initial photograph and the post-processing. Not a blunder.

2. It’s a bald eagle, dude. You know, black and white, right? You can fiddle with the exposure values and contrast values to show more or less belly feather detail. I think it is a matter of choice not a failure of technique. Please note that the under body of the flying eagle is brighter in one shot. That was intentional. Take your choice.

3. Your duck’s neck is blacker than my Eagle’s belly. Howcum?

Alastair Norcross wrote:

BlueRay2 wrote:

itsallBb2me wrote:

For some reason, my signature line did not appear in my original post. I shall invoke it here;

I may not respond to your post if you have not posted photos to your Gallery or entered any Challenges. Nothing personal, I just like to have a sense of my correspondent.

LOL, fair enough, Dude. i have been shooting birds and wild life since 2006, so here are a few sampls:

hope this will satisfy your invocation

Something about glass houses and throwing stones comes to mind.

A shattering insight! Or…perhaps…incite?

There is also this issue. Great reach with an RF 800 f/11 but the drawback of good lighting in the summer is the heat distortion shot across a small pond:

BlueRay2 wrote:

my point is not as much about the darkness as the focus. but if OP likes it, then by all means. i was trying to be honest.

Let’s be, as you say, honest. Your points were about both focus and exposure. Either way, have you read my responses about selective focus…bokeh…etc.? Do you really think the foreground eagle is OOF? And, BTW, have you read AN’s comments about your incipient myopia? Care to respond?

Also, here’s a basic lesson in the physics of light: when the eagle’s wing is flapping down, it is in shadow (dark). When the bird is flapping it’s wings upward, the sunLIGHT hits the underside wing feathers. Not so dark.

I like your photos, but…aren’t they a little…dark? Contrasty?

itsallBb2me wrote:

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Great captures

The first one looks really good - I'd probably (personal taste) ease slightly off on the sharpening but that does depend on output. 2nd one looks every so slightly front focussed if being picky - but still great.

Thanks for posting!

Rick65 wrote:

There is also this issue. Great reach with an RF 800 f/11 but the drawback of good lighting in the summer is the heat distortion shot across a small pond:

wow - great capture !

wow - great shots!

John Photo wrote:

Very nice. The only thing I didn't care for was the apparent vignetting on the right side of the top photo.

Thanks to all for the informative and occasionally entertaining responses. I should mention that the Eagles were at the top of a very tall tree at the absolute limit of capability for my current set up (R7 + 100-400mm RF). Thus the tight crops at some expense to the image IQ. Since my original intent was to showcase the capabilities of this new setup without too much input from me, I am posting below a SOOC JPEG Of a much closer bird. No post, except for the one that the bird is perched on.

BTW, I am considering the purchase of a Telextender. Any recommendations as to 1.4 X versus 2.0 x?

Very nice capture. I especially like the first one.

Adult baldies are very hard to expose, especially in direct sunlight. If you preserve the (all-important) head, then the underside of the wings goes very dark. Not much a person can do about that, and still leave it looking natural. It’s one reason I like shooting eagles over snow!

Agree with the other poster though that the IQ is fairly rough. Maybe a bit of back focus (on the far wingtips) in the first frame? Maybe a bit of near focus (on the near wingtips) in the second frame?

I especially like DxO Photolab for its Deep Prime NR. Also I’d pass on the vignette and artificial blur.

Thanks for posting these!

R2

ps. I personally would go for the 1.4x before the 2x. Almost no hit in IQ with the 1.4x, and the AF should still be good. Plus the 2x would make BIFs harder (at least for me).