... BIF... In a very very lazy mode:
- out of my window;
- without tripod (this morning I was longing for doing immediately something, and my tripod is in my car, and my car has been parked relatively far from home)
- after I has not been shooting BIF for a couple of years (and possibly more)
- as my very first exercise with my a6000 AF in tracking mode
- with focus limiter in the range 10mt -> infinity.
The shots below are 25% linear cropping (1500px vs 6000px) of the originals.
Very first impressions (subjective, without any attempt to get an objective measurement):
- It's not a speed monster of AF, as expected; even though it is faster at shorter focals, and it's definitely not bad below half of the focal range. With AF programmed for still subjects, in a typical landscape approach, AF confirms in a few tenths of second, absolutely fine; I'd say that it's equal or even faster than my Nikkor 300mm AF-S Æ’/4 (I need to do some more precise measurement).
- Hand helding is a pain, as expected: after ten minutes my left wrist was aching. It's the first time I can experience the feeling of unbalance because of the lightweight of the camera. This also had the effect of violently shaking the lens, and jeopardising the effect of the stabiliser. The larger gull photo below appears decently focused, but ruined by the motion blur.
- AF seems to be accurate (the airplanes photos, where tracking was absolutely easy, are properly focused)
- In any case, it seems that you can have some satisfaction with BIF, not the ones that fly in a very unpredictable way (I wasn't able to get sharp photos of swifts), but I wasn't expecting that. Honestly the only bird usage I was expecting was with slowly moving ones on the ground, so this is already exceeding expectations.
I didn't try the custom modes, which I have already programmed for faster AF. And since I'm seeing some slowness of the camera in moving the tracking cursor in the EVF, part of the performance is due to the camera... I expect better results e.g. with the a6300.
I'll post more in the next days.
PS Focals used below are: 500mm, 600mm, 400mm, 400mm, 600mm.
Hell, the JPEG compression did awful things...
The photos appear to have a lot of noise (especially the 1st airplane one. Did you use a very high ISO setting, and if so, how come/why?
And yes, very heavy JPG compression also.
Nice that you are happy with the combo
Certainly a lot easier to work with than the Tamron 500mm f8 I have for my 6D (but I like it for its weight and size, no wrist issues there).
Progress is obviously being made "stopping down"!
BIF look OK, distant airplanes cropped are taxing due to haze and magnification...best start with closer subjects.......
Your friend is the ability to fill the frame, while your enemy is cropping.
One thing I learnt when going from APSc to FF with a powerful zoom is:
Yes,...you use the "sweet spot" of the lens on APSc but then you have to magnify it by 2.25 to get the same size image........;
...that then gives you a bitter-sweet spot!
Oh and eat plenty of spinach!
"Your friend is the ability to fill the frame, while your enemy is cropping."
True: of course I can't do a reasonable test just out of my window
I went auto ISO setting speed at 1/800 and never minded at the value, even though they weren't high: 200, 125, 160, 250, 200. The true reason is probably the fact that I didn't ETTR, and e.g. the aircraft got underexposed, with whited pushed in PP.
It wasn't a test about the overall quality: just the handling and AF tracking speed.
That is fine, I just wondered to why it looked so noisy
For test shots your window came up trumps i would have said, I don't get much outside of mine.
It would be interesting to try out the C's ability close up @ 600mm.........the Tamron does great at minimum MFD, very sharp indeed, probably to do with focus breathing not making it a 600mm FL....it's difficult to tell how much it breaths because of the enormous blurring.
......and a test for specular highlights.......for onion bokeh
I got a couple of yellow Wagtail shots from my bird hide the other day......the little thing was less than two meters.....good sharpness for 600mm!
https://www.flickr.com/photos/124690178@N08/
Yesterday I tried with some flowers (I found no easy wildlife around, and for landscape the air was too hazy)... and even with a couple of extension tubes, for verifying close up capabilities. I'm post-processing the photos, I'll let you know.
PS Klaus, the notification email seems to work again, thanks.
Nice, the lens has pretty gentle bokeh rendering.