Hiya!

So the task I set myself this weekend is learning how to use the different focus modes, in particular AI Servo. I decided I wanted to try shooting birds mid flight so off I went back to the same lake I was at last weekend (I was dressed more appropriately this weekend!).

I took my 100-400L and a bag of bread! :)
All my shots were hand held as I was seated in an area where I couldn't even lean my camera/lens on my bag. I alternated between Av mode and Manual mode. In Av mode I let the camera select the ISO and it seemed to go for around 400. In Av mode I shot at f/5.6 most of the time but for some reason I seem to have taken numerous shots at f/8. When in Manual mode I was shooting at a ss of 1/640 to 1/1000. I didn't turn off IS cos it was quite windy (surprise, surprise!) and I was hand holding.

I'm not sure what the ideal mode was to be shooting in that's why I pretty much settled for Manual in the end so that I could adjust both my aperture and ss.

Using AI Servo was difficult, particularly with the 100-400L. I couldn't see a darn thing when I had it zoomed at 400mm (640mm) so what I was doing was zooming right out to the minimum zoom (160mm), finding my bird, half-pressing the shutter button then zooming in quickly to get a tight picture....
I have a question regarding my technique....does the camera automatically continue focusing and refocusing while I'm zooming in on the bird or do I need to continue releasing the half shutter and pressing it again in order to focus every time I change the zoom? It took a while for the lens to focus on my bird which I found a little frustrating. I'm guessing I was doing something wrong but I don't know what. At times when I was following a bird it appeared really clear and then all of a sudden it blurred then became clear again etc etc. Each time there was more than one bird in the pic, the camera didn't really know what to focus on and I seemed to get a blurred image.
I was shooting in burst mode the whole time and found this really helpful.

The sun was behind me (it was an hr before sunset) the majority of the time I was shooting and most of my pics seemed too bright as a result -everything looked too white -perhaps this was overexposure?

I had a great day and my left wrist is officially knackered!! :) Last weekend I was resting my camera on my bag but this week it was all hand held and that made me realise how valuable a monopod really will be.

My shots aren't too bad I guess, I was pleased with some of them and pleased that I could throw bread in the air, hand hold my camera, zoom and take a shot simultaneously!! :D
I realise that some of my pics are blurred but I've posted them anyway. The birds aren't positioned in any particular way in my picture -basically I was just taking the shot!! I think the few pics I took of ducks this week are sharper than those of last week. It was hard getting a tight zoomed image of a flying bird -that was my ultimate aim.
I shall practice some more, hopefully with a monopod next time!

:)

Sorry there are so many pics, I'm hopeless at just selecting a few!!

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