DA* 300 1st Attempt

Where am I going wrong?

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Any Help Please

lovely shot of the birds, any ideas what the third bird is, maybe a jay,
the pics all look soft, have you cheaked for front and rear focusing.

Would you believe a Magpie. I thought they were soft but i don't think you can adjust a K10 can you?

Hi Barrie,
I noticed the shutter speed on the first bird shot was 1/60 I think that might have been a bit slow for a 300mm lens. Most of the bird is good but I think the blurred head is due to the bird moving rather than a focus issue. I would try a few test shots of a static subject at a higher shutter speed.

John

Magpie, one for sorrow..............

John

Well I would have said camera shake, but strangely enough the Robin which was shot at 1/15th sec is the sharpest? Unless of course you have problems with maintaining steadiness, ie: sometimes your lucky?

Perhaps its focusing? the Squirrel for example doesn't seem to have any point of focus, this point to camera shake.

The Goldfinch seems OK but there's some motion blur in the head,

The Robin (the best of the bunch) should sharpen up to an acceptable level, the branch across his/her feet tail is annoying but this was the birds enviroment and it was there, a lot would say clone it out, I say leave it in and watch your viewpoint next time.

The Magpie, looks like the point of focus is on the tree trunk behing the bird, set the camera to centre popint focus or if you were doing it manually get your eyes tested

Finally, successful wildlife photography does not happen over night, I've been at it for years, wentout today and shot over 100 frames, didnt get ANYTHING anywhere near decent.

All the exposures seem fairly long for a 300mm lense - were you hand holding?

Shot three - the holly leaf seems nearest to being in focus. It seems to be focusing in front of the correct point.

The magpie is interesting. All the ones I have seen are black/white.

Hand held or on your new tripod Brian?........I'm with the "Spider" on this one, centre focus is the only way to go!....I have a hell of a job keeping 300 steady when hand held,dont know if it's the balance or what.......just keep at it and it will come.....all the best......Ken


ps The twig above the Magpies head is in focus!

Great shots but if there hand held thats the problem like me to much red wine

the k10 can be ajusted in the same way as the k20 i believe via a debug mode, faster shutter speeds would help, heres one i took at 750mm hand held hope you dont mind,
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Thanks 'spider on the camera shake i went with a small tripod (12") but no room on the hide shelf for it. So all the shots are hand held. Others were using a bean bag so i might try that.

Your point about the eye test set me thinking.

I do wear specs (test about a year ago) but they are varifocal. I may me looking thru the distance part at the top of the lens when i should be using the close range to see the image in the view finder.

Anybody else with the same problem?

Have you tried using the camera with them OFF and using the dioptre adjustment to correct the defect in you sight?
Of course you could be wearing jam jar bottoms for all I know and the dioptre adjustment just is'nt enough

There are various ways to set the dioptre adjustment, I use the method suggested in the manual, let the camera auto-focus on a bright distant object then adjust the dioptre till it look sharp through the viewfinder, of course this goes belly up if your camera suffers from front or back focusing but try it and see if it improves.

PS I think the beanbag is the best option in a hide.

I have a stigmatism which means without the classes I see two edges to anything near vertical.

Do Pentax do an eyecup that you can have a prescription lens fitted to?

Don't panic! I suspect it's camera shake. The very blurred portions in the pictures are where the animal is moving so it looks like a fairly low shutter speed is the problem for most of those shots. A 300mm on a DSLR is a very long lens and takes a bit of practice to hold it steady. I went through the same thing when I first got my 55-300. About one in five of my shots was sharp! I've improved quite a bit since then (but there's still a long way to go!). Take some test shots off a tripod and I'm sure everyrthing will come good. When you are out in less than ideal light look for something to rest against to reduce the wobble factor.

And I agree with the others, use centre focus!

No they weren't, you just didn't see them in the right light.

I don't know whether Pentax do, but the basic rubber eyecups that I use (like this one) have a circular, threaded hole that can hold a dioptre lens, so I would imagine an optician could supply a prescription lens for it.

Dan