Almost a Great Image

Sometimes it can be so close!

After photographing some Wild Dogs having a standoff with a group of Wildebeest, which was a fantastic sighting and produced some nice images, I almost got a great shot.  You see, the last while I have been shooting with a push-pull Nikon 80-200 f/2.8 lens.   Picked it up for a great price and after being a little bit suspect I have not taken off my camera.  Very sharp and the f/2.8 aperture makes a whole world of difference when shooting in low light and when using creative depth of field to tell a story.

Earlier this week I posted The Ready-or-Not Shot and what happened next was a perfect example of this.  As we came around a small hill we found a Kori Bustard, the world’s heaviest flying bird, standing close to a thicket.  Perfect setup as these birds are quite shy and fly off when they feel threatened and with the hill on the one side he only had one way to go.  This allowed us to anticipate the movement and direction to which the massive bird will take off.  All of this happened in less than 15 seconds so there was still a mild panic as we grabbed our cameras and got ready to track the bird flying off.

My camera was ready and I was fast enough to nail the framing but the resulting image was almost great.  Check it out.

Not bad hey?  There is however one problem which stops this image form being great.  Yeah, the wrong area is in focus!  If you look closely you will see that the area below the wing is perfectly sharp and the head not so much.  In wildlife photography it is imperative to get the animals eyes sharp and in focus.  This might be nit picking but in any image of a living thing our gaze is always drawn towards the head and ultimately the eye.  If that area is not pin sharp, unless specifically left out of focus for a reason, the images looses that fizz.  Almost like flat Coke.  It’s nice but it could have been better!

A 200 mm lens is hardly a massive lens but I am quite comfortable with long lenses and panning along with a moving object.  What I think happened is that the 80-200 mm lens I was using was not fast enough in auto focussing as it tried to keep up with the moving, flapping bird.  Realistically, the lens is about 12 years old and has been known to have slightly slower autofocus then some of the more recent lenses.  To be fair tracking a bird in flight will challenge even the latest lenses so considering that I reckon my ‘antique’ did bloody well!  It does however also show that there is a point where you equipment will start holding you back even though I am the first to say that it is not what equipment you use but rather how you use it.  On that I have my eyes on the new Nikon 70-200 f/2.8 VRII but will have to keep saving for a while!  Until then I am very very happy with what I have.

Back to the almost great image.  I am sure that if I spend a little time I will be able to sharpen up the neck and face a little bit and will play with it when I have a bit of time.  I did however do a quick conversion to black and white, upped the contrast slightly and, even though I prefer the color version and the wings are still the sharpest areas, already it looks a bit better.

A good image that almost made it to great!  Actually, the shot is one of a sequence of about 15 so perhaps there is a great one in there somewhere!  Do you think I am being too critical?  Are you like that with your own images?  I personally think it’s good to look at your own work with a critical eye.  It keeps you looking for ways to improve and create better images!

I have another quick post for later today and will then have more info on tomorrow’s guest blogger.  A fantastic post with spectacular African wildlife images coming up so make sure to check in later!

More soon.

Gerry