Soft / Blurry zoomed photos on Cannon R8 EF 100-400mm lens

[Samtata2024]

Please help, not sure what changed in my manual photo setting but my photos are turning out soft / blurry when zoomed in. It was not this way before. Here are some pics and settings of the photos 😞 

The birds were not that far from me, it was a cloudy day. 

[shadowsports · Accepted solution]

@Samatha,

Your ISO is 16,000, shutter speed 1/4000

This is going to introduce serious noise, grain, etc.  

What I recommend is reading about the "exposure triangle"

Canon Learning

[jrhoffman75 · Accepted solution]

For stationary subjects with IS turned on you could most likely use a shutter speed of 1/1000, maybe even 1/500. That would get you down to an ISO of 4000 or less. 

[Samtata2024]

thank you everyone who have responded to help 🙂

[ebiggs1]

All camera gear has its limits. You have pushed your gear top an extreme level. Why manual mode? Believe it or not cameras almost always do what we tell them to. And most of the time the camera is smarter than we are. Manual mode is basically used anymore for situations where nothing else works. Someone said for static birds you could use a SS of 1/1000 or even 1/500. I think that even that is too fast and 1/250 or perhaps 1/100 would work. This will get your ISO under control and in a better range. Think about it, that is 100 clicks per second or 250 clicks per second. That's quick.

Let's try Av mode and select an aperture that works for you. Say f8 on a bright sunny day. Set Auto ISO and also set an upper and lower limit, say ISO 100 to ISO 3200. Now the camera will control SS and exposure. I prefer just the center focus point and Ins Shot. You can always modify these beginning settings as needed.

Always use raw. Avoid cropping more than 100%. I guarantee you these settings will provide great shots with the limits of your gear and personal talent.