1 ACCEPTED SOLUTION
@jrhoffman75 wrote:
@charlesleblow wrote:Yes, she sent a some that are in my dropbox. Here is a link to them 4 photos. https://www.dropbox.com/t/alkaqxcLFE07Ps91
Hi Charles. I downloaded the images and looked at them in Lightroom Classic (LrC) and Canon DPP.
1. general observation - camera was set to AI Servo but the subjects are static. For static subjects One Shot AF might be a better choice.
2. For most of the shots the selected AF point was the center point with 8-surrond expansion. But the subject wasn't in the center, so focus didn't lock.
3. For the owl on the pole single point AF was selected and the focus point was dead on the owl. But it looks like the focus is more on the light pole - see the detail on the bolt head. Perhaps the camera is front focusing. Need more testing to verify that. I attached screen shots of the various image evaluations........
...I suggest your daughter set the camera up on a tripod and select a subject with good detail. Set camera to One Shot center point and take a photo. Then switch to Live View and take a photo of same subject using center point. Compare the results. If the shot through the viewfinder is soft but Live View is sharp then the camera/lens combination should be calibrated.
I agree with a lot of what JRHoffman and EBiggs wrote, but...
One place we disagree... I think it is not necessary to switch to One Shot, if AI Servo is used "correctly".
In fact I shoot a LOT of sports as well as some wildlife with a pair of 7D Mark II (as well as various earlier Canon models) and I only rarely use One Shot. For shots like these, which appear to be focused and then recomposed, when using AI Servo it is necessary to use Back Button Focusing (BBF). Because there appear to be no active AF points on those two images, I suspect this is exactly what your daughter was doing: using AI Servo in conjunction with BBF. (The advantage to staying with AI Servo is if the bird takes off you can continue shooting without having to switch focus modes... many wildlife photographers use AI Servo or other form of continuous focus most of the time for this very reason.)
The first image really isn't bad, taking into account that the autofocus doesn't appear to be working at all. When I view that image in Canon DPP there appear to be no active AF points at all. Again, that's why I think she was probably using AI Servo with BBF. If she had not been doing so and had some of the AF points had been active, when she recomposed the focus would have gone behind the bird and been much more severely off.
Yes, she appears to be using one of the Expansion Point modes (there are two on 7DII: 4-point and 8-point). That requires the user put the center point on the subject to start focus, then allows the camera to use adjacent points if the center one isn't kept on the subject. But this only gives you one AF point worth of leeway (the owl on the branch is okay, but the owl on the fence post is far outside that area).
It might be better to use Zone Focus mode. This allows the AF to start with any of the AF points in the group selected. There are two forms of Zone Focus on 7DII: small zone and large zone. Small zone is similar in size to 8-point expansion.
However, for even better accuracy, tell her to try using Single Point. That puts her in full control of exactly where the camera and lens focus. It's more "work" for her, keeping the AF point right on the subject, but so long as she uses BBF and AI Servo she will be able to do focus and recompose technique the same as now. There also is a single high precision point AF on 7DII, which uses a slightly smaller AF point. This might make the AF a little slower, so I don't often use it. But it can come in handy with "birds in trees", when you are trying to focus past a tangle of branches, and for other similar subjects. Still, any changes to the AF system such as switching patterns or going from AI Servo to One Shot or vice versa means having to pause shooting and often causes missed shots.
The owl on the branch image sharpens up pretty well in Photoshop. It may be a little soft of extremely close inspection, but that may be as much the 1/320 shutter speed as anything. I would recommend she set a higher shutter speed (Auto ISO will go higher than 500, but that's okay and better than losing sharpness).
I don't know if these will show up well here, but these are the images after a bit of sharpening and a little contrast boost in Photoshop...
The 5MB image size limit here doesn't allow me to upload large enough to do the images justice. Take my word for it, after a little work in the first image the bird's eye and face are reasonably sharp, as is the bark on the branch below it... in the 2nd image the bird and fence post are sharp, as is some of the brush within the plane of focus below. Of course if you zoom in to ridiculously high magnification, both start to look soft. But anything would.
Both those images might be improved by removing any sort of filter from the lens. The original push/pull zoom 100-400mm really doesn't like filters! The II version of the lens isn't quite as bad (but mine still doesn't have a filter on it).
The image of the owl on top of the telephone pole where single AF point is show right on the bird illustrates "front focusing" with that lens. The sharpest part is as JR Hoffman said, on the post near the bolt. When depth of field is shallow like that, even minor front focusing really shows up. That can be corrected on a 7D Mark II using the lens calibration tool.
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Alan Myers
San Jose, Calif., USA
"Walk softly and carry a big lens."
GEAR: 5DII, 7DII (x2), 7D(x2), EOS M5, some other cameras, various lenses & accessories
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