Critique Style Requested: Standard
The photographer is looking for generalized feedback about the aesthetic and technical qualities of their image.
I was inside my bedroom when i looked up and saw a beautiful Indigo Bunting and snapped this photo through my window.
ISO 400 450MM 0ev f5.6 1/60s
Hi Jamie. This is a beautiful bird, but it’s awfully soft (out of focus). It looks as if the autofocus might have caught the post it was perched on-the systems do like nice straight lines to glom onto. You can fix that by controlling the area your AF system is working on. You haven’t mentioned what camera you’re using, but just about all of them will allow you to select a variety of AF areas. By going to a smaller one and putting it on the bird, you’ll be sure that it actually focuses where you want it.
Oh these are my nemesis. I see them and the instant I do, they fly off. Scarlet tanagers, ditto.
Dennis has some good advice and I’ll take it one step further. If you don’t have a mirrorless camera this won’t work so that’s another reason including camera make and model is helpful, but if you do, I suggest using focus peaking to verify and mark what will be in focus and what won’t. I use it all the time and it’s very helpful. If you use it in combination with manual assist to fine tune your focus area, that works well, too. Most mirrorless cameras have both these features and might be called different things, but they work the same. Manual assist on my camera allows me to adjust the focus once the autofocus has locked on.
Hope that helps. If you have any questions, let me know. Sometimes camera terminology is hard to describe.
Hi Jamie, beautiful bird and a lovely background. Good advice given above. You may consider a composition taking the bird off center. Nice image.
Good advice above. There are some additional factors, although some may be outside your control: I don’t know if you are able to open the window to shoot, or of there is a screen. A screen may be well out of the plane of focus but will cause loss of sharpness and contrast. Glass can look clean and still cause softness, and double-pane glass causes a major loss of sharpness. And even if you can open the window, if there is any difference in temperature or humidity between inside and out, thermal mixing will cause softness in an image. You can see that through the viewfinder if you can magnify the image.
I love shooting birds and am happy to see it brings joy to others!
