The Stare

[selig1656]

Sassy a Rag Doll Cat with a lot of attitude

[Urbanflyer]

Rag dolls are cats with such great personalities! Ours RUNS everywhere she goes! I certainly recognize the stare you have captured!

[Manfred M]

It looks like you missed focus with this shot, Raymond.

The "rule" in photography is that when we do a portrait (regardless of whether the subject is human or an animal), the eyes must be sharp. They are not here, so the image does not work as well as it could.

[selig1656]

Manfred , you are 100% correct

[Sergio M.]

Missed focus aside, that's some stare.

Sergio

[selig1656]

Manfred I tried Some touch ups , see if this is better



also an other capture



I value your opinions and you have aided many times in my growth

[Manfred M]

Raymond - out of focus is one thing that cannot be fixed in PP. If there is a bit of focus softness, sharpening can sometimes help, but usually it does not. Missed focus is the number one reason that I delete my own shots.

The focus is still soft in the second image (not quite as much as the first one).

What focus mode are you using? The one I recommend for shooting people and animals is the use of a single focus point. Focus on the eye nearest the camera, depress the shutter release button half way and then reframe the shot and push the shutter release all the way to take the picture. I use this method in over 99% of my shots. I find that the multi-focus point focus modes generally fail, even in high end cameras. If you look at high end medium format cameras like Hasselblad and Phase One, they only have a single focus point. These are primarily marketed to high end photographers who shoot fashion and beauty images, and the method I describe is what they use exclusively for that type of work.

[selig1656]

These quick pics so multi focal points , that as you stated is an error , thank you . I realize that I can not readjust focus , I just tried to compensate for the out of focus. This is definitely a point I will pay much more attention to , with my Olympus it is set to single focus , the Nikon D7100 I have been using multiple which seems ok on landscape , thanks . I am second lead shooter for Baltimore marathon will be using the Nikon mostly with 70-200mm Nikon lens VR etc. F2.8 and on this I will assure you it will single focus on individual runners especially the elite runners . When I get to the larger groups will use multi as this has worked in the past. Please give me some pointers.I am still new at this level.

[Manfred M]

These quick pics so multi focal points , that as you stated is an error , thank you . I realize that I can not readjust focus , I just tried to compensate for the out of focus. This is definitely a point I will pay much more attention to , with my Olympus it is set to single focus , the Nikon D7100 I have been using multiple which seems ok on landscape , thanks . I am second lead shooter for Baltimore marathon will be using the Nikon mostly with 70-200mm Nikon lens VR etc. F2.8 and on this I will assure you it will single focus on individual runners especially the elite runners . When I get to the larger groups will use multi as this has worked in the past. Please give me some pointers.I am still new at this level.

Single point focus works well on subjects that are stationary or are moving parallel to the sensor plane. If they are moving toward (or away) from you, the 3D focus seems to work best, using continuous focus mode.

Another technique I use (it comes from the pre-autofocus days) is zone focusing. I select a zone, based on depth of field tables and prefocus. As I use back-button focus in most of my shots, this is easy as this decouples focusing from the shutter release. Whenever someone is in my focus zone, I shoot without changing focus. One "trick" to using this technique is to shoot at one stop smaller aperture setting than strictly called for in the zone, as this gives a bit more margin of error. What I mean is if I set my zone based on f/5.6, I will set the camera to f/8.

Be careful and practice / fine tune your techniques before race day, otherwise you will end up with a lot more blown shots than you would want.

[selig1656]

Thank you for time and experience , Manfred , I truly appreciate this .

[Dave Humphries]

I agree with Manfred's suggestions Raymond.

When I get to the larger groups will use multi as this has worked in the past. Please give me some pointers. I am still new at this level.

Even with groups, personally I'd rather use a single point and focus/recompose myself - that way I know I have deliberately set it on someone who is 1/3 - 1/2 distance 'in' to (the depth of) the group (to maximise DoF), than let the camera randomly decide that (say) the highest contrast subject, standing at the front (or, much worse, back) of the group, should be where it sets the focus distance.

Perhaps I'm just a "control freak"

Cheers,
Dave

[Manfred M]

I agree with Manfred's suggestions Raymond.



Even with groups, personally I'd rather use a single point and focus/recompose myself - that way I know I have deliberately set it on someone who is 1/3 - 1/2 distance 'in' to (the depth of) the group (to maximise DoF), than let the camera randomly decide that (say) the highest contrast subject, standing at the front (or, much worse, back) of the group, should be where it sets the focus distance.

Perhaps I'm just a "control freak"

Cheers,
Dave

+1 with your thoughts Dave.

There is only one focus plane and all those fancy (and mis-named) focus points are nothing more than a fancy way for the camera to try to compute where it should put the focus plane. The camera does not know what I am shooting, so like you, I prefer to tell my camera where to focus, taking into account the DoF band.

[selig1656]

Put so direct and well , sometimes simplicity is right in front of us.

[Manfred M]

Put so direct and well , sometimes simplicity is right in front of us.

Raymond - autofocus modes are like any other tool. One has to understand how it works in order to choose the most appropriate approach. I find that for most of the type of photography I do, the single focus point gives me the best results and since making the switch a number of years ago, I find I have very, very few images where I have missed focus.

[selig1656]

So good to hear from you , thanks for the valuable input . Will post some marathon pics , than I will be down with major right shoulder surgery , unless I decide to hold off . Would really hate to miss the fall season .

[Wandjina]

+1 to all of Manfred's comments

[rpcrowe]

It's quite difficult for me to provide any comments regarding the shooting of action using the Nikon D7100 and the 70-200mm lens because my gear is Canon and I use the 7D2 for action/sports shots.

However, I investigated using the D7100 on YouTube videos and came up with this selection. I am not at all sure whether the videos are viable for you or not. However, here they are:

https://www.youtube.com/results?sear...th+nikon+d7100

Good luck with the marathon.

BTW: here are some videos on photographing marathon type races. The same caveat applies here. I don't know if they will help or not...

https://www.youtube.com/results?sear...ing+a+marathon

Whenever I am shooting an event or an area, I Google for images to give me some ideas...

https://www.google.com/search?q=mara...=2560&bih=1334

[selig1656]

Richard thank you and yes this is helpful , I might get the chance to shoot Arena Foot ball .