70-200mm

So I just bought my 70-200mm f4 last week. I love it and I went to the Zoo yesterday and took some great shots. What I did notice though, was that a lot of the shots where the animals moved didn't come out so well.

I'm very much debating to myself whether I made the right choice going with the f4 over the 2.8. The extra money for the 2.8 isn't that big of a deal. The reason why I went with the f4 is because I do consulting work for a living and I wanted to minimize weight when traveling.

I'm about to order a monopod to help with the weight while actually using my lens as well as provide me with more steady shots. I also bought a Lowepro Flipside 300 to help me with the weight when I travel as well as being able to bring all my stuff.

So again, I bought the f4 to help reduce the weight weight when travelling but I also love to go to the local Zoo. Do you think I should have gotten the 2.8?

What ISO setting were you using?

If you need a faster shutter speed and are aperture-limited by the lens, crank up the ISO setting.

I feel very stupid about this and completely forgot. The first quarter of the zoo which included the moving subjects that got blurred were set to 100 ISO manually which I'm used to using Auto for that. Once I set the ISO to Auto or I manually adjusted it appropriately after being aware I had it set manually, my pictures started to come out very nicely.

This puts my mind at ease more. Now I just have to go back to the Zoo and play with the lens again. Can't believe I forgot about the 100 ISO being set manually.

Elan22 wrote in post #9018140
I feel very stupid about this and completely forgot. The first quarter of the zoo which included the moving subjects that got blurred were set to 100 ISO manually which I'm used to using Auto for that. Once I set the ISO to Auto or I manually adjusted it appropriately after being aware I had it set manually, my pictures started to come out very nicely.

This puts my mind at ease more. Now I just have to go back to the Zoo and play with the lens again. Can't believe I forgot about the 100 ISO being set manually.

Last time I was at the zoo, I found myself using lots of fill flash (-1 EV usually). Easier to get rid of the ugly shadow that comes mid day harsh light in Arizona.

Ya, I didn't bring my flash with me yesterday as my only mission was to see how the 70-200mm would perform in all cases with no flash. I'll be going back today and will bring my 430 EXII with me.

I always shoot with...

When I use any of my telephoto lenses, I will shoot using at least ISO 400. IMO, the 40D camera on which I usually have my 70-200mm f/4L IS lens mounted can handle ISO 400 with absolutely no problems. This is my everywhere/every-time lens and half of my travel and general photography lens duo.

Since I often need to shoot in lower light, I will increase the ISO beyond 400 when shooting in those lower light levels. The 40D is quite capable of higher ISO performance.

Although the image stabilization of my 70-200mm f/4L IS lens will allow me to get vibration free shots at slower shutter speeds (I can shoot at 1/30 second using 200mm) it will not stop moving subjects. In order to get a shutter speed high enough to stop subject movement, I will increase ISO until I attain those speeds. I would rather have a sharp subject and some noise than a noise free image with a blurry subject.

There are, however techniques such as shooting at peak action which will allow you to shoot moving subjects at a slower shutters speed. additionallly, sometimes a subject with some motion blur will give the impression of movement.

Do you really need a monopod to use the 70-200/4 L IS lens? Outdoors in the sun, you should be ok with ISO 100 but nothing wrong with using 200 or 400 on a 50D.

I love my 70-200mm F4, the IS version offers more flexibility but at extra cost.

This is a shot I took last month of a Bearded Dragon I found in the Daintree Rainforest Queensland. It's not tack sharp but at 6400 and 1/80th i'm more than happy!

http://farm3.static.fl​ickr.com …4031227223_658f​a2489a.jpg

I started with the 70-200 f4. I love it still. I take it when I know I don't need the speed. For outdoor work, it's sharp and wonderful. The cost is really reasonable for the quality. But if you are not using settings outside the little green box, or even the P setting, you are not fully getting the shots you need and the best of your new lens. Crank up the ISO to 400-800 outdoors if you need to and it will make a huge difference. I shoot manual after years of the little green box and P. It's a new world.

Elan22 wrote in post #9018101
So I just bought my 70-200mm f4 last week. I love it and I went to the Zoo yesterday and took some great shots. What I did notice though, was that a lot of the shots where the animals moved didn't come out so well.

WHY didn't they come out well? My zoo lens is the 100-400mm which is f/5.6 at the long end, I don't have any problems shooting animals (including those that move )

You do know you can raise the ISO to allow the use of a faster shutter speed, right?

Sometimes I have to go to ISO1600 in the shade, but that's what it takes!

As stated above, I realized my error. I thought I was shooting in ISO Automatic (I do quite often manually choose my ISO settings) but I was in ISO 100 which caused shutter speeds to be low for several of my shots. It was these shots that were messed up and then realized my ISO was set at 100. Once I realized it, I fixed the issue and things were coming out fine.

if you tell yourself that you will never use auto ISO again, you will never make that mistake again. if you always set it manually you will "almost" always remember to set it. stop using auto ISO.

Yep, I was manually setting my ISO the rest of the day. I need to get myself to always adjust my ISO manually as you said. It's good advice.