Camera Labs

My girlfriends brother is going to do a budgie jump and im going along to take some photo's and I would like some advice and tips on how to shoot it.

I have a 18-70 and 75-300 but neither lenses are very fast. I have an A100 which does not have the fastest focus or FPS. The shoot will be during the day so lighting shouldent be a problem.

How do you recommend I would shoot? what mode? AF or MF? Would I use spot focus or wide area etc...

I have been thinking about how to go about it, but what do you think about this? Im thinking handhold rarther than use a tripod so i can quickley follow the subject as he falls and using the 75-300 to get up close to the subject, Shutter prority at around 1/300s to capture the action. Im also thinking it may be a good idea to use Manual focus so I dont have to worrie about getting the subject in focus or the speed of the AF when he falls? The worrie I have about MF is the distance, the subject may be further away at the top of the fall than he is towards the bottom and I wouldent have much time to manual focus this change in distance from the camera as he falls.

What do you think and suggest?

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Tobywuk personal website || My Flickr
Gear: Sony a700! || CZ 16-80mm! || Sony 75-300 || bag: Crumpler PB xxxl / Lowepro slingshot 200

bump

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Tobywuk personal website || My Flickr
Gear: Sony a700! || CZ 16-80mm! || Sony 75-300 || bag: Crumpler PB xxxl / Lowepro slingshot 200

toby why dont you do AF-C continuous auto focus which would follow him to the ground.. you dont have to wait for focus to be achieved before shooting either.. you can just snap away as he falls and you'll be able to have good focus the whole time.. with your 75-300 i think this would be perfect!!

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Nikon D80/MB-D80/ ML-L3
AF-S 18-55 f/3.5-5.6, AF 50mm f/1.8D
SB-600
Vivtar 2800
My flickr
~Dan Nelson~

what is AF-C? is this an option that would be in the menu?

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Tobywuk personal website || My Flickr
Gear: Sony a700! || CZ 16-80mm! || Sony 75-300 || bag: Crumpler PB xxxl / Lowepro slingshot 200

It's one of the focus modes. I don't know what it's called on Sony cameras but it should be there. The continuous focus mode means that the camera focuses all the time while you have the shutter-release pressed, so you should been able to shoot action with a higher hit rate.

Mark

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Canon EOS 40D / EF-S 17-85mm IS / EF 50mm f/1.8 / My Flickr