How Good is This One? Or Not?

What’s Up?

Multiple IPT veteran Vasili Chernishof is learning a ton. And he is also shooting a ton. Yesterday I cherry picked 211 of his very best images from three flash cards (two 1TB and one 2TB) that held more than 40,000 images. Yes, 40 thousand. He surely needs to learn to be more selective. Right now — “I’m learning my new camera” — he shoots long sequences of anything that moves regardless of the often mega-distracting backgrounds. And he needs to learn to make consistently good exposures. I continue to be impressed by the AF system of his Canon EOS R1 Mirrorless Camera. With “only” 24MP he is shooting at 40 fps with 0.5 second pre-capture. Except for the rare instance where he completely misses focus, probably more than 99% of his images are sharp on the bird’s eye. Most impressive is the AF performance with birds in flight at 1200mm with the RF 600m f/4 and the RF 2X teleconverter. My gut feeling that AF accuracy is better at 1200mm than the Sony a-1 ii with the 600mm f/4 GM and the 2X TC. And that, my friends, is say a lot. The difference however might be operator error (on my part), but I do not think so.

Every session has been wonderful and productive. We’ve been doing great at Santee with Wood Ducks and ducks in flight in general. There is a gorgeous leucistic Wood Duck hen that has been very productive. Pelican flight was fabulous on Friday morning. On Friday night we left Santee early after a great session and headed to La Jolla for sunset. The sunset was spectacular but zero birds flew in the color.

Today is 25 January 2025. With some cloudy weather and a bit of drizzle in the forecast, we are headed out early to La Jolla. Whatever you opt to do, we hope that you too choose to have a great day.

If an item — a Delkin flash card, or a tripod head — for example, that is available from B&H and/or Bedfords, is also available in the BAA Online Store, it would be great, and greatly appreciated, if you would opt to purchase from us. We will match any price. Please remember also to use my B&H affiliate links or to earn 3% cash back at Bedfords by using the BIRDSASART discount code at checkout for your major gear purchases. Doing either often earns you free guides and/or discounts. And always earns my great appreciation.

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If you enjoy and learn from the blog, please consider using one of my affiliate links when purchasing new gear. It will never cost you a single penny. To support my effort here, please order from B&H by beginning your search here. Or, click here, to order from Bedfords and enter the discount code BIRDSASART at checkout to receive 3% cash back to your credit card and enjoy free Second-Day Air Fed-Ex shipping. It is always best to write for advice via e-mail.

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Should You Upgrade to or Purchase a Sony a-1 ii?

I ordered my second a-1 ii five days ago. Every day that I use it, the more I am amazed by speed and accuracy of the Bird Face-Eye tracking in AF-C.

Aside from the improved ergonomics as compared to the a-1, other nice features include the fact that the rear screen tilts both ways. Pre-capture will surely prove to be a plus while in my option, the Speed Boost feature is a total waste for bird photography. In addition, the resolution on the rear monitor has been improved dramatically. Not to mention at Bird Face-Eye tracking on the a-1 ii is vastly improved as compared to both the a-1 and the a9 iii and that the 51MP files are to die for. And don’t forget the Pre-Capture feature!

So, the big question is, is the a-1 ii “worth” a gear upgrade. Remembering that I can never know whether or not something is worth it to you, I can say that I was not floored when using my a-1 ii. The differences between the a-1 ii and the original a-1, are neither huge nor eye-opening. The huge difference between the new camera body and the a9 iii is, of course, the 51MP a-1 raw files (as compared to the 24MP files rendered by the a9 iii).

With the price of a new a-1 having recently dropped $1500.00 to $4,998.00, the decision for new Sony buyers is a very tough one. The a-1 ii sells new for $6,498.00. And the price of used a-1 bodies will continue to drop (but surely not as much as I had thought before using the a-1 ii).

If you do purchase an a-1 ii, be sure to use one of my two affiliate links so that you will receive my a-1 ii settings (in the form of a CAMSEa1ii.DAT file), the Buttons and Dials Guide, and an Info Sheet. Folks who do not purchase their new a-i using my B&H link or from Bedfords here and entering the BIRDSASART discount code at checkout will be able to purchase the a-1 ii guide for $227.43. If you are at all confused and do not want to screw up your order, please get in touch via e-mail.

This image was created on 21 January 2025 on an In-the-Field Workshop at La Jolla, CA. Standing at full height, I used the Robus RC-5570 Vantage Series 3 Carbon Fiber Tripod/Levered-Clamp FlexShooter Pro-mounted Sony FE 600mm f/4 GM OSS lens with the Sony FE 1.4x Teleconverter, and The Latest Greatest Sony Flagship Body, the a1 II Mirrorless Camera. ISO 800. The exposure was determined by Zebras with ISO on the rear wheel: 1/4000 second at f/5.6 (wide open) in Manual mode. RawDigger showed that the exposure was perfect. AWB at 9:05:21am on sunny morning. Tracking: Zone/AF-C with Bird-Eye/Face Detection performed perfectly. Click on the image to enjoy the larger, inexplicably sharper high-res version. Image #1: Brown Pelican Pacific race mega-breeding plumage tight flight

How Good is This One?

Your honest opinion is valued. Be sure to click on the image and then let us know your overall impression. What do you like? What don’t you like? I will share my thoughts on this image in the next blog post.

You’ve Heard it Here Before

Autofocus with the top-of-the-line mirrorless bodies is so good that when you can no longer fit the whole bird in the frame, the best course of action is to keep firing. Why? Bird photography is like the proverbial box of chocolates.

Typos

With all blog posts, feel free to e-mail or to leave a comment regarding any typos or errors.