New member

[Slug]

Have had photography as an interest for many years ranging from underwater to aerial, and most bits in between. Have been using Sony cameras for about 7 or 8 years and currently have A7R III, A6400 and A9 with 100-400 G master to cover most of my needs. I'll be interested to read how other nature photographers set up to track small birds in busy environments.
Cheers. Greg C.

 

[jonhawk]

Welcome Greg, you should get lots of guidance here. I'm new here too and just staring out with Sony kit so much to learn!

 

[Slug]

Thanks for the welcome, I'm in Tasmania so it will be interesting to see how that works with different species and seasons.

 

[FowlersFreeTime]

Welcome!

 

[Tim Mayo]

Welcome Greg and thanks for joining up here! With the a6400 and a9 you have the real-time tracking option. If you go into the focus area menu you'll see the different tracking options like "flexible spot tracking", although these tracking options only work with Continuous AF. Now when you focus on a subject it should track them throughout the frame, even if other subjects get in the way. Sometimes it works well, sometimes not. You might also want to experiment with the tracking sensitivity options on the a9 which can be found in the menu under camera setting 1 > af tracking sensitivity. If you select 1 it should be a lot more sticky, although often the default setting works well.

 

[Slug]

Welcome Greg and thanks for joining up here! With the a6400 and a9 you have the real-time tracking option. If you go into the focus area menu you'll see the different tracking options like "flexible spot tracking", although these tracking options only work with Continuous AF. Now when you focus on a subject it should track them throughout the frame, even if other subjects get in the way. Sometimes it works well, sometimes not. You might also want to experiment with the tracking sensitivity options on the a9 which can be found in the menu under camera setting 1 > af tracking sensitivity. If you select 1 it should be a lot more sticky, although often the default setting works well.

Thanks Tim, yes I’ve experimented with the sensitivity but still have problems locking on to the subjects. I’m wondering if the new A7IV with bird eye tracking will be better. Canon R5 seems to have it working.

 

[Tim Mayo]

Thanks Tim, yes I’ve experimented with the sensitivity but still have problems locking on to the subjects. I’m wondering if the new A7IV with bird eye tracking will be better. Canon R5 seems to have it working.

It looks like it will be similar to the a1 at least in how the Bird Eye AF algorithm works. It will definitely be interesting to see it in action though, I've only seen Sony's promo video for the Bird Eye AF so far. I have an R5 and it does do a very good job of finding and tracking the eyes but it's not nailing every shot when you check the focus afterwards, but I don't expect the a7IV will either. It's interesting technology but not something to rely too much on.