So, I’ve had the wife’s OM1 mark ii in my hot sweaty hands for a few days now. I am so in love … with the camera that is. I have been shooting with subject detection on and set to bird. I have set focus area to full. The results are impressive. This first gallery shows that if there’s a bird in the scene, no matter how busy the background is, the camera will find it.
If an eye is showing it will put a small square around it, if the eye is not in view or the bird is very distant it will put a frame around the bird. When multiple birds are in the frame each one will have its own box one of which will be highlighted. Why would you ever have more than one in a shot?
Can you fool it? Yes you can. Distance, poor light, no eye in the frame may lead to failure but not very often. It’s no longer necessary to switch to single point focus to find a bird in a bush. Does the focus stick if the bird moves? Little Terns fly along about 15m above the sea surface looking down. When they see their supper they dive. Focus will stick as long as you can keep the bird in the frame. In the example below focus is perfect all the way to the water. There are 17 frames between the splash and the bird reappearing. At 50 frames per second that’s 0.34 sec. In that time focus had been captured by a wave in the foreground.
Skill it seems is still required. The finger needs to come off at the water and then back on again for the bird’s re-emergence. (You’ve got a third of a second what’s the matter with you!)
bobmcgee 