9 | WILDLIFE
The new season is agreat opportunity to practise using your camera’s autofocus tools
Spring is on its way, and soon there will be an abundance of March hares and rabbits populating the fields once again. This is a great opportunity to dig out your telephoto lens and explore your camera’s autofocus system. Whether you are shooting a single subject or a group of rabbits, setting up your camera’s autofocus correctly will give you better results. Autofocus is a very useful tool when shooting wildlife, especially when there is more than one subject in your scene. Modern cameras offer an incredible number of autofocus points, with some having more than 400. Multiple AF points
Set up the correct autofocus points in-camera to help you master wildlife photography
Single subject = Single autofocus point If your scene has a single subject, then shoot it with a single AF point. Place this point near the centre of the autofocus grid and guide your camera over the eye of the subject.Knowing exactly where your focus point is within your composition will enable you to move it to where you want quickly.
This stunning portrait of a March hare (opposite page) was captured using a single AF point, focusing it on the eye and bringing the area around it into sharp focus. With the use of a wide aperture (f/4), the face of the hare is sharp against an out-of-focus background. To complete the technical excellence of this photo, shooting against a solid green background has made the hare stand out even further.
Multiple subjects = multi
