Olympus E-M1X will soon get a major firmware update…

[Angus Gibbins]

One of the best things about Bird AF is when you own a cockatiel is, pet portraits during lockdown just became a whole lot easier.

 

[Mountain_Man_79]

So I finally got an outing to try the bird AF. Not A SINGLE shot was in perfect focus out of several hundred. This is the worst performance I’ve ever gotten from my X, albeit in my short history of birding. I would watch the white square turn into a small green box around the birds eye at half press, and then upon a full press, return either a shot that completely missed focus (rare), or just slightly missed focus (the rest of the time). In inspection afterwards, it shows the focus point was most often on birds butts. Jeez. Thanks. I can focus on birds butts just fine without fancy tracking.

I want to give it the benefit of the doubt, and will try again. Some general observations-

-It was dark. I arrived at my location only 20 minutes before sunset, and much shooting was done at dusk.
-I had my teleconverter on. Honestly, I question the quality of my tele (1.4x). My 300 has pulled outrageously detailed shots without it. I’ve gotten very few shots I like with it on however.
-I did find myself adjusting the focus points to a much smaller grid pattern than what I usually used. It gave me a fighting chance to get the bird I wanted it to focus on, when I was dealing with a whole ton of birds.
-It did seem easier to track BIF. Albeit it still returned a somewhat out of focus shot.
-Bird AF seemed to track aircraft great (still not in perfect focus though). I wonder if aircraft AF works better for birds then bird AF?

Overall, it stunk though. I will try again in better light, and without my teleconverter on. If I leave without a single shot in critical focus again, I’m done with this “novelty”.

Just my two cents after my first go with it.

 

[retiredfromlife]

So I finally got an outing to try the bird AF. Not A SINGLE shot was in perfect focus out of several hundred. This is the worst performance I’ve ever gotten from my X, albeit in my short history of birding. I would watch the white square turn into a small green box around the birds eye at half press, and then upon a full press, return either a shot that completely missed focus (rare), or just slightly missed focus (the rest of the time). In inspection afterwards, it shows the focus point was most often on birds butts. Jeez. Thanks. I can focus on birds butts just fine without fancy tracking.

I want to give it the benefit of the doubt, and will try again. Some general observations-

-It was dark. I arrived at my location only 20 minutes before sunset, and much shooting was done at dusk.
-I had my teleconverter on. Honestly, I question the quality of my tele (1.4x). My 300 has pulled outrageously detailed shots without it. I’ve gotten very few shots I like with it on however.
-I did find myself adjusting the focus points to a much smaller grid pattern than what I usually used. It gave me a fighting chance to get the bird I wanted it to focus on, when I was dealing with a whole ton of birds.
-It did seem easier to track BIF. Albeit it still returned a somewhat out of focus shot.
-Bird AF seemed to track aircraft great (still not in perfect focus though). I wonder if aircraft AF works better for birds then bird AF?

Overall, it stunk though. I will try again in better light, and without my teleconverter on. If I leave without a single shot in critical focus again, I’m done with this “novelty”.

Just my two cents after my first go with it.

In case you have not watched this one from "Mirror Lessens - Mathieu Gasquet"
See video below when bird detect used with 150-400, better without it

Subscribe to see EXIF info for this image (if available)

 

[Mountain_Man_79]

In case you have not watched this one from "Mirror Lessens - Mathieu Gasquet"
See video below when bird detect used with 150-400, better without it
View attachment 867637

I have seen his review. He still got 68% perfectly sharp. I got 0% perfectly sharp. I would say his 86% acceptably sharp is probably similar to what I got. So not sure what’s going on for me right now...

 

[Bengeo]

-I had my teleconverter on. Honestly, I question the quality of my tele (1.4x). My 300 has pulled outrageously detailed shots without it. I’ve gotten very few shots I like with it on however.

Check for front or back focus with the converter. Mine needs +5 adjustment and that makes all the difference.

 

[Gy Rob]

I have seen his review. He still got 68% perfectly sharp. I got 0% perfectly sharp. I would say his 86% acceptably sharp is probably similar to what I got. So not sure what’s going on for me right now...

It's not as good as I hoped but I do get a lot of sharp shot's although they do still need sharpening up a bit to make them Sharp sharp so to speak . I did give up on it but decided to keep trying.
As long as I see and get on to the bird early I get around 30 sharp out of 40 on gulls and pidion in flight shots .
This is in good light my setting are 1/3200 sec f6.3 iso 500 using the 100/400 Oly either a block of 25 or all points c-af + tracking and bbf .
Sensitivity does not work when tracking is used so you can ignore that .

Rob.
PS I have in camera sharpening on +1 and contrast - 1.

 

[Gy Rob]

this is FF out of camera . no PP
https://flic.kr/p/2kqzGx4 https://flic.kr/p/2kqzhne

 

[Mountain_Man_79]

Sensitivity does not work when tracking is used so you can ignore that .

Are you certain about that? It was mentioned directly in the video posted above. Prior to bird AF I used CAF+Tracking and had a sensitivity set to +1. I always had an issue if I took a burst of say 10 shots, where some photos within the burst would be out of focus. He addresses that specifically in the video, and I have since turned it back to 0. That issue has not reared its head since. Now my burst of 10 are all out of focus ?

 

[Mountain_Man_79]

Check for front or back focus with the converter. Mine needs +5 adjustment and that makes all the difference.

This I may need someone to walk me through or point me in the right direction. I assume you‘re referring to the micro adjustment feature? I’ve always been to scared to touch it, as I didn’t want to make something worse.

 

[Gy Rob]

Are you certain about that? It was mentioned directly in the video posted above. Prior to bird AF I used CAF+Tracking and had a sensitivity set to +1. I always had an issue if I took a burst of say 10 shots, where some photos within the burst would be out of focus. He addresses that specifically in the video, and I have since turned it back to 0. That issue has not reared its head since. Now my burst of 10 are all out of focus ?

35 seconds in
http://learnandsupport.getolympus.c...-m1x-menu-settings-c-af-sensitivity-explained

 

[Mountain_Man_79]

35 seconds in
http://learnandsupport.getolympus.c...-m1x-menu-settings-c-af-sensitivity-explained

Whelp, then I’m even more confused about the behavior I’m seeing. Super!

 

[Gy Rob]

I do use release priority, over all I found it better than Focus priority even though this sounds wrong .
It seems to me that with the EM1X and bird AI you really have to work at it to see what works for you, I keep at it as I want the new 150/400 so if I can get my 100/400 to give 70% every time then the new lens should give around 85 % that would be great I am surprised Mathieu Gasquet did not get more sharp shots but he did not have the lens long enough really.
My Sony a9MKII just seems to know what you want and rarely lets you down but you have to pay a lot more for a long lens and have the weight to contend with .

Rob.

 

[Bengeo]

This I may need someone to walk me through or point me in the right direction. I assume you‘re referring to the micro adjustment feature? I’ve always been to scared to touch it, as I didn’t want to make something worse.

Lots of info in this thread: https://www.mu-43.com/threads/em1-micro-focus-adjustment-why-and-how-to-perform.95155/

As a quick test put 3 bottles close together, in a diagonal line. Put them at a reasonable distance away. Focus on the centre one and take a few images using C-AF and see which bottle is the sharpest.
If the nearest one is sharpest then it is front focusing. If it's the back one then it is back focusing. Adjust the microadjust value by PLUS for front focus (or MINUS for back focus) and then it is trial and error until you get results you are happy with. You can easily set it to 0 again if you are not happy with your changes.

If you save a setting it will only apply to that lens / converter combination. If you use the lens on its own that setting will be switched off. If you want to use the converter on another lens then you would have to adjust again for that lens.

 

[Mountain_Man_79]

Lots of info in this thread: https://www.mu-43.com/threads/em1-micro-focus-adjustment-why-and-how-to-perform.95155/

As a quick test put 3 bottles close together, in a diagonal line. Put them at a reasonable distance away. Focus on the centre one and take a few images using C-AF and see which bottle is the sharpest.
If the nearest one is sharpest then it is front focusing. If it's the back one then it is back focusing. Adjust the microadjust value by PLUS for front focus (or MINUS for back focus) and then it is trial and error until you get results you are happy with. You can easily set it to 0 again if you are not happy with your changes.

If you save a setting it will only apply to that lens / converter combination. If you use the lens on its own that setting will be switched off. If you want to use the converter on another lens then you would have to adjust again for that lens.

Thanks for explaining that for dummies. Thats actually quite helpful.

 

[MetilHed]

I wonder what the keeper rate is for people who didn't normally get a lot of good BIF shots before the bird AI vs. after.

If I could ever find any birds when I go out . . .

 

[Mike.K]

So I finally got an outing to try the bird AF. Not A SINGLE shot was in perfect focus out of several hundred. This is the worst performance I’ve ever gotten from my X, albeit in my short history of birding. I would watch the white square turn into a small green box around the birds eye at half press, and then upon a full press, return either a shot that completely missed focus (rare), or just slightly missed focus (the rest of the time). In inspection afterwards, it shows the focus point was most often on birds butts. Jeez. Thanks. I can focus on birds butts just fine without fancy tracking.

I want to give it the benefit of the doubt, and will try again. Some general observations-

-It was dark. I arrived at my location only 20 minutes before sunset, and much shooting was done at dusk.
-I had my teleconverter on. Honestly, I question the quality of my tele (1.4x). My 300 has pulled outrageously detailed shots without it. I’ve gotten very few shots I like with it on however.
-I did find myself adjusting the focus points to a much smaller grid pattern than what I usually used. It gave me a fighting chance to get the bird I wanted it to focus on, when I was dealing with a whole ton of birds.
-It did seem easier to track BIF. Albeit it still returned a somewhat out of focus shot.
-Bird AF seemed to track aircraft great (still not in perfect focus though). I wonder if aircraft AF works better for birds then bird AF?

Overall, it stunk though. I will try again in better light, and without my teleconverter on. If I leave without a single shot in critical focus again, I’m done with this “novelty”.

Just my two cents after my first go with it.

The part of your experience that stands out to me was "It was dark. I arrived at my location only 20 minutes before sunset, and much shooting was done at dusk."
I had problems shooting motorsport in daylight and delved deeply into the menu to try to solve the problem. My testing was with the E-M1ii and 100-400 Pany lens at 400mm and f6.3. I found the biggest menu setting to affect AF in dim light was setting the EVF framerate to fast instead of normal prevented AF locking on to the target and reduced the framerate. At times it is impossible to actually see the target, remember this is at f6.3. Setting normal allowed the EVF to show a clear image and slowly focus, this in very poor light, as light improved the AF became faster. I found in various low lighting conditions during the day (not bright sunshine) the fast EVF framerate would reduce AF accuracy. I do have a EM1X but unfortunately there is no sport available to shoot to see how my revised settings affect my shooting. I don't shot BIF so I am not telling anyone my findings are correct, but you may find it something to try out to eliminate as a possible problem.

 

[Gy Rob]

fast EVF framerate would reduce AF accuracy .

Surely this has nothing to do with AF accuracy Mike it's just the image in the EVF .

Rob.

 

[JonSnih]

Are you certain about that? It was mentioned directly in the video posted above. Prior to bird AF I used CAF+Tracking and had a sensitivity set to +1. I always had an issue if I took a burst of say 10 shots, where some photos within the burst would be out of focus. He addresses that specifically in the video, and I have since turned it back to 0. That issue has not reared its head since. Now my burst of 10 are all out of focus ?

AF-C Sensitivity: -2 and few points are bellow, the tutorial:

I found the biggest menu setting to affect AF in dim light was setting the EVF framerate to fast instead of normal prevented AF locking on to the target and reduced the framerate.

I thought that EVF set to high frame has a negative impact only on max FPS. In other words you cannot achieve 18 FPS with this setting. Also LOW ISO processing should be set to Drive priority instead of Detail priority [Menu >> Cog >> E1]. In some cases it is wise to disable Noise reduction [E1]. And the real dealbreaker is if an SD card with low write rate is used.

 

[Mountain_Man_79]

AF-C Sensitivity: -2 and few points are bellow, the tutorial:

So now we have two videos that go directly against the official Olympus video in regards to sensitivity. Curious.

His suggestion to have all AF points turned on I have to strongly contest. I had a custom grid about 3 tall and 7 wide (21 points) that I had to turn down to a 5 point center grid. At least when there were dozens of birds, with the larger AF grid the decision the camera made on which bird to focus was too unpredictable. The smaller grid assured the bird closest to the grid was focused on. The smaller grid did not seem to affect it’s ability to identify birds with white boxes.

 

[Mountain_Man_79]

Oh, and not sure if this has happened to anyone else after the latest firmware update, but I just realized my copyright/author exif info was erased when the update was performed. I’ve not experienced that before in other updates to any Olympus camera.

Edit: let me refine that - The copyright settings were in fact maintained. DxO however no longer recognizes that portion of the exif info, whereas it is recognized on my 5ii. So that’s odd.