Setup Fail

[jstp]

Hi all,

After my success with getting a good photo of a blue damsel fly I thought I would head out again, this time armed with my tripod, and try to get a shot of a red damsel. Well having the tripod was the only right choice I made, for some reason I thought I would change the focus and lighting settings I used yesterday, and boy let me tell you did I get it wrong. There were red damsels in abundance, there was even a stunning orange dragon fly the was kind enough to land right next to me, I was snapping away thinking great, these should look good. I hurry home and upload to my computer only to find that not one of the shots was in sharp focus, I can not crop at all and maintain any sharpness. Man was I miffed and a little annoyed. I went out into the back yard and played with the settings and confirmed that my choices for the conditions were not the wisest.
I took one photo on the walk home that turned out nice and it sums up the way I was feeling, a bit prickly. Just goes to show, just when you think you have a grasp and understanding of what you are doing, and feel a bit confident, whammo, reality check.
Anyways, they say you learn from your mistakes, and boy am I continually learning.

Cheers

Jason

[Donald]

Just goes to show, just when you think you have a grasp and understanding of what you are doing, and feel a bit confident, whammo, reality check.

How true that is. You feel you've got everything under control; you know your equipment so well that it's all now done in automatic and you are concentrating solely on the subject .............. and the you realise you've forgotten one of the basics and screwed the whole lot up.

Ah well, it just reminds .......... until the next time we do it again.

[Geoff F]

It is something which many of us have done at some time, Jason.

I try to stop and check my settings from time to time because what often catches me out is when moving my camera from my carrying backpack, or holster, the adjustment knob on top gets accidentally moved.

Particularly problematic with those 'Wow, look at that' scenes when I'm rushing to snatch a quick shot.

[jstp]

Well I went out again for another try, this time keeping my mistakes in mind. Unfortunately the red damsel fly proved to elusive, they stayed just that bit too far out of range. I did find though that the longer I stayed still the more the dragonflys would investigate and actually hover at a good range allowing me to have a try at them. Patience is the game with these zippy little bugs and just when you have them in frame they zip off......backwards , you can not even predict which way they are going to go. Anyways attached is one that turned out ok given that I shooting hand held, I did have my tripod but laziness got in the way of me setting it up, I may have been a bit overzealous with the sharpening though.

Cheers

J