The R6 for Wildlife Photography

It’s not often I buy a camera brand new and that’s just recently been release, but the R6 was an exception. I’m not the kind of person who needs to buy the latest camera because it’s ‘the latest’ and for the most part I was happy with my 80D which was 4 years old at the time.  There was, however, a few niggly things I was finding a little frustrating. Focusing for birds in flight wasn’t anything to write home about and the shutter sound was very audible, even on ‘silent’.

I like to photography in particularly mammals which tend to have good hearing and the last straw came when on two occasions the animal was spooked my the shutter sound and ran off.  Come along the release of the R5 and R6.  Reading the specs I could see a number of advantages and improvements.

Compatibility

I did have to consider this long and hard as most of my lenses were quite old, especially my long lenses.  Canon has a compatibility chart showing which lenses officially work with the R6 an R5 which I was worried about as only one of my lenses was on it.  Closer reading and it just meant that these lenses worked at the cameras full potential or close to.  For my interest, I wouldn’t get the full 12 fps rate.

Next, the adaptor.  I thought this must slow down the performance.  All the research suggest not at all but in fact, your lens will worker better.

R6 or R5

Ok, I’ll get this out of the way at the beginning.  I choose the R6 for some very good reasons from my point of view which I’ll list below.

• Price: The R6 is already an expensive camera at £2,599.00, but at the time of writing this the R5 was £4,299.00.  A price difference of £1,700.  Once you factor in the need of an adaptor (£199), a CF Express card (around £169 for a cheap 64GB), you will want the battery grip despite being over priced (around £429 give or take) and although it does take your older batteries, I would highly recommend the newer, high capacity one (£114).  Add that to cost and that’s another £911.  You may not need or want all of these additions, but the chances are you will want most.

Just to note that since buying the R6, I have brought the adaptor, two additional fast SD cards, a battery grip, additional battery and a used RF25-105mm f4 lens, still for less than the price of the R5 alone.

• Sensor: Now, nobody is going to chose a 20MB sensor over a 45MB sensor, but for me 20MB was ample for my needs. Reading through the forums on the internet and you would think you must have 45MB so that you can crop!  If you need to crop by any large amount then I would suggest your photography/field technique is lacking.  Look at images posted on image sharing sites and the highly cropped images stand out and look like they’ve been cropped.  Cropping an image by any large amount will also emphasise a lower quality lens, atmospheric conditions, camera shake, noise, etc.  If your lens can’t handle the megapixels, then you’re basically throwing away many of those 45MB.

• File size: For me, taking wildlife images, a 45MB sensor and the file sizes it creates is a real disadvantage.  You can take an awful lot of images with a camera that has such a high frame rate.  You then need to upload them, so needing a fast card, view and process them, so needing a good computer, then store them, so needing the storage space.  For this, all would have added to the likely overall cost.  If this camera was just for landscape work were I take far fewer images, then file sizes this large would not be so bad.

• Noise: This was a factor at first as I shoot a lot in low light, but I don’t think there’s a great difference between the two cameras until you start shooting a much higher ISO’s.

•  Battery Life: The battery has a slight benefit in battery life but not by any meaningful amount.

 

The R5 has some advantages such as additional video options (not a factor for me), a slightly better screen and EVF and the top LCD which is perhaps the only thing I would have liked.

In the Field

This is ultimately where it counts.  Out of all the camera upgrades I have done over the years, this has had the most impact and has made a massive difference to what and how I shoot.

Focusing

This has been the most outstanding and immediate aspect of this camera.  Every year during the summer, the Tyne Bridge in Newcastle is the home to a nesting colony of Kittiwakes which makes for a great opportunity to photograph birds in flight.  For a number of years I’ve gone here with different cameras – the 80D the 1DmkIII with very mixed results.  The birds fly through some changing and busy background and are constantly changing direction.  The R6 had no problems locking onto the birds.

Below is a series of images taken with the Canon 400mm f5.6 lens, showing the typical backgrounds that in prior years, with the same lens, caused misfocusing.

 

       

 

Animal Eye Tracking

This alone makes the R6 and R5 stand out.  It’s simply outstanding.  Once you latch onto an animal with it, it will just lock on and keep it in focus.  I have my camera set up to have two back button focusing.  One for the normal single point and the other for animal eye focusing.  If the eye focusing doesn’t immediately or struggles to pick up the animal then the single point will initiate or help it.  Normally it will pick up the eye.  If it can’t find that, it will find the head and if it can’t find that, the body.  Most of the time it will succeed but it isn’t perfect.

    

Using it with a x1.4 converter

The above were taken with a x1.4 converter on the lens (Canon MkII).  There seemed to be little difference in focusing speed.  I’ve also used it with a 3rd party lens and converter (Sigma 500mm f4.5 & x1.4 Teleplus Pro 300) which also gave me fast, if not as good as the native version.  Below is a series of images of a Brown Hare coming towards me.  It wasn’t able to get all images in focus, but it was as much to being unprepared for this event which also meant I was shooting at around 1/400s.  Not ideal for a fast moving animal.  No sharpening or noise reduction or cropping, just a bit of exposure adjustments.

 

 

 

     

The first one is slightly out of focus, maybe partially down to the slow shutter speed.  The Hare continued towards me until it was too close to focus.  I’ve no doubt my old camera combined with this lens and converter, would have misfocused most of these.  This series of images brings me onto the next subject.

Shutter Frame Rate

Earlier on I mentioned the frame rate with older lenses.  Using the mechanical shutter, I’m getting around 7-8 frames per second, which may not seem much by todays standards but it’s fast enough for most of my needs and if I need it faster I can switch to electronic where I’ll get the full 20.  I believe if you use the latest EF lenses you’ll get around 9-12 fps and obviously with the new RF, the full 12.

Rolling Shutter

This is something to be aware of if using the electronic shutter.  Not really an issue for me as I wanted the electronic shutter for it’s silence and will probably not be in a position where it’s going to distort an image.  Below is an example where it can effect your image.

     

Image Quality

Now comes the biggest issue people seem to have about this camera and that’s the 20 megapixel sensor.  I’ve already shared my feelings about a larger sensor size, but what about this one?

The first two images below are straight out of the camera and just converted from RAW, the second being a 100% enlargement of the birds head.  There’s plenty of detail there and having used the Canon 6D for a number of years, also a 20MB sensor, this one feels much cleaner and sharper.

 

 

My style of photography means I rarely end up cropping to any extent, usually only for aesthetics.  I’ll situate myself close enough to get an image that fills as much as the frame as possible and if not, I’ll make the best of the surroundings to make it part of the image.

 

The other argument is some need to print to a massive size.  There’s plenty of websites, books and YouTube videos that explain how we perceive large images, so I won’t go into that, needless to say, I’m not convinced of this reasoning either.

 

If you really need to enlarge or crop then I would highly recommend software such as Gigapixel A1.  Below is the same image again but then cropped using Gigapixel A1 and resized back to it’s original resolution of 5472 px by 3648 px.

 

 

 

Noise

Another reason for getting the R6 was better noise at high ISO’s but I wasn’t expecting just how good it was going to be.  Previously I topped my ISO at 6400 and even then used it sparingly.  Now I have it at 25600, though again sparingly but have no hesitation to go up 12800.  The first image below is at 20000 and with some noise reduction, whilst the second is at 25600, taken around 20 minutes before sunrise.

Thought it might be an interesting comparison to see how far camera sensor technology has come over the year.  The first image below was shot on my old 30D at 3200 ISO.  The second with the R6 at 12800 ISO.  Neither processed.

Battery Life and the Battery Grip

If like me and you’ve come straight from a DSLR, then the rated battery life of 360 shots is a bit of a worry.  I have to admit when I first went out with this camera, it felt much less and it started to concern me.  However, if you listen to others who have this camera, most are saying they are getting much more and I’ve since looked at advice on how to extend my battery life.  Soon I was getting a lot more, to the point I would carry a spare but not worry too much about it. 

Since then I’ve added the battery grip – admittedly over priced – but this did come with the offer of a free battery (the new LP-E6NH).  This now gets me through a whole day’s shooting.  The grip also helps with the balance of a long lens and just makes the camera a bit more ergonomically comfortable if a little heavier.

The EVF

I wasn't sure what to expect with the camera's EVF having never seen through one before, but I was pleasently surprised.  You can set it up in a number of ways including what you see is what you're image will look like or you can have it so that what you're seeing is how it currently looks.  Having the former means you can get the exposure correct up front.

It has an OLED EVF with around 3.69 million dots and a 119.88 fps refresh rate.  This can be reduced to save batteries but I've kept it on it's hight setting.  Since I shoot a lot in low light, having it set up so that what I see is the same as my exposure means it looks bright when my DSLR would look dim.

Buffering

I've been using ScanDisk Extreme Pro UHS-1 cards, so not the fastest but I've yet to experience reaching a buffer image, even shooting at 20 frames per second.  Having said that, I think the longest I've shot is around 3 seconds but I've found I can still take more straight after without delay.

Conclusion

I've had this camera for nearly a year now and haven't managed to shoot in every kind of situation or subject that I have using my previous DSLR, but I have covered most.  This has been the biggest and most notible upgrade of any camera I've made.  The biggest improvements for me for my wildlife photography have been the focus speed/eye tracking, lower noise and silent shutter.  I know without doubt I have got images I couldn't have on my pervious cameras.

 A Few Question Marks

There has been some negatives but most have been overcome, but will go through them here.  Megapixels.  I have said 20 is enought for my needs but there is that nagging psychological 'if only it had a few more'.  I think it's imprinted on digital photographers, but honestly, it hasn't been an issue.  I like to get as close to my subject as possible - it's part of the challange of wildlife photography.  If you have to crop heavily on a regular basis, there's something wrong with your fieldcraft.

I do miss not having a top LCD screen but it's something you adapt to.

View finder lag.  You can get this when shooting a fast moving image going across you.  It makes it a little more difficult to keep the subject in the view finder, however, you get used to this and compensate for it and now I don't realy think about it.

Battery life if not what I'm used to and at first was shocked how bad it seemed to be.  But a lot of research and delving into the settings along with a battery grip with the newer batteries, I no longer find this an issue.  It's something you just have to be aware of and I always take a spare set of batteries with me.

Electronics.  The more relient on electronics the more that can go wrong.  I've had one situation where the camera 'died' on my at the worst possible time.  After some researching it may have been down to the cards I was using and since doing a regular low level format on them, it hasn't happened again.

Any disadvantages are outweighed by the massive amout of advantages, to the point now where I would be hard pressed to go back to a DSLR, at least for my wildlife.

EF Lenses I've sucessfully used with no issues:

Canon 500mm f4 Mk1

Sigma 500mm f4.5

Canon 400mm f5.6

Canon 300mm f4

Canon 17-40mm f4

Samyang 14mm f2.8 (manual version)

Canon 1.4x II & Teleplus Pro 300 1.4x Extenders (the latter not working on the Canon 500mm)

The only lens I had some issues with but still works, is the Sigma 105mm f2.8 Macro (non IS version)

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High and Low

My success in capturing wildlife on camera has been as unpredictable as the weather so far this year!  Hopefully things will start to improve – on both accounts.  In the meantime, here’s a few from recent months.

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At this time of year… past and present

I find it interesting to look back at previous years at the same time, to see what was about and what I was photographing at any one particular time.  It’s not only a record of what is about at any particular time of year, but how much as time goes by, nature changes as does my own ability to photograph it.  Every now and then I like to go back through my photographs and delete older ones as I improve, though I still like to keep some of the older ones just as a record of the past.  This collection goes back to 2006 when I moved into digital photography and I’ve tried to put together a couple of images from each of those past years at the same time of the year. At the beginning of June should be a busy time – life is in full swing with animals bringing up offspring and plants in full growth – but I was surprised to find it hasn’t always the most productive time for me.   Present Most activity, as expected, seems to involve parents bringing up their young, birds sing loudly proclaiming their territory and insects are everywhere. Some of the images I achieved last year couldn’t be replicated.  It wasn’t as simple as going to the same place around the same time and see the same bird or animal performing the same behaviour and just goes to show nature is constantly changing.

2013 Much the same as this year and, although my 500mm lens was being repaired, I don’t think it meant any missed opportunities as it seemed quite quiet considered the expected activity around.  The Reed Bunting encounter was perfect for me as I was able to get close without it being to bothered by my presence.  Mallards and Geese were a plenty with their young and again very approachable with just a 400mm lens.

2012 I could find very little in the way of photographs taken this year, probably more down to my ability to get out as anything.  Warblers were the theme of the day.

2011 Skylarks were in their numbers in the same place where today, they’ve been replaced by Reed Buntings.  Same activity though, busy feeding their young.  New camera this year – the Canon Mark III

2010 The locations where I saw the birds in 2010, no longer have them in the same numbers or in the case of the Coots, they have gone completely due to dog owner irresponsibility at the small lake.  The Sand Martins are there but in much smaller numbers, more down to the naturally changing landscapes of their nesting sites where the sand banks have eroded making a less than ideal nesting location.  New lens this year, the Sigma 500mm taking over most of my wildlife photography though the Canon 400mm was still getting used as shown by the Sand Martin image below.

2009 Not sure what happened this year, but I couldn’t find any images at all for June so just a Kingfisher from the following month.  This year also saw my taking the plunge into getting a ‘professional’ camera, the Canon Mk IIn.  This felt so much better to use than the 30D I was using and image quality also seemed an improvement.

2008 Another slow time of year for 2008 and very few images to show for it, in fact this is the only wildlife one I could find.

2007 To big steps in my photography this year.  The purchase of the 30D but mostly by getting the Canon 500mm f5.6.  What a difference that made both quality of images but also being able to get much closer to the wildlife, though the somewhat fierce looking Fox below was an exception in achieving that!  I also replaced the kit lens with the Canon 17-40 mm lens also making a big difference to my landscapes.

2006 My reintroduction into photography and in this case, digital was through a Canon 350D, a Tamron 70-300mm lens and the standard ‘kit lens’.  The Tamron lens was awful – very slow and soft, the kit lens was ok but you had to use it in the right way, but I loved the 350D.  It gave me a love of photography all over again.  Prior to this my camera kit consisted of a couple of Olympus cameras and a statement of lenses, the longest being a 300mm mirror lens -  not recommended for wildlife unless you live in a very sunny place!

I like to think during these years, my photography has improved as certainly my knowledge of wildlife and nature has.  I feel my photography has had an impact too through various introductions – a professional body camera, the 400mm then 500mm lens. Also interesting to see the Damselflies differences.  The one taken in 2006 using the Tamron zoom and very soft in quality and the most recently taken one using the Sigma 105mm lens, technically much better.

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A mixed bag for a mixed day

A day that promised lots of sunshine, took up inland along the Tyne this weekend.  Between Newburn and Wylam is an area I will visit between May and August because of the Sand Martins that nest along some of the banks.  There are also a number of ponds dotted around the area, of which one of them I stopped off at.  What caught my eye was the colour and pattern the reeds were creating at the back of parts of this particular pond – a nice backdrop for a picture of a bird I thought.  Only trouble was, it wasn’t exactly a hive of activity and there was only two sections that stood out and had a clear view of, so I decided to get my camera out at a low view point and wait. The only obvious birds around were a nesting pair of Swans, two pairs of Moorhens and a Mallard family.  At first, apart from the Swan, the others were wary of my presence and stayed at the far back in the reeds.  After about half an hour, they started to swim around, cautiously at first, but eventually ignoring me.  The only trouble was none were going past either of the two ‘ideal’ locations.  It was an hour before the Moorhens started to go past the furthest of these spots though moving quickly making it difficult to get a good picture, especially due to the very low angle (I was lying down flat) and it was hard to see through the view finder correctly, keep a straight horizon and focus accurately.

After a while, it became obvious as to why the Moorhens were moving quickly back and forth past this spot, it must have been the territorial boundary between the two pairs of birds and a fight broke out, with eventually all four birds involved.  Unfortunately for me, as had been concentrating on photographing a single bird at distance and had just attached my converter on the lens to give me a bit more reach but a slower focusing speed, a narrower depth of field and slower shutter speed.  The action was over in a flash, sweeping from right to left and with my camera set on a slow frame rate and the other disadvantages, I wasn’t able to get a decent image.

A few minutes later, everything was back to normal,  a Swan swam past as did a Mallard family and the Moorhens had withdrawn to their respective parts of the pond.  By this time I was back down to a bare 500mm lens, which was fortunately as, while positioning the lens on an ideal spot of reed for what I was expecting a Mallard to swim past, instead he took off and all the disadvantages I had previously had with the Moorhens were gone and managed to get a series of decent image of the bird as it went past.

Of course the main purpose of the trip, was to check on the the Sand Martins this year.  I’ve been watching them for a number of years and recently they had moved further up from their previous nest site, but, unfortunately, due to the fewer nesting opportunities there has, correspondently, been fewer Sand Martins.  The image below shows the bank where they used to nest.  It’s changed.  There has been no obvious erosion from the river or from the top, but the bank is not as steep has more of a slope and so grass has managed to get a better hold, making it easier for predators to access the nests within the bank.  Previous examples of my successes here at this same spot (and a predator attack) in the past when the birds were successfully nesting here in large numbers. There was then today very few Sand Martins compared to others seen at the same spot at the same time of year on this day.  It could still be early and it still seems quite cool, but I’m guessing the nesting area will have moved elsewhere for the most part.

Panoramic view point of the same spot

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