Originally posted by gatorguy The biggest issue with your current setup is your *300 lens seems to need better fine focus adjustment. It's a great lens for birding, and especially so with the 1.4TC, proven out in the field.
But in any event, as you've decided to try the Nikon route I think the D500 will be the wise choice from that brand for your birding. It's a fine selection. You'll be better off using the K1 as a landscape or slower-paced camera where it is a better all-arounder than the D500, but that Nikon is very well-regarded for action. I would take Ian's advice on the lens to pair it with, he's very knowledgeable on the glass available for it.
I can try to readjust the fine AF, though I did test with all possible values and the extreme end at -10 did the best. I didn't use the "high contrast subject and live view technique" so I'm going to look at that too.
The K1 ii's imaging capability is simply amazing, it's just let down by speed (though as already mentioned previously that the camera was never intended to be a high performance camera for action photography.) I also love the interface too, with the dedicated dials and no need to use the menu system for most things.
Partly my issues might stem from the 300mm not being long enough for the AF to get a good lock. Yep a TC may help indeed...
Earlier, two squirrels were playing around in the backyard so I got some more shots in. Some are fine and some are a little out. The 4.4fps (as stated in the manual unless I misunderstood) burst speed in large RAW format didn't keep up with their jumping around and backflips etc... the 12fps of the K3 iii would have really been a great addition here but my concern with the K3 iii really is how good is the AF and is frame buffer size competitive with the Nikon D500.
The Nikon system also offers more variety of lenses and I have an old 1980s 50mm that came together with the FM camera that my folks bought when I was just hatched.
Weighing up the Pros and Cons, I think the D500 will be the better option in the long run.
I even checked out the Z6 ii which actually has two processors instead of a single one. The limitation with the mirrorless system seems to be in 3D tracking and not much variety of lenses; additionally if used with the DSLR lens lineup the performance drops dramatically according to the sources that I've been reading. Otherwise it also would have been a strong contender.
---------- Post added 05-22-22 at 04:23 AM ----------
Here's another test shot. I increased the AF fine tune from -10 to -5.
This should have been a simple enough image for the AF to lock on to:
_IMG3541.jpg - Google Drive
shutter was 1/1000 and f/22 with auto iso set to 51200 and AF points where set to full 33 Auto. My intention to use f/22 was to give me a larger DoF for the test.
High ISO aside, to me that looks blurred and no where near as sharp as what Ian is presenting. Maybe -10 setting isn't enough for the AF fine tune??
I even tried against an unpainted brick wall. First manually focus in live view with x16 magnification. Read where the distance gauge on the lense is. Then use AF in Auto 33 point mode with different fine tune settings. The lighting is fairly consistent right now, and AF fluctuated quite a bit. Camera is locked on a solid tripod too and I even used the 2 second shutter release delay to fend off any vibrations.
What I did find is that if I repeatedly press the shutter halfway to readjust the focus, eventually after a few attempts it will get there but still a little bit too much hit and miss.
I guess if the focus would just nail it each time, things wouldn't be so bad. Many other K1 ii users have also reported the hit and miss variation in frames which I asked about specifically in the K1 part of the forum.