I have been for the first time in my life to an animal park very close to home...
this is a fantastic place I had never seen before and I definitely have to go back because I couldn't see a third of it...
It is a bit stupid because I have visited lots of zoos and animal parks all over the world and I never took the time to go there...
Back to the subject: D200 autofocus.
Among other things... there was a birds show (very classical, I have seen those in Vancouver, Singapore, ... very similar)
and I tried to catch some flight shots.
My experience is the following:
- sometimes the D200 has problems to follow at all and ends up focusing on the background - all pics unusable
- the closest subject mode doesn't really seem to work for birds flying very fast in your direction.
- the simple (one focus sensor only) modes do not work properly for fast moving targets like birds (probably a "locking" issue)
- group dynamic with continuous AF, and lock on target before the flight started gave me excellent sequences (see hereunder for an example)
- one series was totally wrong - AF completely lost and all pictures overexposed exactly the same way (example below).
This could be related to a shutter/diaphragm lever issue I have had later with the camera.
You can find an excellent document describing the Nikon autofocus system on the Nikonians site; see here
