Canadian Cardinal

Hi Lindy
I also shoot with a D300, May i ask why F14 or is that a typo, I am wondering as you say there is no compensation was the image very dark and needed to be lightened in photoshop, There is snow on the ground so compensation would be needed, In this situation i spot meter off of the snow and add 2 stops so +2 and as long as the bird is in the same light as the snow you metered off of you will get a good exposure, Did your histogram look good or was it way to the left
Hope this helps

Dave

I really don't think it's a focusing issue. May just be the 1/60 exposure is just too slow-even on a tripod unless you used a cable release. And you can't trust the bird, or wind, not to move. The male cardinal is a tough focus problem anyway-red is harder than it seems it should be. You also don't comment on post-processing procedures. Sharpening, unsharp mask etc. This could probably be sharpened at 100-125% radius .2 or even .3 for your personal use and then use the unsharp mask before posting to the net.

Good questions Dave: I had to look back at the exif - the bird is cropped about 70% - in the original the snow is blown out. I used f14 because I wanted more detail around the bird in the trees etc. You are right, the histogram is to the left. I will definitely try it with your metering tricks. I did not alter the image except to crop it down to this size. To be honest, I don't know enough about Lightroom or CS3 to alter images well.

I used to have a Nikon 300 f4, it was wicked sharp. Have you tried shooting some test subjects with everything locked down and then view the results at 100%. I'm not into pixel peeping, but a systematic approach is about the only way to nail down the culprit. 1/60 will require flawless technique. The crumy ball head (brand name withheld) I used, back in the day, was a source of a lot of my unsharp photos.

I'm in agreement with others here, Lindy: I think that the low exposure time is your main culprit. The tripod takes care of your camera motion but that little bird doesn't have to move much to spoil your detail.

Lindy

I would not have used f14 for the aperture in this, perhaps f8 to f9, that would have given you more shutter speed and may have reduced the softness you see here. A tiny breeze at 1/60 can cause some motion blur.

I like the pose of the cardinal, it seems relaxed but alert too.