K-H, love the shots, the 70-300 seems to be doing a marvelous job, I really like the way it locks on to the eye of the bird. Did you shoot with wide area AF in AF-C mode or did you do a flexible spot?
I wonder if anybody knows how the PDAF algorithm works on the Sony system. I tried to look it up but there is not much information, even the manual does not describe it fully.
What I'd like to do is set up my A-9 (the others are too slow for this) with a wide angle lens, say the 24-70 at 24mm or 35mm and with a remote control (have got that one figured, the Pocket Wizards work really well) to trip the shutter as needed. My intent is to keep the camera in a location where the animals are likely to be active and to catch them as they come closer or as I had mentioned previously, put my camera on an inverted monopod at ground level and shoot from that perspective.
The idea is to get the animal that is closest to the camera in focus, using a wide aperture (low light plus OOF background). I tried using the iPhone smart control, but that does not allow me to pick a focus point on the screen with the A9. With the others (A7Rii and Rx1R2), it does, but I can only shoot one image at a time and the camera then takes a few seconds to write it to the card, will not allow me to shoot until that is done, so won't work. I tried everything but no go. The only way to do this would be to have the camera tethered to a computer via cables, running LR or other tethering software which cannot work in the field for me.
So the only option is to set up the wide angle lens and shoot blind, using the PW to trigger AF and shutter release remotely.
My questions then are:
1. Does the PDAF in AF-C mode with focus area set as 'wide', focus on the object closest to the camera especially towards the center of the frame?
2. Does it focus preferentially on whatever is moving in the field - thus allowing me to focus on the animal instead of the bush.
3. Any possibility of using eye-AF with animals? I know most people claim this does not work.
I tested this by walking around in front of the camera setup as above, using the PW to trigger the system. It does appear that it focuses on the 'bigger' object, i.e. me instead of the flower pots on the ground, and does get it right most of the time. I wonder how it would behave if say two people walked towards the camera but at different distance from it, just off-center. My guess is it would focus on the closer one since it would be seen as bigger and thus the main subject of the image.
Any ideas?