I took this shot of a red fox during one of my winter wildlife workshops in Montana. Even though this is in captivity, foxes are challenging to shoot because they are so active, and so fast, it seems they never stop moving. If they give you a pose for a half second, that's a lot. Keeping the animal in focus is the real problem. I use a center cluster of 9 focus points as well as AI servo (continuous autofocus). I also use shutter speeds no slower than 1/640th of a second to make sure I freeze the movement. I took this with my first digital camera, the Canon 1Ds Mark II, and back in 2006 when this was taken, noise was a serious issue. With this $8000 camera, 1600 ISO had way too much noise, and 3200 ISO was unusable. That's why I shot this with 100 ISO. The whiteness of the snow provided enough bounce light for the 1/640th shutter with an f/5.0 aperture. Today, with my 1Dx Mark II, I feel comfortable using much higher ISO settings, and with incredible Neat Image software to eliminate noise, I don't feel inhibited about using super high shutter speeds and sky-high ISO settings.
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