Male house finch. Beautiful picture, and yeah... it's hard to keep subject where you want. Do you use continuous autofocus?

thanks for the ID...need to read up on my birding, they are wonderful to watch. I was in live focus mode when I should have been in AI. but I was actually waiting for a hummingbird at a feeder and had a fixed point ready so when he came in range I snapped. he didn't show, then this guy was there so I slewed and shot... need a longer lens for birding, they don't like me that close.

Lucky for you! :) And so you know, you don't need anywhere close to 1/8000 shutter speed to freeze a hummingbird's wings. I've done it at 1/1600. Try a lower shutter speed, and then you won't have to raise your ISO so high. Just a suggestion. But still... I love the picture.

no but it's still cool to have frame times of 125 microseconds. and iso 800 is still pretty quiet. it's amazingly quiet at 3200. I have the a version so it's does astrophotos with an iso of 28,000. does get noisy then, but I can post process stacks with dark frame subtraction and other tricks.
I also need to do speed events, like water splash, bursting baloons...that sort of thing.

Awesome shot! I love how you can see the feather arrangement so well!

I know, it's just as 'he' is pushing off so it's full flaps as it were. so the 6fps and 8000th sec shutter really catches it.

Dang, I'm impressed! It's really hard to get that type of shot, I've tried many times.

as I like to say, serendipity is the friend of the incompetent!