You seemed to enjoy our last outting with Belle, so here we go again. This time, Uncle Frank and I went birding, in the Baylands Preserve, near Palo Alto, CA, where egrets are plentiful... in the summer time that is. Very few are still around now, and they tend to be inaccessible.
Anyway, we were trying out some new equipment: Uncle Frank and I both tested our new teleconverter, and in my case it was also the first outting with a monopod, to help carry the D70 + 70-200/VR + TC-17EII + SB-800 combo. The monopod is a very welcome help in that regards.
We started off with easy marks: birds resting just a few tens of feet away.
Here is the first shot I fired: 340mm f/5.6, 1/640s ISO250, that's almost wide open, folks (wide open is f/4.8)!
http://proger.smugmug.com/photos/12541081-L.jpg
Then I tried tracking some birds in flight: I had no idea how difficult that is, not being an avid bird amateur. But, I did manage to catch a few that were going straight... while huffing and puffing
340mm, 1/500s, f/11, ISO 200
http://proger.smugmug.com/photos/12541086-L.jpg
Ok, I was also able to get one decent seagull in flight, but the ratio of keepers when trying this is... pretty bad, let's leave it at that!
340mm, 1/320s, f/10, ISO 200
http://proger.smugmug.com/photos/12541092-L.jpg
The light was constantly changing and was quite challenging at times:
340mm, 1/800s, f/9, ISO 200
http://proger.smugmug.com/photos/12541089-L.jpg
The birds were plentiful and quite colorful too. Here are a couple of pheasants, walking by just a few feet from the parking lot!
340mm, 1/100s, f/10, ISO 200
http://proger.smugmug.com/photos/12541093-L.jpg
340mm, 1/500s, f/4.8, ISO 400
http://proger.smugmug.com/photos/12541096-L.jpg
I have to say that is was a real pleasure as always to shoot alongside Uncle Frank.
290mm, 1/500s, f/9, ISO 400
http://proger.smugmug.com/photos/12545297-L.jpg
We both enjoyed our monopod a lot: it is not required to shoot that long with the VR, but it helps carrying the weight tremendously and the VR does not need to work as hard :-) I also realized how difficult avian photography is and why one may always need more reach. However, the 70-200/VR with the 1.7 TC is my limit, even though most captures I made were at the maximum reach of this combo!
The complete gallery is available here: http://proger.smugmug.com/gallery/315118, all images were shot in RAW, post-processed in Capture and finished in Photoshop.
--
Philippe
FCAS Member, CAT and WASS as well...
http://proger.smugmug.com
