New Year- Photographs and Thoughts

I have been blogging since October of 2007 and I find it increasingly difficult to make a blog post.  It is not so hard if one puts up a few photographs with minimal commentary--at least if one is having good success with photographic opportunities.  This time of year can be especially difficult in the area where I live as rifle deer season puts the damper on whitetail buck photography.  The countryside is also drab looking when there is no snow on the ground.  I am conflicted about this as I do not like having to deal with snow, but I do like to see and photograph wildlife in it. We have had a bit of snow off and on and I photographed a mature gobbler one morning as he preened and basked in the morning sunlight at the edge of a meadow.

Mature Gobbler Preening: Canon 7D-Canon 600mm F4.0  L IS - ISO 200-1/500 sec. f 5.0

This was a was a welcome change from the usual bare ground, but the snow was gone within a few days.

Distant Whitetails: Canon 5D MK III-Canon 600mm F4.0 L IS - ISO 400-1/1000 sec. f 5.0

It is good to see and photograph deer under any conditions, but photographing them in falling snow is especially rewarding.

Doe in Falling Snow: Canon 7D-Canon 70-200 mm F 2.8  L IS II - ISO 400-1/100 sec. f 4.0

I included an old manure spreader in the background of the photograph shown below to add to the atmosphere, but I am not sure if it is a plus or a minus composition wise.

A Snowy Day: Canon 7D-Canon 17-40mm F4.0  L@40mm - ISO 400-1/80 sec. f 7.1

It should be easier to get good wildlife photographs once the late flintlock & archery deer season is over and wildlife populations calm down a bit, which brings me to a point that I wish to address briefly.

While it is not difficult to make a post such as this one has been so far, it is difficult to write about controversial subjects and one can spend hours or parts of several days in writing a post about this type of subject matter. The problem is that I feel compelled to write about wildlife issues from the perspective of a wildlife photographer as it seems to me that much of the writing done about wildlife issues in the public media is from the perspective of the hunting community.  While it is true that at this point wildlife conservation programs are primarily funded by hunting license dollars, I  think that persons who are interested in wildlife for other reasons should have a voice in wildlife management  and they should be responsible for bearing a fair share of the cost of  wildlife management.

State conservation agencies in general and The Pennsylvania Game Commission in particular, are faced with declining hunter numbers and a  corresponding loss of revenue from license sales, while the legislature steadfastly refuses to give the agency a license increase.  So far the problem has been staved off by funding from timber sales, and Marcellus shale leasing,etc. but this will not carry the load forever.  As a result, there is a frantic effort to attract new hunters and to entice those that have quit hunting back into the fold.  There is a continual clamor for more and longer seasons, special seasons, mentored youth hunts, mentored adult hunts and on and on. At the same time, a substantial-or at least very vocal portion- of the hunting public believes that the whitetail deer population has been decimated by the excessive killing of does and this is the primary reason for the loss of interest in hunting.

This situation provides a fertile field for discussion and I hope to write about some of these issues in the coming year along with the usual photography content.

Originally published at Pennsylvania Wildlife Photographer by Willard  Hill.

Winter Wildlife and The 5D MK III

Late February, some days are relatively mild, making one think of the spring to come, only to be followed by cold, windy periods that make life difficult for wildlife and humans alike. The last few days have been especially brutal, with strong winds and piercing cold. Through it all wildlife must go about the daily struggle of living.

Whitetail Doe in Falling Snow:  Canon 5D MK III-Canon 500mm f4-ISO 640-1/400 sec.  @f4.5

Alert Doe :  Canon 5D MK III-Canon 500mm f4-ISO 1000-1/500 sec.  @f4.5

Many of the bucks have shed their antlers by now, but it is still possible to see a rack buck on occasion. 

Winter Bucks:  Canon 5D MK III-Canon 500mm f4-ISO 1000-1/500 sec.  @f4.5

In this case, it was growing late on a bitter, cold evening and the wind was blowing in strong gusts.  It was so uncomfortable that I  decided to leave before photographic dark, and stashed the cameras and tripods away in the vehicle.  Before leaving, I paused to take a quick look at a camera manual.  When I was done reading, I looked up and was astonished to see a bachelor group  crossing the meadow.  Only one was a rack buck, but there were a few spikes, three-points and  four-points, etc.  The rest had already lost their antlers, but it was easy to tell that they were bucks as the pedicles were visible. The deer hidden behind the rack buck is a button buck that was born  last spring and is seen each day, but the others are not  frequently seen in this area. Bucks are difficult to see at this time of year since many were killed in  the fall hunting season and,the population is at a yearly low.  Most of those that remain are together in bachelor groups. Few live in herds with the does and yearlings. Even though they may feed in the same area at the same time, they are not part of the same herd.  Since there are two to a dozen or more bucks in these bachelor groups, most of the bucks in a large expanse of territory may be together.  As a result, there are a lot of bucks where they are, and very few where they are not.

I was lucky to see the bucks, but putting the equipment away early made the situation very difficult.  There seemed to be no hope of setting the tripod up again without spooking the animals, but a nearby round bale saved the day. I crept to it with the 5K MK III and the 500mm.  This is the type of situation where IS can save the day and it this case it worked reasonably well.  The rack buck in the photo above is sharp at 100% in Photoshop.  The photo below is slightly soft at 100%, which was was caused by a bit of motion blur from camera movement. Regardless of this, it works well for posting on the internet, and looks as though it would make a decent 8x10 print.

Alert Eight-Point Buck:  Canon 5D MK III-Canon 500mm f4-ISO 1000-1/500 sec.  @f4.5

I took several frames, but these were the best of the series. The bucks were about 100 yards away, so the last photo is severely cropped.

5D MK III images do stand up well to cropping, as long as the photo is sharp. It is the best camera by far that I have owned to date, but the same was true of the 7D over the 40D when I made that upgrade, as was the 30D and 40D over the 10D.  At the end of the day though, the fact remains that the best photos taken with the 10Dand the other models as well,  are still quite usable today.

Originally published at Pennsylvania Wildlife Photographer by Willard Hill.

Introducing Dan Gomola

Interest in serious wildlife photography seems to be steadily increasing.  When I first visited Pennsylvania Elk Country, it was very rare to see photographers with professional grade equipment, but now there is a thriving photographic community that gathers on Winslow Hill each year. I always enjoy meeting or corresponding with fellow photographers so it was a pleasure to receive an e-mail from.Dan Gomola, who is an excellent photographer from Western Pennsylvania.  Dan loves to photograph the flora and fauna of Pennsylvania Elk Country, as well as other areas of special interest such as Gettysburg National Military Park, McConnell's Mill, and Moraine State Park.

Dan Gomola

You may see Dan's work by visiting his Website dangomola.com, which  features several photo galleries including Nature and Wildlife, Landscape & Historic, and A Good Day At The Lake, along with video clips of Pennsylvania elk. To view the website click the above link or click  Dan's portrait.

Dan's favorite prime lens is the Canon 300mm F2.8, which he uses with the Canon 1.4XEF III extender, and  Canon 2xEF III extender when the need for more reach arises.

According to Dan, "Many people don't have the opportunity to see wildlife up close.  I've always had a love for animals big and small and like to show that in my photos.  If I can help someone have that same admiration for our wildlife and landscape, it was worth it to me to go out for hours to get that one photo." 

Originally published at Pennsylvania Wildlife Photographer by Willard Hill

2012 In Retrospect-Part 1

Mature Bull Eating Apples

2012 was a challenging and rewarding year.  This marked my 38th year of photographing wildlife,my 21st year of video filming, and the fifth year of publishing the Pennsylvania Wildlife Photographer blog

I was especially pleased to win first place in the Wilderness category of the Pennsylvania Magazine 2012 Photo Contest.  One is only notified if they place or win in the competition--they are not told the official reason why. I do have a good idea why this photograph was selected, however, and will pass those ideas along in hopes of helping other photographers.

First some technical information:  The photo was taken along Winslow Hill Road at 6:06 in the morning of July 14, 201. The lens used was a Canon 300mm f2.8 lens mounted on a Gitzo tripod with Wimberley Head.  The Camera was a Canon 7D, with ISO set at 400.  Exposure was 1/125 sec. f2.8, with the camera being set in manual mode. Evaluative metering mode was used with the reading being taken from the brightest part of the grass beside the elk.  I captured numerous poses that morning, some of which were portraits of the animal in the traditional alert pose, but most of my efforts were focused on capturing him getting apples from the tree.  In many cases he used the tips of his antlers to dislodge them and then ate them once they were on the ground. The photo above yielded the most pleasing composition as he attempted to reach an apple by stretching for it.

This reminds me of a piece of advice that PGC photographer/videographer Hal Korber shared many years ago.  He emphasized that one should try to capture wildlife doing something.  A certain amount of photographs of animals grazing, etc. are fine, but it is the ones that capture the animal doing something dramatic or unusual that are most likely to be successful.

In summary, I think this photograph succeeded because it captures an impressive animal in a beautiful natural setting,  the photo is technically acceptable, and most of all it captures the bull doing something unusual in an attractive way.

Originally published at Pennsylvania Wildlife Photographer by Willard Hill.

Conowingo Dam-Bald Eagle Photography:Canon 7D

Mature Bald Eagle: Canon 7D 500mmF4

On Friday, February 19th, Coy Hill of Country Captures and I traveled to Conowingo Dam northeast of Baltimore, Md. to check out the reports of good Bald Eagle photographic opportunities there.

Conowingo Dam: Canon 30D-17-40mm

Coy Checks Out The 500mmF4-Canon 30D-17-40mm

While this is not the peak season for eagle sightings, we did see at least four different birds. One perched in a tree near a parking area for several hours, and gave several photographers the opportunity to take close-up portrait shots.

Photographing Eagle In Tree: Canon 30D-17-40mm

While I still use the Canon XL-H1 for most of my serious wildlife filming, I find that I am turning more and more to the Canon 7D DSLR for that purpose and I used it extensively on this trip. It does not have the long range ability of the XL-H1, but it does deliver beautiful footage. It is difficult to focus in video mode as one must use the LCD and it is difficult to see plainly in bright sunlight. I recently purchased the "Zacuto Finder" an add-on viewfinder which clips onto the LCD and makes it somewhat like a traditional camcorder viewfinder. This makes the camera much more effective in video mode.

Filming Eagle With Canon 7D: 100-400mm L lens, With Zacuto Finder

I hope to post either some sample clips taken with the 7D or a short film on winter wildlife in the very near future, which will use footage taken entirely with this camera.

For more Camera Critters photographs, Click Here!

"Fred-"Bull 36: Some Thoughts On Wildlife Photography

It seems that one is always looking for that super, award winning shot and may be disappointed with a day afield if such an opportunity does not present itself. I know I am always looking for such photographs and video footage, yet if we concentrate on that to too great of a degree we may miss a certain type of shot that is valuable in its' own way.

Elk In "Natural" Setting: actually part of a reclaimed area

I seldom used to photograph or film the elk in town, except when I wanted footage documenting that situation. I have come to photograph these animals more and more as I find that it documents a different aspect of Pennsylvania's Elk Range, and the town of Benezette in particular. While I ordinarily think of foot trips in the backcountry when visualizing elk photography, this is not what most tourists do. The photographs featured today are actually more representative of what they may encounter-along with roadside encounters on Winslow Hill Road and Route 555.

Low Light Levels and a lot of distracting objects usually define this type of photography. All of the photographs featured today(except for the elk in bright sunlight by the pond) were taken at ISO 1600 with the 70-200mm f2.8 IS,. The highest shutter speed used was 1/60 and the lowest was 1/15. As much as I firmly believe in tripods, I do not usually set one up in town, as I do not wish to create a spectacle, or impede traffic. These were shot out of the vehicle window, resting the rig on the windowsill.

Fred is of course the famous Benezette town bull that I have featured in many posts before. He is a favorite of many Pennsylvania elk watchers and many travel to the area to check on "Freddie".

Fred: 1/15 f2.8

Sometimes it works well to shoot the animal as one finds it, but trying different angles may result in being able to isolate it against a pleasing backdrop. (I am not too fond of the position of the elk in the shot below, but I do like the rustic building as a background)

Fred: 1/15 f2.8

Sometimes the animals are positioned so that one may take a photograph that looks as though it were taken in the wilderness. There were buildings on both sides and objects in front of the animal below, but I was able to get a natural looking portrait by zooming in to 185mm.

Unknown Bull In Town: 1/60 f3.2

Photographers should remember to respect private property and not walk in lawns, or block traffic.

More Spring Turkeys: PA Spring Gobbler Season

At present the mating season of the Eastern Wild Turkey is going full steam ahead and I have been spending most mornings and evenings pursuing the birds with DSLR and Video Camera.

Distant Jakes

I usually see hens or jakes, but the mature gobblers do not always appear. Bird Photography is an added bonus while waiting for them. Recently, I was fortunate to get a decent chance at a male Rufous Sided Eastern Towhee. This bird frequents the woodlands, mostly scratching about in the understory.

Rufous Sided Eastern Towhee

If one is lucky, eventually they get the opportunity at their primary subject, but sometimes the encounters with other species are just as memorable.

Mature Gobbler Guarding His Hens

Wild turkeys are a popular game bird in Pennsylvania. The annual spring gobbler season runs from April 25th through May 25th statewide.

Only turkeys with visible beards are legal. Hunting is by calling only—no stalking. Hunting hours are one-half hour before sunrise until noon. Hunters must be out of the woods by 1 p.m.(Source PGC 2008-09 Hunting Digest)

Hunting pressure can be quite intense in areas open to public hunting and the birds quickly learn that season is in, so they can be extremely difficult to encounter.

I will of course be hunting only with camera, but the arrival of season usually means less photo opportunities.

Published Photograph-Pennsylvania Bull Elk

The 2008 Pennsylvania Game Commission Calendar features photographs by both current and retired employees of the Agency. I have contributed to the calendar for the past several years. This year I was pleased to find that one of my submissions was chosen as the cover photograph for the calendar, along with being the photograph for the month of September.

Bull #35-Canon 10-D: 300mm F4 ISO 100 1/180 f4.5

The photo was taken at 5:58 p.m. on September 20, 2007. It was a warm evening and the elk were somewhat lethargic acting on this occasion. A large herd of cows had just passed through a newly reclaimed strip mine and the bull was following behind. I was standing inside the woods at the edge of the meadow, looking up at the animals. When the bull stopped and looked at me, I pressed the shutter.

This was the great Bull No. 35, which I videotaped for the first time in 1999 or 2000, and photographed for the first time with a DSLR during the rut of 2004. In short, he was in at least his seventh year as a mature, branch antlered bull, and time was running out for both the bull and the Canon 10-D.

The 10-D was replaced with a 40D in early October and by late winter or early spring Bull 35 was found dead near the village of Medix Run. The bull was wearing a radio collar and the biologists noticed that the signal was no longer moving. There was no evidence that he was the victim of poaching. It seems most likely that he was injured at some point during the rut and never recovered, contracted a fatal disease, or perhaps simply died from old age. The latter does not seem too likely, considering how active he was during the rut of 2007.

Whatever the reason, another famous Pennsylvania Bull Elk is gone, but I am glad that many will be able to look at his photograph this year.

Eastern Wild Turkey In Winter:

Capturing The Moment

Eastern Wild Turkey: Canon 40D 500mmF4

In our area, wildlife sightings usually increase toward the end of January as the animals and game birds lose some of their fear of humans since most of the hunting seasons are over.

Food also is harder to come by at this time of year and wildlife spends a greater portion of the day searching for it and they look for it in areas where they are more easily visible.

In this case a small flock of turkeys came into my observation area. One spent ten minutes or so standing on a branch and eating something that was in the tree top. I could not tell what it was eating, but it must have been remnants of seed pods or berries.

I took a large amount of video with the Canon XL-H1 with 35-350mm lens. At one point I left it run unattended and took a series of shots with the 500mm and 40D which was mounted on a tripod and standing beside the camcorder. As luck would have it, I happened to capture the moment that the turkey jumped for the ground.

It then joined other birds in feeding on weed seeds.

Pennsylvania Game Commission: Wildlife Documentaries

Pennsylvania's Wildlife Documentary Series

and

PENNSYLVANIA ELK: Reclaiming The Alleghenies

To the best of my knowledge the Pennsylvania Game Commission has produced detailed video documentaries on three species. Harold “Hal” Korber did most of the shooting, video production, and editing. It is possible that assistants aided him at times in certain aspects of the work.

The first was, “On the Trail of Pennsylvania's Black Bear”. This 100-minute video documented a year in the life of the black bear along with quite a bit of information about bears and bear management. It was narrated by Dr. Gary Alt, who was later to gain fame, or notoriety, depending on ones’ point of view, as the architect of a whitetail deer management plan designed to drastically reduce Pennsylvania’s deer herd.

This was followed by, “Pennsylvania Whitetails: Living with Change,” which was 75 minutes in length and was two years in the making. Land Management Officer, David R. Koppenhaver of Bedford County, narrated it, although if I recall correctly he was a District Conservation Officer at the time. I had the privilege of working in his land management group, and on my promotion to Maintenance Supervisor, he became my immediate supervisor.

Pennsylvania Elk “Reclaiming The Alleghenies” is an 85-minute production, which was released on VHS video in 1999. It was shot in the approximate time period of 1995-1998. It was narrated by then PGC Elk Biologist, Rawland “Rawley” Cogan.

All of these videos are available yet today from The PGC Outdoor Shop, but they are in VHS only. They were introduced at about $30.00 each, but are now selling for $5.00 each.

As I mentioned in previous postings, Billie Cromwell shot significant portions of the elk video with the Canon L2 camcorder. His preferred lens was the Canon 35-350 L with the EOS adapter.

My Canon L2 with 35-350mm L : Billie Cromwell used a rig like this to shoot the elk video.

Hal Korber is an excellent cameraman, but he had to use what the PGC provided him. Initially this was a monstrous S/VHS industrial camcorder, but during the course of the shooting he was provided with either Mini-Dv or DV-Cam equipment. The S/VHS footage had a colorcast and noisy areas in the image. It is easily possible to tell this camera from the others.

Mini-DV was the hot new prosumer format and DV-Cam was similar but more geared to the professional market., These formats should have been superior to the Hi-8 format of the L2 and in fact most likely was on a sheet of written specifications. In actual use, the superb Canon optics outweighed any advantage gained by the Mini-Dv format and it is difficult to tell footage from these cameras apart. I well remember Hal telling us that we definitely did not need new camcorders. In spite of the performance of the new equipment, he was still impressed by the image the analog L2s delivered.

The bottom line was that Hal had a limited amount of time to shoot, with tremendous pressures to bring this complex project to completion, while also dealing with other demands on his time. Hal did shoot the interview portions and also quite a bit of the wildlife segments, but it was a tremendous advantage to have Billie available with his L2 to assist in the wildlife shooting aspect.. The 35-350 was approximately the equivalent of a 89mm-1890mm zoom lens, in 35mm still camera terms. This enabled Billie to take stunning video in many situations where Hal could not.

Distant Meadow: Canon 10-D 28-135 mm at 28mm

Herd in same meadow: Canon L2 with 400mm Telephoto.

I didn't keep records of specific shots with the L2, but to the best of my recollection the above shot was taken with an old Spiratone 400mm pre-set lens which was between $50-$75.00 new in 1974. This lens was not very sharp and standard definition video does not make excellent stills, but this does give one a decent idea of the long range ability of this outfit and how it enabled Billie to really "reach out" and get outstanding footage.

To be continued:

An Unusual Expression !

While processing some whitetail deer photos from last summer I came across an unusual shot.

I don't know what the deer on the left reacted to. Flies harass them severely in warm weather and it may have been shaking its ears, etc. to frighten them off or it may have been reacting to the other doe trying to lick her face.

Whatever the reason for the expression, It made for a humorous shot, as these graceful animals seldom look so grotesque!

Canon 10-D 500mm F4

Male Cardinal On A Frosty Morning

Since most of the hunting community is away in deer camp, I decided to post a few miscellaneous wildlife and bird shots for the next few days, before pursuing the series on the elk further.

Cardinals are one of my favorite birds and they are visiting my feeding station on a regular basis and in increasing numbers. "Salty" has been shooting some at the same spot and is getting more material than I am. If you haven't done so already, be sure to check his site out. I know he has a superb shot of a nuthatch which he will likely post in the near future if he hasn't already.

Canon 40D 500mmF4/cropped severely-ISO 500

A Break From Elk Season! Female Cardinal and A Wedding

It's time to take a break from the elk season reporting and enjoy a picture of a female cardinal. I have been spending large amounts of time afield trying to photograph the whitetail deer rut, but have not been seeing as many deer as usual. I erected a bird feeding station in a rockbreak near my favorite photography stand. I only see a few species such as nuthatches, different sub-species of sparrows, and cardinals.

Canon 40D-500mmF4 1.4X extender

I have to travel Elk County to videotape a wedding. The happy couple are both lovers of the outdoors and they are going to have the ceremony outdoors if the weather permits, but light snow is in the forecast. This should be a unique experience. After I return I will bring the Elk Hunt Chronicles to a close.

The Hunt Begins: Sunday P.M. and Monday A.M.

After a mid-day break on Sunday I returned to the backcountry-this time to the reclaimed strip-mine where I photographed elk earlier in the rut. I was looking for elk of course, but my primary mission was to determine if the area was going to attract hunters in the morning. No elk appeared, but two separate groups of people did, and by their actions it was obvious that they were discussing hunting strategy for the next day.

I was using my Canon XL-H1 High Definition video camera in this case with the Canon 300mmF4 attached. When a Canon 35mm lens is attached to this camera it increases the power of the lens by a factor of 7.2 so that the lens is in fact the equivalent of 2,160mm.
The downside is that it gives a dismal image in poor light and one may not crop it to a great extent (in card camera mode). This camcorder delivers superb video which can be bettered only by cameras in the $30-100,000.oo price range, but it is a lackluster performer as a still camera, with most any point and shoot camera being able to deliver a better still image. They cannot: however, deliver detail at the extreme ranges that this camera can. Gaussian Blur was applied to the faces so the individuals are not readily recognizable.

Scouting for the next days' hunt?

Monday morning was bitter cold and frosty with a heavy fog and I was on station near where I saw the 6x6 well before dawn. When it was still too early for photography I could see the faint outline of an elk moving through the thick fog very close to me, but when I looked in my binoculars I could not find the animal. It seemed likely it was the bull, but I was not certain. Sometime after he went out of sight I heard antlers smashing against branches as an elk horned a tree. Shortly thereafter I heard a growling call from behind me and then a few elk bugles, but I was certain that this was a hunter trying to attract an elk by calling.

The elk was here when the fog was too thick to see well

In time the fog lifted revealing a beautiful autumn morning.

After taking a series of photographs of the area ,I walked to the reclaimed strip mine without spotting one hunter, but that situation was going to change. There was no doubt that hunters were in the area.

Shenandoah Visit

Today fellow Game Commission Retiree, Billie Cromwell and I traveled to Shenandoah National Park in Virginia for an eventful morning of photographing wildlife. It is a three hour drive one way. We left at 4:00A.M. and were at Big Meadows in the central district of the park at 7:00.

Soon after dawn we found a superb 10-point whitetail buck grazing by the side of Skyline Drive which follows the top of the mountain through the park from Front Royal in the north to Waynesboro in the south. The Big Meadows Area is perhaps the best spot in the park to observe and photograph wildlife as animal and birds are used to humans and do not flee at the sight of them.

Canon 40-D 70-200mmL f2.8 IS ISO 500

The highlight of the trip was a rare encounter with a Barred Owl along the edge of the meadow. The meadow is a large clearing that lies atop Virginia's Blue Ridge. It is thought it was originally cleared by the Indians. Later it was farm land until the ground was taken to create the park. The Big Meadows complex features a visitors center, lodges, campground, and camp store all of which close for the winter at the end of November or slightly before.

Barred Owl: Canon 40-D 500mmF4 IS ISO 100

Is This A Great Blue Heron?

Late Sunday Afternoon when I went to cross the fording, which Salty and ASH write about, I was lucky enough to spy this large bird sitting upstream from the crossing. I think it is a Great Blue Heron, but I am not certain. If anyone knows for sure, let me know. Locals call these birds “fish cranes” and from there it goes down hill. I won’t repeat the favorite local term. Also in backwoods Pennsylvania a stream crossing is not a “fording”,but rather a “forden” or “fordin”.

Over the years I have seen a lot of these birds and have gotten excellent video, but never a decent still shot. In this case the deck was stacked against me, but not impossibly so. I had the 70-200mm mounted with the camera on ISO 100. I would have liked to have had my 300mm to make the bird larger, and a higher ISO for the flying shots.

I cropped the image as much as possible without destroying it, which made the bird reasonably close looking.

Like “Wom Tigley” driving his Land Rover. I smashed my Chevy S-10 Blazer into the stream. At that point it all happened at once. I saw the bird, brought the camera to my eye, slammed the brakes, and fired a burst. Road hunting and 4 wheeling at its finest!

Canon 40-D 70-200mmL f2.8

Discussion of Extenders for Canon DSLRs

This is in response to Abraham Lincoln's question about extenders to boost the range of his 70-200mm F4 L lens. First off there is no choice but to buy Canon in this case. Canon has a list of which lenses their extenders will work with. In some cases extenders will actually not physically fit the wrong lens, but in many it is that although they will fit, optical performance is unacceptable. It is generally accepted that one should buy extenders designed for a specific lens. I have been down the generic brand route before and it has never worked well.

The second point is somewhat controversial, but most consider the 1.4X to give acceptable results. I have found it to work well on the 70-200mm 2.8L and it is also recommended for the F4 version. Using the extender makes the lens about one stop slower. According to a chart I found, the 70-200mmF4 becomes a 98 -280 5.6 lens which equals a 156-448 mm film camera lens once one factors in the digital rebels 1.6X multiplication factor.

Most do not recommend the 2X extender. I have never tried it on the 70-200mm, but did extensively on the 500mmF4 early on and only got a few acceptable photos. It seemed I could get better results by using the 1.4X and cropping more severely in photoshop. Two seasoned photographers advised against buying it and I wouldn't listen.

Now for the confusing part. This test is by no means scientific and one must bear in mind the quality of pictures is hard to judge at the size we use them on the internet. The acid test would be to print them out.

A flock of Eastern Wild Turkey came into the meadow between 200-250 yards from me. (I still think of distance in a rifleman's terms) and I conducted this impromptu test with the Canon 40D and the 70-200mm 2.8. The birds were continually moving about but they stayed about the same distance. I didn't try for correct composition on the uncropped shots, but basically centered them. Images were shot in RAW and sharpened in Photoshop CS3 along with tweaking

levels. Everything was optimized for the best possible images: ISO 100, tripod, remote release and of course good lighting. Exposure was 1/500 f4.5 without extender and 1/350 f4.5 with extender.

200mm No Extender

200mm 1.4 Extender

200mm Cropped in Photoshop

200mm and 1.4X- Cropped in Photoshop

The bottom line is that it is hard to tell from these pictures if the extender is of value or not as the image holds up well to the cropping in both cases. Personally I wouldn't want to be without one. Although I don't use it often, it does come in handy. Perhaps the biggest lesson to be learned from this is that a photograph can be cropped quite tightly when a good lens is used and conditions are ideal.

Another possible option is the 100-400mm Canon L Zoom. I don't think it can be cropped as severely as the 70-200mm or the 500mm, but it is a very powerful lens which on the Rebel is 640mm 35mm equivalent on the top end. This is about a $1,400 lens. "Salty" is using mine at present and is quite happy with it. I know two other superb photographers who use it as well and all are pleased with it. On the down side it is a push-pull type zoom and gets longer as you zoom in, it also is not as sharp as a prime L lens and has only a 5.6 aperature when at maximum zoom. Its' big pluses is that it has IS, is reasonably sharp, and is a very powerful lens in a relatively small package. It is listed as being compatabile with the 1.4 extender, but it doesn't hold up too well with it and I prefer to avoid using the extender with it.

Here are some links for further information: All are to B&H Photo in New York.

1.4 extender

2x extender

Canon 100-400mm

Summer In October! and More Info. on DSLRs

The weather has been unusually warm throughout most of October with the last several days hitting the low 80s (Fahrenheit). It is even uncomfortable to the deer as this panting young buck demonstrates. At least it is raining today after about a month and a half without any significant precipitation.

Buck Panting-Canon 40-D 500mmF4

Doe and Fawn Nursing-Canon 40-D 500mmF4 with 1.4 Extender

I successfully captured another nursing scene, this time using the 500mmF4 with 1.4 extender attached which is equal to a 700mm lens. On a Canon Digital SLR such as the 10-D through the 40-D and the digital Rebels this actually results in an effective focal length of 1120mm. These cameras have a 1.6 crop factor.

When one goes higher up the scale into models such as the 5D and the higher end professional DSLRS you are back to the lenses performing as they did on a film camera.,with full frame sensors. For that reason many professional wildlife photographers actually prefer cameras in the first group as they give them more effective range. If one wants better coverage of wide shots however then it is best to have a full frame sensor such as the second group of cameras offers. Most manufacturers have found a way around this by making special wide-angle zoom lenses that offer increased angle of view for the cameras in the first class.

Which will win out? Who knows! At this point many think that at some time the full frame sensor will dominate, but they are going to have to come down in price substantially for this to happen, and then one will lose the "crop factor" of the 1.6 sensor.

I am really getting technical now, but one position maintains that a full frame sensor camera with a high mega-pixel rating can be cropped in imaging programs to give the same size as the 1.6 crop factor cameras straight from the sensor and still equal or better their image quality. I don't know as I do not own a full frame DSLR, or know anyone who does so that I can make a

personal judgment.

As a side note, the picture of the panting buck is severely cropped and it maintains its quality well. So it is hard to find a definitive answer on this subject. The major criteria for being able to crop a photo to this extent are 1. Good Lighting 2. Shoot with a premium quality lens 3. Shoot with a fixed power lens also known as a "prime", but the better quality zooms such as the 70-200mm L will also do very well. 3. Only crop images that are in perfect focus.

A Discussion Of ISO In Digital Photography

ISO setting in regards to film is a rating that expresses the film’s sensitivity to light. Generally speaking a lower ISO such as 100 will give sharper images, more vivid colors, etc. In film days, the roll was rated at a certain speed, which could not be changed between shots.

With a digital camera ISO is a rating of the camera sensor’s sensitivity to light. The beauty of this is that the setting can be changed between shots to meet the photographer’s needs. In many cases the camera will select the speed automatically depending on the lighting conditions. In the earlier models of DSLRS (Digital Single Lens Reflex Cameras) this was not the case. The Canon 10D did not have this feature, but the 40D does. (I still prefer to make the decision myself). If the picture quality were better at the lower settings, why would one choose a higher one that results in diminished quality?

Things are fine as long as lighting conditions are excellent, but when one is photographing action scenes they must have sufficient shutter speeds to deal with the motion. In wildlife photography one often has to contend with both poor lighting conditions and subject movement. This involves compromises such as raising the ISO setting so that a satisfactory shutter speed may be obtained to stop the action.

Using a higher ISO may result in a softer looking picture with digital “noise” being visible. This usually appears as red and blue or green dots in the image with it being worse in shadow areas. DSLRS have made large strides in dealing with the noise through improved image processing in recent years so that it is possible to shoot at higher ISO settings and get more acceptable results than was previously possible. In fact some have said it is feasible to use many DSLRS at ISO 400 or 800 in all instances with little noticeable hit in quality.

One may also use post-processing tools, such as the noise reduction utilities built into Adobe Photoshop, or pug-ins such as Noise Ninja to remove noise, but we’ll try to keep this simple as possible and not go into that subject at this time.

We can address this in practical terms by talking about the photograph posted below.

It was very early this morning when these whitetail bucks came near me and started sparring. I decided to try IS0 500, which gave me a shutter speed of 1/180 at f2.8 with a Canon 70-200mm f2.8 L lens. Basically doubling the ISO rating will enable one to double the shutter speed, and cutting the ISO by one half will decrease the shutter speed by ½. Had I used IS0 200 I would have been at 1/90 or less and at 100 I would have been about 1/45. Even 1/180 is marginal for stopping this type of motion and 1/45 would certainly have resulted in blur unless I caught the animals at a moment of perfect stillness.





The good news is that if one shoots in decent light and situations that do not cause focus problems, that they do not need to concern themselves with many of these issues. As Wom Tigley pointed out in his response to my previous post he shoots a Canon S1, and uses a few basic settings and takes excellent photographs. By looking at his pictures I could not tell that he was using a point and shoot. “Salty” of Country Captures is another case in point and my Daughter “ASH”. Both have used the Canon S2 extensively with excellent results. Salty had a picture published in The Pennsylvania Game Commission Calendar and it fits right in with the others. No one would guess it was taken with a point and shoot camera. The main downside to these cameras is that ISO 400 is very noisy in poor light because of their small sensor size (the smaller the sensor all things being equal the more noise there will be) and their manual focus is difficult to use. This makes them less than ideal for wildlife photography, but they are an excellent choice for many tasks.

So much for the rant on ISO. I hope that clears things up for Wom, and others interested in the technical matters. If I am wrong or confusing on some of the above points, perhaps some of the knowledgeable DSLR photographers such as Abraham Lincoln, Salty, Chad Oneil, etc. can chime in an clarify things.