Fryin' Pan Bucks

[silvernail]

Hey Tom, I know you are going to be really jealous of these after all those sorry shots you have been layin' on us lately however I had to show you what a D70 and a Sigma AF, APO 400mm 5.6 D comes up when shot hand held in the dark, in the rain, on autopilot, by just anybody. Otherwise I wouldn't expose this clutter in public. Been too stoved up all summer to get out but had to get to the State Park for an hour or so in the thick of the Whitetail rut. Drove around and hoped for incidental encounters. The big one got away, but these guys were cooperative. The first and third one were limping pretty bad from recent knife fights with a bigger one. The only reason I included No. 3 is it's a good example of why you should use manual focus for such stuff. Hoping for better light and drier weather.

 

[Tom/Cocoa]

I really like the first one.. Great capture... My 400mm lens is manual focus and I have been thinking about buying the Sigmas APO macro 400 D lens. I'm so glad you took these just to give me a idea about how good it is...I love my 400mm f3.5 but the manual focus causes me to miss quite a few birds when flying and I'm thinking with the Sigma lens I get more birds in flight...
thanks for sharing... by the way, glad to see you putting that D70 to good use.
tom.

 

[silvernail]

It is a very nice camera. I've been side-tracked too much by geriatric ricketies and only had it out the door maybe half a dozen times - so it isn't very well practiced. It doesn't seem to care if you just put it in a pre-program, juice up the ISO a little, and go. The pix I posted on 06-01 (except the baby robin), and 06-04 were shot with the same rig, as were the following at maybe 6 feet, and way-over-yonder-and-way-up-there on the same stroll.

There are certain technical limitations in all this stuff I have not gotten around to worrying about yet, and may never. I'm having a lot more fun than I did with film and making better pictures too. The main reason is I am not tied to commercial processors ... a liberating experience akin to growing wings! The Sigma started out on a N70 (35mm), always on a good tripod or monopod, per expert? recommendations. I used a squeeze-grip ball head but only managed to catch a few odd flying gulls. The AF only works against the sky if you have a bead on the feathered demon to begin with, and can follow the target ... at which point the tracking system may or may not keep up. Also it can be distracted by background trees, etc. That f5.6 tube is not the brightest peephole in the world either. User reviews on that lens have been very good and most of them doubtless know a lot more about the subject than I do. I'm afraid my photography is not much witness either way, but it is kind of a fun lens for a duffer.