I have been venturing into the bird photography domain the past month as an excuse to buy new equipments (What else, duh?). My goal with this new endeavor is to bring in my bag of tricks from landscape photography into nature portraiture. I was lucky to live 45 minutes away from Bolsa Chica and I have come to the wetland to try out some arrangement that would work for this type of shooting.
I rented a 80-400mm on one occasion:
Nikon D750 + Nikon 80-400mm f/4.5-5.6G ED AF-S VRI recently acquired an 80-200mm f/4 AI-S for cheap. I thought I would give it a try using a TC-200 and D90 body to get that 400mm. Dang, it's hard to focus. I can certainly feel the weight on my shoulder when focusing on small/distant object in low-light. Forgive the graininess on these shots, they are shot at ISO800 and underexposed to get them sharp handheld. I need to get a Wimberly I think.
Nikon D90 + Nikkor 80-200 f/4 AI-S + TC-200
Nikon D90 + Nikkor 80-200 f/4 AI-S + TC-200My take away from the two trips to Bolsa is that I almost always shoot at 400mm or more (on the D90 body). I ordered Tamron 150-600 since it won't break the bank while I acquire the skill necessary for this type of photography. It has been a fun beginning!
