Hunting Deer at Richmond Park with my 300mm

Fooooood!!!

Richmond park is located about an hour from London via public transport. The underground takes you up to Richmond underground, and from there walk or take a short bus ride (take the bus!) to the gates of the park.

I went there on a Saturday, and it was very busy with people strolling the myriad paths, bikers moving at all speeds and cars clogging the roads. Well not clogging but there is a very low speed limit.

Now this is probably my first time out looking for wildlife in the wild. Unlike the Dingoes in Alice Springs where they'd come up to you at night. My first deer was sighted about half an hour in, under heavy shade just by the road side. I'd actually walked past it, and only noticed when I stopped to look around. Cool. I was certain I'd see more, so I continued on.


At the end of the day, I found a bunch of deer that were quite tolerant of me coming close. Unfortunately, my flash ran out of batteries at that time, and I could only shoot in ambient light. Which was bad.


The next few hours saw me little deer. The park *is* rather big, and they have free reign of it, seemingly moving at will. It reminds me of random encounters in final fantasy - I'd never know when it'd hit me. That in itself is an experience, to see a bunch of deer just gallop across your field of vision and disappear into the thickness of the woods. A binoculars is a very useful tool here. I have been using a cheap, compact Meade binos for the past half year or so, and constant scanning with these binos were key to finding the faraway deer. They are also very good to use at Zoos and wildlife parks just to observe the critters without bringing up the heavy weight camera.

While my main focus was to see deer, other fantastic stuff to observe were the birds - I observed one or two Carrion Crows (I think), big glossy black buggers. Didn't bother to shoot them as my 300mm was just too short. I did come across many packs of Jackdaws foraging in the shade, and they were a good subject to practice shooting birds in flight. They seem to be quite adverse to humans and tend to keep away, so the 300mm was a godsend. Most of the time they just fly away, and the rare times they fly across, I rarely can lock my focus fast enough. Out of the many shots I took probably only had one good BIF keeper:



Jackdaw zooming past

Being a park, there are also plants and flowers of all sorts around. I pulled out my 55mm 2.8 AIS and its extension tube and spent a good hour on my belly shooting just a bunch of flowers :)







Definitely will be going back in Winter during the rutting season, and hopefully with a longer lens.

Woo I'm back!

Aperture UK

Finally got access to blogger from home! Woo! Time to spend some time angst-ting online.

Didn't go out shooting this Saturday as I had stuff to do that couldn't be done on Sunday.

For fun and giggles I went up along New Oxford street, where there are a few camera shops that are supposed to have used goods; Jacobs, Jessops and Aperture.

Jacobs had a fair amount of used stuff, but nothing that caught my eye. Jessops, I only browsed quickly and did not find out where their used rack was, but I spent some time playing with the new Olympus Pen. Damn, it's a really small camera. The AF speed was not very good though, perhaps this was a pre-production camera. 3 were on display, two with the kit zoom lens (I played with that) and one with the pancake lens and viewfinder. OMG, that is really pretty. I'd expect the build quality to be better though - for the price - I think my old rangefinders were better built. Oh well. That said, I tried the Olympus E series SLRs, damn, their autofocus speeds on the kit lenses were _fast_.

Finally, I went over to Aperture (shops were very close to each other) and this is what I saw on the window sill:



Holy Moly! Super telephotos in the flesh! From left to right: 600/4IS, 400/2.8IS, 400/2.8IS, 400/2.8 AF-S, 300/2.8 AIS, 800/5.6 FD.

Inside the shop, there were lots of MF camera gear that I kinda glossed over (sorry). The only thing that caught my eye, was a grey barreled 500/4 AF-S. Drool.... They also had a 300/2.8 AFI.

But I was there for the food; the shop combines used camera gear with a snack cafe. I had probably the best ever smoked salmon ciabatta. ever. Too bad they aren't open on Sundays as I usually shoot stuff on Saturdays :(

Work has been busy, didn't spend much time at home on Houdini though - let's just called it OS issues. I'll be getting a Dell soon, and get rid of this lovely macbook pro. I'm looking forward to running Vista/Ubuntu dual boot - work OS + an OS i can use for photoshop work and gaming :)

Tale of 3 Micro Nikkors

I remember buying my 55mm 2.8 AIS Micro-Nikkor on a whim. Basically I was not using my 28mm/2.8 Nikkor, sold it, and acquired the 55mm - never had a dedicated "macro" lens before, so thought it'd be something fun to experiment with. The 55mm 2.8 Micro is fantastic. Stupid sharp wide open, focuses down to 1:2 life size, which makes for interesting perspectives for a 50-ish lens, and its light. I just put on my 16-85 that I haven't used in ages, and oh man, that's a heavy piece of glass. I can't believe I trekked that and its tele breathen up Morialta and Black Hil Conservation Park.

Now the only main issue is I'm actually using it nowadays as my main lens. And being a MF lens, its not exactly easy to track moving subjects with. Props to the Manual Focus photographers pulling off the amazing shots. So I thought I'd look into Nikon's modern AF offerings. The 60mm AF-D and the 60mm AF-S. Here's my thoughts and comparisons:

Build quality:
1. 55mm 2.8 AIS Micro Nikkor. You hold it, you know its the good stuff. Why don't they make stuff like that anymore?
2. 60mm AF-D. Very nice, even though its plastic-ky. Feels very solid in my hand.
3. 60mm AF-S. Feels like any kit lens. Hello? Nikon? Some metal externals please?

Handling:
I'll give the edge to the 55mm 2.8, though it's not very fair since I have used it *alot* in the field. The 60mm AF-D only for 2 days, and the AF-S only a few days. Somehow, I need a slightly higher shutter speed on the AF lenses to get rid of hand shake. Does 5mm make that much of a difference? The AF-D has a very nice manual focusing ring, big, easy to handle. The AF-s has full time manual, and the focus ring is very wide, easy to grab. But also easy to accidently move.

Controls:
55mm 2.8 only has a focusing ring, very high tech. The AF-D has a AF/MF control on the lens, needs to have a button to be depressed to switch. Very nice. It also has a two-range focus limiter. The 60mm AF-S has full time manual focus, and a little MA/M switch - not much use for people using AF-On technique anyways.

Focusing Speed:
1. 60mm AF-S - I think this is the fastest of the bunch. Very solid lock on.
2. 60mm AF-D - *feels* slightly slow, but snaps in fast.
3. 55mm 2.8 - being non-autofocus, it takes ages to autofocus. Like. Never.

Bokeh:
Super subjective stuff again, so take it with a grain of salt.
55mm 2.8 AIS - Generally smooth, however, I consider it a neutral - slightly harsh lens. This feel propogates even when stopped down to 5.6
60mm AF-D - Didn't bother to keep an eye out as I was distracted by its infinity focus issues (see below)
60mm AF-S - Still early days, especially since my 55mm has gone through hundreds of shots and this lens has gone through less than a hundred! That said, I think it is quite smooth, though I'd put in in with the neutral - slightly harsh lens. Needs much much more use in the field to get a feel for this.
300mm F4 AF-S.... what?! Well for fun, I must say I don't like the bokeh of the 300mm/4 AF-s, which is sad since its a nice big solid prime. Does not do well against harsh backgrounds.
70-300mm VR - bad. bad. bad. Both the 300/4 and 70-300VR perform very well if you choose a proper background to shoot against, but if against a harsh contrasty background. Ergh. If you are only going to put up 800x600 stills on the web, it's perfectly fine - you'll need to really blow stuff up to at least 10x15 to see it. 8x12s are fine unless I'm nitpicking.

Image Quality at close focus
Again, two of these lenses are so not field tested, take what I say with a grain of salt. The 55mm AIS and 60mm AF-S would be the winner here, because the 60mm AF-D shows definite signs of CA, very obvious since I use flash alot for my macro stuff. And usually I don't even bother about CA but it shows up a leeeetle too much. Now wide open at close focus (it's no longer F2.8 but F something else), the 55mm 2.8 and 60mm AF-S seems better imo. At 1:1 I'd say the edge goes to the 60mm AF-S.

Image Quality at Infinity focus
55mm 2.8 is perfect. I love it. 60mm AF-S - I think I may have a front focusing issue with my body, but it is generally excellent. And this is at F2.8 I'm talking about. Now the 60mm AF-D... don't bother focusing at infinity. Use it only for close up work. Horrible! This is probably a very stupid thing of me to do, buy a Micro Lens to use as a general purpose lens. I've read in forums that macro lenses are optimized for *duh* close up work. And aren't that good at infinity. But I'm very spoilt by my 55mm/2.8 that does both. Hence, the 60mm AF-S

Why did I even bother getting a AF lens anyways? Back in Australia, I'd like to go up close and personal with the critters in the wildlife parks, and using a MF lens only works on sleepy red roos, not the active greys. Moving kids are also in the same ball game. Finally, sold off the 60mm AF-D.

Here's some test shots using the 60mm AF-S with my neighbourhood cat.

Perpetually unappy, this furball will scratch if annoyed :P
Very obvious front focusing issue. But wide open its good enough for me. Focus point was on the left eye (or eye on camera right :P)
The 60mm Micro allows a very different perspective because of the ability to go closer. Not something say, a normal 50mm lens can do. (That said, I do still lust after a 50mm/1.4G :P )

Cleland, the pre final visit

Kimba (Omega)
Mary (Alpha Female)

Ah, Cleland. Magic again. The bus ride up was sad. So very sad. Raining most of the way up the expressway, and upon reaching the summit of Mount Lofty, the view was nothing but a white fog bank. The bus driver mentions that usually Mount Lofty has very sudden weather changes, and things could change at any moment, and started the bus for Cleland. Just minutes from Cleland, the sun broke through the clouds, and parted the fog. Sun light backlights the trees on both sides of the road. Marvelous.

Female Superb Fairy Wren

Red Browed Firetail Finch (cropped image)

Spent some time at the aviary, and decided that I won't leave till I get at least one shot of a Firetail Finch. These birds are... wild... I guess. But there is a feeder there where they congregate. Unlike the Fairy Wrens who I've experienced flittering up to me a few times, the Firetails simply will not tolerate movement. Thankfully, I didn't need a hide, and just sat down at a convenient bench, barely 2 meters away from the feeder. And kept quiet. About 5-10 minutes later, the birds returned to feed, and I took as many shots as I could as these birds move *fast*.

Short Nosed Bandicoot

Was never ever able to catch a good pic of the Bandicoots, and as luck would have it, a nice side on shot.

Hairy Nose Wombat

The Wombats are usually munching away or snoozing. Today, one of them was posing just for me. How could I resist.

POTOROO!

Most of the potoroos in the main cleland park are evidently not too human shy. Apart from the one in the bush area. This one was happily posing for me and tons of tourists. (assume 1 tourist == 100kg, 10 tourist == 1 ton)

I leave thee today with one of our fine feathered friends.

Superb Parrot

Adelaide Zoo

The meerkat shot that every. one. has.

Visited the Adelaide Zoo last week, and they were having the new Panda exhibit going along pretty well. Slated for delivery late this year, so perhaps I'll be able to check it out when if I visit Adelaide again.

Otter!

The otters were very reclusive this time. I walked past their enclosure like 3-4 times, and only once was once of them out eating something, and only managed to take a few shots before one of the other patrons moved too close and it ran into its log.

Persian Leopard

The lion's enclosure was very packed during lunch time, and it was fortunate that everyone was interested in the lions so I was able to grab a very good spot to shoot the Persian Leopard. Only managed 2 keepers, but they were sufficient.


Emu!

A lovely emu, less about subject, just about the bokeh. 300mm at F4 is sweet indeed.

American Crocodile

The crocs were being crocs as usual. Not. Moving. An. Inch. Bwa. All the better for me, with nothing moving.

I leave thee today with a contemplative relative:

Work sucks :(

More accurately, leaving work sucks :( Today marks the last day of my time on Terminator 4: Salvation. My second project at Rising Sun Pictures, I've had a fantastic time there. Sure, all of us had to pull some a few long days here and there, but overall I loved the team and project.

Will also miss my time at Cleland :(

So damned depressed. I'm going to go pixel peep and enjoy some jazz for a while.

MOOD: DEPRESSED

I was at Cleland last week too :P

A dingo. DIIINGGO. (can't decide to print this at A3 canvas, or A2 satin.... hmmm...)

Been very busy the last two weeks in the final push to complete the show. In most every day, but I still got my time to go to Cleland. And back to office after :P Processed some pictures but had no time to blog about them. So there. Last week was relatively meh. Weather was quite warm, and my cuddly Rock Wallabies were hiding amongst the rocks again. Took quite a few shots but most went into the trash bin. Still got one in a reasonably environment-kinda pose.

Andu / Yellow Footed Rock Wallaby

I've also decided that the Andu are much cuter than the Swamp Wallabies. So there.

No, they don't have red eyes, that's the flash causing it. And no, I don't have photoshop. It's quite freaky when you actually see it through the viewfinder when the pre-flash goes off...

Cattle Heron

The Cattle Heron reside in a fair sized aviary, and they don't seem to like me, the last few times I visited their home. Perhaps my new hairstyle gets them confused them this time, so I managed to get closer and get a shot of one of 'em.

Baby Wombat peaking outta pouch!

Ok. I present to you a wombat rear, with a tiny joey sticking its head out of the rearward facing pouch. It's pretty ingenious evolution; if the pouch faced the front, the little pup would be swimming in dirt if the mom started to dig. It's times like this I wish I owned the legendary 200-400mm/4. Being legendary, these are owned by... legends. I'm not. So.... (plz ignore the horrible bokeh... thanks....)

EMU!

Emus aren't very cuddly, so if you do want to hug one my advice is don't bother. This one (nearly 6 feet tall) was in a fairly curious mood, pecking away at my lens. Thank goodness it's my damaged 55mm 2.8, so I didn't bother to much.

100% crop

Optically it is my best lens in my meagre stable. Damn, I love the old stuff :) Cheap and good :) Pain in the rear to focus though. Today, I leave thee with a final picture of the iconic Koala! (They are NOT bears!!!!)

Koala.

OMG, Cleland yet again? What?

Andu, Yellow Footed Rock Wallaby

Everytime I step onto the bus to Cleland, a thought goes off in my mind... are you insane? Surely everything there to be shot at has had eaten too many shots! In addition, dark clouds were looming, even though it was *hot* in Adelaide.

Indeed, when I first stepped into the Dingo enclosure, I was greeted with really awesome shutter speeds that remind me of shooting indoors. Yes, it was a real dreary day :(

Fortunately, this minor weather altercation results in a wonderful opportunity - the furballs were reacting in ways very much different from weeks before. The top picture is a Yellow Footed Rock Wallaby. Hidden amongst the huge man-made-but-naturally-feeling rock structure, these little buggers are not only tough to spot, but also hiding in concrete caves to fend off the warm weather. Translated, using a 8x binoculars, you're only going to see a tiny bit of fur, if you can pick them out of the surface clutter.

Today's clouds brought them out enmasse on the rocks, but unlike the Red Roos, they have an aversion to people (or maybe it's my dress code.), and won't snuggle up for food. Thankfully though, they were pretty close, and my 300mm was able to fill the frame easily.

Tawny Frogmouth, awake!

Similarly, in the avairies that dot the park, the birds seemed more active than usual. Or perhaps I'm paying more attention to them today, take your pick. My usual tawny was very obliging today, to look me in the lens a for one very nice shot.

Female Superb Fairy Wren

Bothered to actually try to catch a shot of the Wrens that are flittering all over the place. An act of frustration, I tell you. Especially with a long lens. By the time you get the focus point there.... they're... gone! GAH! I was especially lucky to catch this female trotting up to me, and I fired off a rapid barrage of shots, only of which a few were good and sharp. I'm getting more enamoured by our feathered friends, the more I learn about their names and habits.

Eurasian Coot

I was also testing the theory that VR actually kills sharpness. I took it to try a whole sequence of exposures using the 70-300VR @ 300mm. I won't post pictures here, so take my experiment what you will. At low shutter speeds, in the region of 60-100, VR definitely shows up, so long as the subject is still. 120-300+ is kind of a grey area. VR enabled shots were definitely on the ball, but a good percentage of VR disabled shots were up to speed. Now the interesting part was a sequence I shot at 1/400. I did quick bursts of 4 shots with and without VR, and it's quite obvious that the non-vr shots are actually sharper (I did a test on a very nice, still Masked Lapwing). Interesting times.....


I gave in and spent time in the Roo enclosure today. I can't decide which is more fun, feeding the roos here in Cleland, or the Wallabies in Gorge. For one thing, I don't remember the wallabies being as scratchy. I went head on using the 55mm manual focus lens, and oh man, it's so frustrating trying to get anything in focus! Props to the MF photogs that were able to nail shots in the days of olde. I was only able to get anything usable when I happened upon some calmer specimens. I miss auto focus in this case :) Stopping down to 5.6 seems like a very good compromise; good depth of field, yet still leaving a smooth background. F8 royally sucks, by bringing too much detail into the background, super super sharp as it is.

Flash was used the whole day together with the flash extender, or off the camera in wireless mode. Definitely getting a hang on dialing in the exposure compensation; -2.7EV for close up critters, to abouot -2EV for further shots.

Of course, I went there primarily for dingo hunting, and here's a few pictures to tie up this long and non-vfx related blog post.

My First Giclée :)

Collected a whole stack of prints today, and also my first Giclée prints from Atkins Technicolor. I've already quizzed them if they'd sent overseas, so if I can't find a good printer wherever I'm going next, I can still get 'em to send it to me. Wooot!

What can I say. Printing big kicks ass! Can't wait to get these home, frame 'em up and stick 'm on my wall. Printed them at A3 size, you can see a 5x7.5in print (5R) for comparison. Now THIS is the cumilation of working on technique and spending time in the field. Don't see why one needs a 20 megapixel camera for posting a teeny 640x480 image on _____ (pick your favourite photo upload site). Bleh. Sharpness only matters here in the bigger prints; I can see the insane detail up close, the tiny food particles on the edge of the potoroo. Its a crap image, but its a good memory of how I got it.

This also concludes my color management/calibration setup. At least with Atkins. It's almost a perfect match on my new screen. Mostly inspired by Peter Maystrenko's portfolio. Peter specializes in portraiture and motor sports. He does his own wet prints, I wonder what how one does those!

I leave thee with an image I captured on the way to pick up the prints; a golden bush frond. Annoyingly, I took tons of shots, only 1 came out with acceptable sharpness (hate wind when doing macro......)

D200, 55mm AIS Micro-Nikkor @ 1:2 magnification

More Cleland Wildlife Park

Dingoes at feeding time

My previous run at Cleland was with the SB600 flash. Lots of fun with a new way of shooting, but this week I went back with the SB600 equipped with a FX4 Better Beamer. Previously, I had the flash doing perfectly fine for fill flash on my 70-300VR, but it did not have the reach required for further subjects. This week with the flash extender attached, the reach was magically extended, easily twice! Downside with the flash extender of course, was the uneven flash illumination on focal lengths less than 300mm.

As close as I can get @ 300mm to fill the frame.

Overall, the experience with the flash extender was very positive.

In between using the long lens on the park's denizens, I pulled out the 55mm for normal use as well as macro use.

Relaxing Roo

It's pretty sharp, and after using it over two weekends, manual focusing on static furballs wasn't too difficult. At least in good light. For close up use is another whole ball game.

Fungi! Sb600 providing the light on camera right.

The 55mm focuses only to 1:2 on its own, and with the PK13 extension tube, down to 1:1. The problem with using tubes is that the lens loses the ability to focus at infinity. The modern AF nikkors focus straight down to 1:!, perhaps one day when I get into macro photography I'd get one of the newer ones. But till then, this old baby (made since 1979, evidently) more than suffices.





I bid thee, the reader, my thanks for reading. I leave thee then with a few dingo shots :)