BristolUK

20 minutes last time we did it.

christmasoompa

Tawny owls. And I'm afraid I do begrudge the sparrowhawks, they are amazing birds but I'm fed up of seeing them swooping on the songbirds and gobbling them up! Not to mention that they've nested in our barn owl box, so the barn owl's haven't been nesting here this year.

Bob

So you folks who shoot your own pics, what gear are you using?

I use a fairly basic Nikon D3300 body with either a 80-200mm Pentax from the 70's or a massive tank of a 400mm Mamiya lens from the 60's. Cheap as chips and not bad, but going all manual is tricky on fast moving objects and getting the lighting right as distance where a modern lens makes life so easy, but my only modern lens is the slightly soft 18-55mm kit lens which is a bit meh and only ever gets used if I'm in the car driving to be honest, as I don't need to focus and it becomes a giant point and shoot thing out the window

Stinkypup

I'm Canon whore. 7D mk2 camera body and previously Canon 100-400mm which was a bit long in the tooth design wise but was still good - 70-200mm IS F2.8 mk1, Canon 1.4 teleconverter. I have just acquired the mark 2 version of the 100-400mm which is a fantastic lens- I haven't taken really a lot with it as yet. This will probably relegate my 70-200 to certain landscape work and some portraits. I will flog the older 100-400mm which has taken most of the photos that I have posted on this thread.
For other stuff, an assortment of Canon Lenses and a Sigma 10-20mm for wide angle work. I kept my 7D mk1 as a spare body. I always use a Canon battery grip to balance out the heavier lenses and also increase the battery capacity. Gods teeth I can be a photography bore when I put my mind to it

Bob

What do you think of the Sigma gear?

I've a 28-200mm one but it's push pull and I don't like those as much, plus it's got a very weird and short hot spot to the focus, but that might be the lens converter.

My go to bag of stuff includes a 28mm 2.8 Mamiya which is just lovely for scenic stuff, that's from '68. A 55mm 1.4 Mamiya that desperately needs to be serviced as it's a bit firm to adjust but I'm not brave enough and still love it for the bokeh it has. A cheapo 50mm 2 Ricoh lens because it's got a fab, cheesy bokeh and a fab portrait lens. Some lenses I keep around but don't use to much of but still lovely, a Pentax 55mm 1.4 but it has a odd hot spot for focus up close. There's a 135mm F2 Mamiya which is my go to for fireworks and a 200mm 3.5 Mamiya that works great for water scenes and then a few other random bits and pieces in a bag somewhere.

All sounds very fancy, but I bought most of that gear off a Vietnam vet who was starting to have issues with his hands and wanted someone to use them so flogged them on craigslist for peanuts. I bought the bundle just for the 28mm and 55mm so the rest was essentially free. I've a closet full of camera bodies that they came with, complete with Japanese instructions dated between 1968-70 when he got them

Stinkypup

I love the specialised go to lenses... Firework lens, water lens I'm presuming that they are all fully manual focus etc now? Great quality lens. I have my analogue Canon in the cupboard gathering dust along with it's lenses. Sigma Art lenses are getting a great reputation, not cheap but as is often the case you get what you pay for. They make pretty good telephoto too, not brilliant but cheaper and often slower than Canon/Nikon which isn't great for wildlife photographers. They are also honkiingly big and heavy. They do a 150-600mm but it is big and slow. They do a 200-500mm f2.8 @ $26000 as well
The 10-20mm is fine for my needs. You swine... You bring out the boring in me

Bob

Yeah, they're fully manual and I love them, but now and again, especially doing sports shots and of the birds, I'd be envious of the new automatics that take the guess work out of things. Also handy for indoor portraits and pairing them with the flash, well my external has to be manually set because of the lenses but that might be down to the body but the amount of times I bother use a flash indoors, doesn't bother me to much.

Can't daisy chain or remote trigger the flash from the camera body either, but like I said, not worth the cost for me to do anything about it. Plus, I don't like people, so it's okay not to photograph them, even though I do seem to be the designated photographer for all the events my kids get involved in

Stinkypup

You are very lucky having all of these birds breeding on your land. I am jealous!
When we were living in Norfolk, Stinky found a little white fluff ball on the ground in the woods.He was incredibly gentle and did it no harm and I think was just puzzled as to what exactly it was. It was a tawny owlet, clearly fallen out of the nest. We took it to the local owl rescue/trust and they took it in thankfully.
The other two were photos taken at a local owl sanctuary-obviously an adult barn owl and an adult tawny owl

Stinkypup

The first photo of these three is a female Eurasian eagle owl, apparently one of the largest owls in the world-a beautiful bird. (Great greys can be larger and the Blakiston fish owl is even larger! )
The other two photos were taken from our garden, a hunting barn owl regularly hunted in the field next door

I hope these meet with JamesM's approval!

Come on, there must be more bird photos out there! Bananahammock.......Anyone???

Siouxie

That's a nice long beach!

https://www.google.ca/maps/@46.23989...!7i7168!8i3584 (pan in each direction, it's a surround view)

Siouxie

I don't have any bird photos on this computer - just a photo of a monarch butterfly from last year - will that do for now?

I'm loving all the photos though!

BristolUK

That bit doesn't look familiar.
These two show it better I think..




Nice restaurant there with a large deck where you eat and look over the sea. Unfortunately it's some distance from the other bits.

Not as convenient on foot as places like Weymouth, Bournemouth (and other mouths ) and any number of Greek and Spanish beaches.

Bob

A few more, but fairly mundane in comparison

Bob

Last handful I yanked from my flickr page.

R I C H

Hummingbird outside our porch.