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  • Great pictures - I like the way you've captured the character of the individual. Particularly like the nuthatch :-)

  • Interesting about your equipment as I have a Pentax DSLR but my Sigma telephoto is 70-300 (with macro setting, 200 without). I might investigate a new telephoto lens but I also want a dedicated macro lens ...... Oh! the cost - draws back of hand across brow... (wink)

    Squirrel

  • Thanks for sharing, those images are absolutely stunning.  I'm scouring e- bay for a decent SLR rig, as my father in law has gone very quiet about giving me a loan of his old one, and may well end up trying the police auctions.  (Strathclyde and Lothian and Borders forces regularly auction off seized and unclaimed goods, so it may be possible to pick up a bargain.)

     

    There have been so many times that the birds (and foxes) in my garden have almost been begging to have a picture taken and I haven't been able to comply!!  Maybe one day......

  • cheers for the nice comments,

    Squirrel B said:

    Super pictures again. Interesting about your equipment as I have a Pentax DSLR but my Sigma telephoto is 70-300 (with macro setting, 200 without). I might investigate a new telephoto lens but I also want a dedicated macro lens ...... Oh! the cost - draws back of hand across brow... (wink)

    Squirrel

    what pentax do you have also i would recomend a sigma 150-500mm apo dg if you can get one on ebay for about £400 , you wont regret it, ,as for a macro lens sigma make a nice 105mm macro and tamron make a nice 90mm one as do pentax, i dont regreat spending the money when you see the difference.

  • My Pentax is the  ist DL2 - normal lens is 18-55. I bought it in a hurry as my 35mm Pentax MZ50 gave up the ghost and, as I already had the telephoto and wide angle lenses with Pentax fitting, I needed the new to accommodate those lenses.

    I was chatting with a chap recently who had a very serious camera kit. One thing he had (he "lost" me a bit on this so you'll have to bear with me!) was an "extra" section (I thought he called it a convertor but when I searched that on Jessops it didn't come up!) which fitted between the camera body and the lens and doubled the range - so, for example 500 became 1000. At least, I THINK that's what he was saying. Whatever it was, it looked to be a rather handy piece of kit.

    Squirrel

  • Squirrel B said:

     

    Hi, more wonderful pictures there STH. My Pentax is the  ist DL2 - normal lens is 18-55. I bought it in a hurry as my 35mm Pentax MZ50 gave up the ghost and, as I already had the telephoto and wide angle lenses with Pentax fitting, I needed the new to accommodate those lenses.

    I was chatting with a chap recently who had a very serious camera kit. One thing he had (he "lost" me a bit on this so you'll have to bear with me!) was an "extra" section (I thought he called it a convertor but when I searched that on Jessops it didn't come up!) which fitted between the camera body and the lens and doubled the range - so, for example 500 became 1000. At least, I THINK that's what he was saying. Whatever it was, it looked to be a rather handy piece of kit.

    Squirrel

     

    hi yes your right its called a tele converter you can get 1.5x or 2x or 3x, but they do need to be used with top quality lenses and they still degrade the quality then, as for the ist dls its a good camera, the new pentax dslrs have shake reduction in which helps alot, you can spend lots on camera gear i have what they say is the ultimate camera for wildlife and sports as it shoots 8 shots a second and has one of the beast autofocus systems in the maket, but then i paid over £2500 for my nikon and 2  lenses,

  • I Have a Canon EOS 400D which I bought second hand from a local wildlife photographer about 18 months ago, I think Canon have upgraded this model at least once since then so probably a good chance that many more of these and other DSLRs will be coming on the market as people upgrade.

    I have a Sigma 135-400 lense, and have been getting some reasonably good results (definitely blaming myself for any failings and not the equipment), probably relying too much on the zoom, tend to find the clarity of the pictures suffers, so I think I need to concentrate on getting closer to the subject, like everything it's probably just a case of practice, practice, practice.

    At least with digital photography you can afford to take as many photos as you like without worrying about the costs.  I managed to take about 500 pictures on a trip to the Farne Islands, have only printed off about 20 of them for the album...........think how much that would have cost in film and development!!!!

    Have a weeks holiday next week so will be aff for some practice at Titchwell, Cley and the Kyle of Lochalsh (!!!!), I know the first two are quite close together but the final destination will involve a bit more travelling, in the meantime have posted a few of my Farne Island pics.