Category Archives: water birds

Fine Weather for Ducks

November 4, 2014 by Words | 4 Comments

Today proved to be perfect weather for ducks, and pretty good weather for testing out the 7D Mark II in some fairly challenging conditions. I’m still tweaking settings as I go, but I’m getting it closer to how I want it to work and learning more about some of the incredibly useful controls you can use while still glued to the viewfinder.

Anyway, it was raining cats and dogs this morning when I arrived at Falmer Pond. Not that the ducks were complaining. Given the conditions I would not have attempted these shots with the original 7D. It was truly gloomy out there, but a good test of the cameras ISO capability. After the first shot I increased ISO from 1600 to 3200 to retain a decent shutter speed.

Duck in rain

Sleeping duck (ISO 1600)

Duck in rain

Happy Duck (ISO 3200)

Duck in rain

Serious Duck (ISO 3200)

It was still raining at lunchtime, though there were breaks in the weather. The ducks were still enjoying themselves.

Hybrid Duck (ISO 3200)

Hybrid Duck (ISO 3200)

white duck

White Duck (ISO 3200)

A female mallard flew across the pond. These are from a longer sequence

Duck in flight

Duck in flight (ISO 2000)

Duck in flight

Duck in flight (ISO 2000)

And to close: Swimming in the Rain…

Ducks swimming

Swimming in the Rain (ISO 1600)

Still much to learn and to test out, but early impressions are of a highly responsive camera, with great and easily accessible controls, great focusing and excellent low light capability.

Camera note: all photos taken with the Canon 7D Mark II and EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L USM IS lens.

Also posted in Wildlife Tagged , |

Up in the Sky

November 2, 2014 by Words | 2 Comments

I’m still playing around with the 7D Mark II and spent some time today calibrating the 400mm lens, which had felt a bit soft. I’d had to do the same with the previous camera and my method of calibrating is none too exact, though making the in-camera adjustments is easy. It may take me a few attempts to get the lens working to its maximum capability. That said, the settings are not too far off.

The first sequence (with the uncalibrated 400mm lens) is a sparrowhawk flying over the garden this morning, startling (but not attacking) a small flock of starlings.

sparrowhawk and starlings

The sparrowhawk flies close to the starlings

The starlings wheeled away. The sparrowhawk was searching, but not hunting. It hung over the garden for a while longer.

sparrowhawk

sparrowhawk

sparrowhawk

The next shot, of a helicopter, was taken with the 100-400mm lens.

Helicopter

Now a herring gull (I’d calibrated the 400mm lens by this point and was using the 1.4 extender).

Herring gull

There’s one other regular feature in the sky that is hard to miss. It appeared mid to late afternoon.

Moon

Moon before nightfall – 400mm lens

And it was still there tonight.

Moon

Moon after dark – 400mm lens + 1.4x extender

Camera note: all photos taken with the Canon 7D Mark II. Lenses are the EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L USM IS lens, EF 400mm f/5.6L USM and Canon EF 1.4xIII extender as indicated.

Also posted in Bird of Prey, Helicopter, Moon, sparrowhawk, Wildlife Tagged , , , , , |

More 7D Mk II images

November 1, 2014 by Words | 6 Comments

Another day testing out the new Canon 7D Mark II. I used the 400mm 5.6 lens for all of these shots, many of them with a 1.4 extender attached. Nice to have autofocus operating with that combination (something that wasn’t possible with the original 7D).

Coot

Coot – ISO 3200,
1/2500, f11, Lens EF400mm f/5.6L USM +1.4x III

Coot

Coot – ISO 1000
1/2500, f8.0, Lens EF400mm f/5.6L USM +1.4x III

Moorhen

Moorhen – ISO 3200
1/2500, f11, Lens EF400mm f/5.6L USM +1.4x III

Moorhen

Moorhen – ISO 1600
1/3200, f8.0, Lens EF400mm f/5.6L USM +1.4x III

Squirrel

Squirrel – ISO 1600
1/2500, f6.3, Lens EF400mm f/5.6L USM

Only very basic processing has been done. I’ve run them through the defaults on DPP 4.0 and added a little sharpening once they’ve been reduced for the web. One or two shots have been cropped a little.

The camera itself is very comfortable to use. I still need to sort out the best settings for how I work, but will spend a little more time doing that over the weekend. Today I just wanted to play with the new toys. 😀

I’ll write more about using the camera soon, though I have to say I miss having Lightroom for processing. DPP 4.0 is ok, but like all these things it takes time to get to know, whereas basic processing was second nature in Lightroom. No doubt an update will appear soon!

Camera note: all photos taken with the Canon 7D Mark II and EF 400mm f/5.6L USM lens. The Canon EF 1.4xIII extender was used where indicated.

Also posted in squirrel, Technical Tagged , , , |