New Equipment… | The-Plot.com

I’ve been a bit idle on the website front for the last couple of months, partly because I have a new job that is taking up some more of my time. In the intervening period I’ve had a splurge on equipment, starting with a new body – the 7D – at the start of February. It’s a fabulous piece of kit, and a noticeably bigger step up than my last upgrade between the 400D and 40D. The autofocus is much more sophisticated and, based on my limited experience with a D300, firmly in Nikon territory in terms of quality. The 8 frames a second has proven pretty useful for sport and wildlife.

I was over at the HQ of the RSPB today with a mate, and managed to get a couple of passable shots of a woodpecker, something I’ve been hankering after for months. If you have ever tried to take a picture of one you will know they are incredibly nervous, and very very tough to get a passable shot of. A great opportunity [in a hide] today was marred slightly by not-great light: as this was taken at 1/100 second at 400mm, it’s surprising this shot isn’t softer than it turned out:

1/100 sec, ISO 100, 400mm at F5.6

The other new piece of kit was a surprise birthday present from my wife: the new 100mm F2.8 L Macro. I borrowed a macro lens for a couple of months at the end of last summer and really enjoyed it. The image stabilisation, in combination with the flimsiest efforts to steady the camera, make handheld results at minimum focal distance pretty reliable.

It’s a wonderful lens and, barring a lottery win bringing exotica like a tilt-shift into play, the last lens I’ll buy.

1/100 sec, ISO 100, 100mm at F8

These were shot on full manual. The reflection from the flash is a little harsh, so the output on the second shot is reduced by 2/3.