photo sharing and upload picture albums photo forums search pictures popular photos photography help login
Tom Grey | profile | all galleries >> Birds - Trips >> Birds - Los Banos, CA, January 2004 tree view | thumbnails | slideshow

Birds - Los Banos, CA, January 2004

Pictures taken on a trip to Merced and San Luis NWRs, areas in the central Valley of California specializing in winter waterfowl, cranes, swans, ibis and the like. A first serious outing with my new lens, a Canon 300mm f4 IS, plus 1.4x extender.
American Bittern
American Bittern		 Bald Eagle
Bald Eagle		 Greater White-fronted Geese
Greater White-fronted Geese		 Loggerhead Shrike
Loggerhead Shrike
Northern Pintail
Northern Pintail		 Red-tailed Hawk, adult
Red-tailed Hawk, adult		 Sandhill Crane
Sandhill Crane		 Sandhill Cranes
Sandhill Cranes
Savannah Sparrow
Savannah Sparrow		 Snow Geese
Snow Geese		 Tricolored Blackbird
Tricolored Blackbird		 Tundra Swan
Tundra Swan
Turkey Vulture
Turkey Vulture		 Western Meadowlark
Western Meadowlark

comment | share
Tom Munson19-Jul-2005 03:17
Terrific galleries Tom, Thanks for sharing.
Tom Grey07-Feb-2004 13:56
Hi Mark -- I'm delighted with the Canon 300 lens. It works for bird photography for me because I'm mainly looking to post on the web, which allows for pretty drastic crops. It might even work nearly as well used without the 1.4x extender -- you'd have to crop more, but the lens gives some extra sharpness, some extra focusing speed, and one more stop. On the other hand, for printing, the pros seem to be looking for full-frame pictures, and for that, I guess that super-expensive big glass is really necessary. Tom
Les Chibana 05-Feb-2004 18:53
Tom, very nice shots! I think your camera data leaves out the fact that your DRebel provides an additional 1.6X factor because the sensor size. So, for a 35mm film SLR comparison, the focal length is actually 672mm, not 420mm. I guess this information isn't necessary for the exif data.

Les Chibana
Mark Paxton 05-Feb-2004 17:58
Tom,

Loved the pictures! Seeing what you did with 300mm and a 1.4 inspires me to consider giving it a shot. I've been eager to do bird shots, but felt hamstrung by the buy-in costs of big glass. That had me thinking about digiscoping, but I still prefer film as a medium for a variety of reasons. Some very nice work. Thanks for posting to SBB.
Mark
click on thumbnails for full image