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| Osprey with prize catch! James River, Newport News, VA (click to enlarge) Olympus E-M1 Mark III; 300mm f/ PRO lens; 1/2000th sec. @ f/4.5; ISO 400 |
The other day I learned there is a Bald Eagle nest within one mile of our new home. I was told the distance from which you can view the nest is quite far and really too far to photograph. That said, I chose my m4/3 gear to try to photograph an eagle since I have the greatest flexibility with that gear as well as the longest potential focal lengths of all three systems I own.
Additionally, it is that time of year to find the local ospreys feeding. As the wind was strong out of the east, I knew of a place where the osprey feed and where I could stand so that the ospreys would fly right right to me while 'fishing.' I was off to see what I could find.
I did find the eagle's nest and it is, indeed, really too far away to photograph short of a 2000mm or so lens. Hmmm—a challenge I thought. I set up my large, heavy but very stable Induro 400 series tripod, mounted my Olympus 300mm f/4 PRO lens on it and then placed my Olympus MC-20 2x tele-converter between it and my E-M1 Mark III. A remarkable combination.
I located the nest high up in a distant pine tree. Not long after setting up my camera and lens, the male eagle flew in and landed right on the top of the tree in which the next is located. Using my best technique, I made quite a few exposures of the eagle as he turned his head in first one direction, then another. The morning sun was bright and coming from my left.
What you see below is quite remarkable, in my opinion. Remember, I'm using a "tiny" micro4/3 20mp sensor. One can't possibly make good photos with a sensor so small. And, add in a 2x tele-converter. That is a recipe for photos that are subpar and unsharp. Or so 'they' say.
In this image the full frame equivalent field of view was 1200mm but then I cropped the image file down from 20mp to 1.42mp. I then enlarged the file by 2x in Topaz Gigapixel and cropped some more. I'm not saying this image would make a great 8' x 10' print, but it does okay for these kinds of displays.
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| Bald Eagle (click to enlarge) Olympus E-M1 Mark III; 300mm f/4 PRO lens + MC-20 2x tele-converter; 1/500th sec. @ f/9; ISO 320; Full Frame Field of view 1200mm; cropped from 20mp to 1.4mp. As I mentioned in the text, this eagle was really far away and I wanted to see if my tiny m4/3 gear, along with all of the great technology in editing software, could eeek out a decent image. What do you think? |
After photographing the eagle, I drove to Newport News to see if ospreys were feeding. I sat in my vehicle for about 45 minutes until one showed up for lunch. Here are some additional osprey images from the same 'fishing' spot as the image at the top of this post. I've seen as many as 8 ospreys at one time fishing in this one spot. The exposure information is the same for all of the osprey images as I had my camera set on manual.
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Too bad I didn't have a full frame camera. I realize that the puny m4/3 gear can't handle birds if flight, wildlife, etc. even if more and more professional wildlife and bird photographers seem to be switching over to the format because of the size, weight and quality of the telephoto lenses as well as the quality of the images the cameras are capable of producing...he says tongue-in-cheek.
It was a good day and I chose the right gear for my photographic mission.
Thanks for looking. Enjoy!
Dennis A. Mook
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Dennis, the eagle does work, at least on screen.
ReplyDeleteAlso, I think you've mentioned that you don't do enough bird photography to consider yourself accomplished, but I think your osprey shots look really good.
Thank you Jim. I keep working on improving my wildlife and bird photography skills. What I did differently here, for the first time, is used the entire screen full of focus points on my 1.3 and C-AF and found the camera locked on the ospreys quickly and tracked the ospreys all over my viewfinder. About 90% of my images were in sharp focus. I’ve never tried the mode before and it worked much better than I thought.
DeleteNice work. Too bad you didn't have full frame sensor and a 10 pound lens. :) I tried a full frame camera and lens combo for grandkids sport this spring. Back to the EM1 III and 40-150 2.8. None of the parents seem to mind the shots I give them not being from a "real" camera.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the laugh. Micro4/3, in my opinion, works so much better for me in most situations than full frame and I’m not able to discern the difference in the final image.
DeleteDennis, you are seriously tempting me to get the m4/3 gear! Shame on you! And my GAS thanks you!
ReplyDeleteRudiger, if you do and spend the money, it’s not my fault! Lol. Thanks.
DeleteAmazing! I see lots of guys down by the river with their huge cameras and lenses trying for photos of ducks and herons. I feel tired just looking at them. :) (I use a full frame camera, but with nothing longer than 85mm on it, and usually compact 28mm or 50mm lenses).
ReplyDeleteOn a January photo outing to photograph birds, I used my Z7 and the Nikon 200-500mm f/5.6 lens. I had forgotten how large, heavy and unwieldy it is when compared to the nimble Olympus gear. The interesting thing about the two is that I have a higher hit rate and a more enjoyable experience with the Olympus gear and there is little or no difference in the quality of the images.
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