Cape Porpoise Maine

By the dock. It was empty when we arrived. 

Our 2nd day in Maine was stormy. After arriving the day before and deciding to just stay indoors the rest of the day, we decided to drive around the area and explore. Weather wasn't cooperating but it really didn't matter. We were determined to take some photos of the area no matter what. So I packed up my camera gear and off we went. I packed my bag with the 5D MK2 and my favorite lens for landscapes...my 17-40mm f/4 L.

Lobster cages everywhere...Maine isn't called the lobster capital for nothing.

We went to this dock and started taking shots. There was no one there, we weren't sure if it was the weather or if it was something else. That didn't stop up from taking shots around though. It was overcast so I set my camera to aperture priority and set a wide aperture to keep up with a reasonable shutter speed.

Took this from the top of the dock to get the maximum view of the sky and the sea.

I zoomed in to 40mm to get this shot. It's not as wide as the other ones.

The temperature was around maybe 65 degrees and it was really windy. it was good we bought windbreakers with hoods before we went out. The rain was non stop. The shots show that the sky was really dark. 

The restaurant at the side of the dock. I guess the sell buoys too.

The other side of the dock. That building on the right I think is a restaurant.

After about an hour, we decided to wrap it up as our equipment were drenched in rain. Again, it's the perfect time to be using the weather sealed Canon L lenses. My wife was using a Canon Rebel XT with a 28-135 lens and that did survive the rain too. Although it's not really advisable to use non sealed equipment in the rain but I guess we were lucky.

Going around a dock in Kennebunkport Maine

One of my favorite first shots in Maine

So we arrived in Kennebunkport Maine and I have packed more camera equipment than clothes...very typical for photographers. We arrived in our cottage late in the afternoon and then walked around the downtown looking for a place to eat. I then found one of the docks near the restaurant where we had our first Maine dinner.

So I take out my camera, with the 17-40mm attached. and started to take shots. we just went on walking around the dock area looking for some interesting subjects to photograph. The 17-40mm f/4 L when attached to a full frame body gives you excellent point of views if you know how to compose properly. It's also an excellent lens to walk around with in any weather as it is weather sealed. It was raining a bit when I did these shots so the weather sealing was an excellent feature. 

It is the same boat as the one above, although I tried to capture the water reflection too at the bottom.

 I love taking pictures of docks and bridges because they are actually excellent in giving you nice perspectives.

Maine is an excellent place to capture marine photos. They have docks, boats, wildlife, and everything you can think of when it comes to the sea. I took advantage of that by taking with me wide angle lens, a telephoto and a super telephoto, and boy did I use all of them.

 Taken before we headed out for dinner that day.

A rusty piece of machinery. Gives the photo a bit of interest.

These are just the first batch of photos that I took. There are many more to come in my upcoming posts!

What has happened in June 2012

A ton of stuff has happened to me at the beginning of the month.

I got married to my fiancee of almost 4 years. I have pictures from that.
We went to Maine. I have pictures from that.
We went out for a whale watching tour. I have pictures from that.
We saw surfers by the beach. I have pictures from that.
I acquired a ton of new equipment. I'll review those, no pictures as of now.

Anyway, it has been a busy June for me. I had taken around 2800 photos from our last trip. When you go to Maine make sure you pack a ton of disk space like we did, and also a raincoat and a camera rain cover.

I'm in the process of processing all the photos that we took from the wedding and the trip. For now I'll leave you a lovely picture of one pretty scene we saw by the coast when we were on our trip.

Taken with my 5D MK2 with my 17-40L

A bloody hand and little people

Couple of months ago I entered a photo contest with an open subject. The contest was also judged by a single judge although the top 25 entries were to be picked by a voting public. The instruction was pretty simple...impress the judge with a simple but powerful image that catches the eye. I usually don't enter contests that are picked by a voting public at the same time free, as these two things together create a bit of a problem for photography contests. The thing is, I wanted to create a photo project for myself so I might as well enter it at the same time, so I chose to create this image and enter it.

The setup was simple. I needed a white background and lots of blood...fake blood that is. So I went to the grocery store for some ingredients. I got colorless syrup that acts like a base for the blood and red food coloring. I mixed them up together with water until I got the consistency that I wanted. Problem is, the blood looked transparent red, so I read online that to make it more realistic you add chocolate syrup which I did. I finished my blood mix and was ready to go.

So I went up the studio and prepared my shot. I prepped my light table and all the stuff that I will need. I bought some little people from the hobby store and arranged them around the jar that I'm using. 

Fot this shot I chose to use my Canon 100mm f/2.8 macro. It's the sharpest lens I own so that's a no brainer if I'm willing to get all the sharpness I want for the shot. I attached it to my full frame body and then attached a wireless shutter release. I then attach it to a tripod then pre focused on my jar. I then attached a wireless flash trigger on the body to trigger the lights. 

I used two lights on each side. The light on the left of my had acted as my main light and the opposite became the fill. I then overpowered the flash at the bottom of the table to overexpose the bottom of the table where my jar is located. I also did the same thing on the light behind the table to make the background overexposed. I then set my aperture to f16...the maximum I get without underexposing my shot. Then the shutter to 125th/sec. 

I then practiced some shots with the fake blood pouring out of my hand. I then chose the best one.

My entry didn't win. Although I had lots of fun doing it. 

More samples from my Canon 400mm f/5.6

A blue Heron diving for food.

So I've been really digging this Canon 400mm f/5.6 that I recently purchased. I have also purchased a carbon fiber monopod to basically use with it. The 400mm has a neat tripod collar that I use to attach it to the monopod. I've gone out to use it a couple of times to shoot birds in our local nature center, and usually I go home really happy. As I've said in my review, the 400mm f/5.6 has excellent focusing abilities. I activated the additional focus points on my Canon 5D MK2 to compliment the ai servo mode to capture birds in flight, and still works excellent with an aftermarket teleconverter attached.

A cormorant flapping its wings.

Robins are excellent to take pictures of. They are everywhere plus they are not so scared of people.

I caught this one with a fish in the birds mouth

The excellent focusing on the 400mm allows you to shoot birds in flight, slow or fast.

Most of these shots are cropped. Even when the images are cropped, the subjects still look pretty decent. The superb optics of the 400mm give you the ability to sharpen or crop your images with minimal image quality loss, even when paired with a teleconverter.

I think I'll use it more often this summer. I've never had this much birds shots since I started photography.

My first hummingbird shots

Fall of last year we went to our favorite botanic garden in Glencoe Illinois to take photos of the last blooms of the season. The weather was getting chilly and the flowers were on their last blooms. Also wildlife is starting to get rare, with a couple of birds and bees and animals going around gathering food to get ready for the cold winter. My friend from work told me a week earlier that hummingbirds are now frequenting some of the spots in the garden. I have never photographed a hummingbird in my life...this will be my first attempt. 

As soon as we got to the garden, we saw a bunch of photographers waiting for the birds. All brandishing their cameras of choice, from medium formats to point and shoots. My camera of choice was my 5D MK2 equipped with my favorite 70-200 IS USM f/2.8 with my Kenko 1.4x DGX 4 attached to it for the extra reach. The telephoto 200mm range will now become a 280mm...I think that'll be enough for what I'm gonna use it for. Of course my f2.8 lens with the teleconverter attached is now an f4 lens. Still not bad for the maximum aperture. We had plenty of sun that day which translates into faster shutter speeds for me. Excellent when capturing hummingbirds.

As soon as we get to one spot, 2 hummingbirds were already flying around. With hummingbirds you really have to have a very keen sense of hearing and sight. These birds aren't big enough to be noticed and they also fly really fast! The busy landscape of bushes and flowers doesn't help too as it helps to hide these little birds. 

I set my camera to aperture priority to let me set it to the maximum aperture that I can so I can have the maximum speed that my camera will allow me to have with the lighting conditions. I know I should've set it to shutter priority so I can specify my speed but it was getting darker in the late afternoon that I am not taking any chances with underexposed photos. I was thinking, it's better to get a blurred hummingbird picture than to get a very dark image of it. Next time I'll remember to bring a flash.

I handheld my camera waiting for the hummingbirds and managed to take some shots while they flew in front of me. 

This hummingbird just froze in front of me for about 4 seconds. Enough time for me to snap this. 

I was lucky with this one. The sun was shining directly into the bird that my camera allowed to have a 2000/sec shutter speed to freeze it in motion.

This season I have my longer 400mm ready for any birds that might come along. I'll be ready to take it with soon when I hear the hummingbirds are back in the gardens!

Canon EF 400mm f/5.6 L USM

The Canon EF 400mm f/5.6 L USM. One of the best lenses for birding.

It isn't sexy but it sure will find a way into your gear bag for birding.

One of the most popular starter super telephoto lens in the Canon lineup for birding is the Canon 400mm f/5.6 L USM. The reason is that this lens is somewhat on the cheap side which makes it great when you just start taking pictures of birds. It is way cheaper than the 70-200 2.8 IS USM L but it also has double the focal length...the downside is that the 5.6 aperture is pretty slow in some situations. Of course you can step up to the 400mm f/4 DO IS USM for around $5000-$6000. It's one stop faster and it also has image stabilization, though a lot of photographers who are just starting out in birding won't spend that much for a lens. In my opinion for $5000 more I'd get something longer than a 400mm, but of course, I don't have that amount of money right now and if I did I'd buy a car instead.

Having an f/5.6 maximum aperture and no image stabilization doesn't mean this lens is a slouch though.  This is actually one of the sharpest lenses I own. It comes from Canons L line which means it contains elements that minimize aberrations and other problems. L lenses also have excellent build quality...well most of them at least. This particular lens has excellent build quality. Similar to the 70-200 L but without the weight.

The 400mm compared to the 70-200 IS USM f/2.8 without the hood attached.

Notice the difference in the barrel diameters.

I ordered mine online, got it within 4 days. I was so excited when I opened the box and found this long lens inside it. In my hand it felt really skinny. I got so used to holding my 70-200 IS that this lens felt like half of the diameter of the 70-200. Looking at it made me realize that this lens isn't sexy at all. I decided to attach it to my 5D. 

Attached to my 5D MK2 with the hood unextended.

With the hood extended you can see the size difference.

On my 5D the lens looked really long and skinny. Although you can really tell how well built this lens is. It also does not weigh a ton. That is a plus when you are carrying this on a monopod or in your backpack on a birding tour...yes it fits on my regular Lowepro Flipside 300 bag. What's also awesome about it is the built in retractable lens hood. Now I don't have to worry about carrying that with the lens and taking a quick shot without putting the lens hood first, it saves you a lot of time for those emergency quick shots. The tripod collar that comes with it is one of those quick release ones that you can take off without taking off the lens from the body. Physically here are what I noticed about this lens:

Well built. 

Long and skinny.

Light.

Built in lens hood is perfect.

Quick release tripod collar is another plus.

No weather sealing gasket in the mount.

Yes...there is no weather sealing in the mount like other L lenses do. This is basically to keep off dust and moisture from entering the camera body through the mount. I'm not really worried about that as I'm not taking this to the amazon jungle to take shots, it's nice to have though but it really does not bother me. It also has a focus limiter on the side which allows you to set the focus to a particular distance. This prevents the lens from hunting in situations where it travels a lot from near to far trying to focus on a subject. This is a plus when you take photos of birds in flight or subjects where you are going to need all the speed that you have.

The AF and the MF switch on the side plus the focus limiter.

So I attached the lens to my monopod and off I went to take bird shots. The first birds I saw where ducks flying around everywhere. So I sat in one spot and waited for one to come across my field of view. For starters I set my focus mode to ai focus just to try out the lens accuracy in locking the focus to a particular subject. I set my camera to shutter priority at 1/800 sec. And of course 3 minutes later I have a duck flying across from where I was sitting down.

One of my first shots with the 400mm f/5.6.

Capturing birds in flight with this lens is pretty awesome. The USM really does its job in tracking fast moving subjects. for a 400mm lens, the focusing speed is actually faster than some of my lenses, and it's effortless, no whining or hunting at all. You have to consider the lighting situations when you shoot this lens. The more light you have, the better chances you have of nailing those shots. I didn't even have to limit my focus on most of my shots. With the USM motor, instant manual focus override is possible without switching to mf.

  Cormorants in flight. I was hiding under a tree when I snapped this.

 This egret knew of my presence and started to take off as soon as I approached it.

 Blue Heron hunting for food. 

 This bird didn't really mind me getting that close. It was hopping from one branch to another.

That's a bird house where this bird was standing. It didn't really bothered this bird that I got a bit close.

After a couple of days using this lens I found the lens strongest points. The USM focus mechanism is fast when tracking birds in flight...faster when the subjects are stationary. 400mm seems to be the perfect range in framing birds in flight...a bit short for small birds but otherwise perfect for medium and bigger sized birds. I was trying to find faults with the focusing system by adding an aftermarket Kenko 1.4 teleconverter to the lens but the lens still focused perfectly...and still fast. I did that with the 70-200 and I felt the significant slowness of the focusing, not with this lens though. The teleconverter slowed down the maximum aperture to f8, it is slow but when you have enough light f8 still can get you a fast shutter speed for birds in flight. I heard that the Canon teleconverters don't allow you to use autofocus with this lens with the 2x teleconverter, the 1.4 will only allow af with a 1D series camera on center point af. With an aftermarket 1.4 teleconverter the af still works...on all points, although I haven't tried it still with an aftermarket 2x teleconverter.

After a while of using it I have to admit I really love this glass!

A lot of people are afraid of buying a long prime lens basically because of the fixed focal length. It all goes down to how you are planning to use the lens. I didn't have a second doubt about buying a fixed 400mm because I am pretty sure myself that I am using this for birding. Being a prime lens has it's advantages like faster focusing and better image quality with the use of teleconverters compared to long zooms. I carry this in the field on a monopod and rarely regret not having a shorter zoom attached to my body. With birding, no lens is long enough...the longer lens you can afford, the better.

The The Canon EF 400mm f/5.6 L USM is not a perfect lens. It has its shortcomings like the slow maximum aperture and the aesthetics. If you're planning to buy this lens make sure you try out other options like the Canon 100-400 L IS USM. I went the prime way because I already have the Canon 70-200 f/2.8 IS USM and it's pretty much pointless for me to get another zoom within an almost similar range. Before buying make sure you understand the lens shortcomings. Attaching this to a monopod pretty much solved the non IS issue for me. That's a $50 monopod versus spending five grand on the IS version that's one stop faster. The L lens build quality makes this lens last for years basically retaining it's value till you are ready to upgrade to a longer lens.  Other than that this lens will be a great birding companion for years to come!