Hi John and everyone,



I agree generally with what John says here.? One of my frustrations at times has been when people see a big lens and say, 'wow, with that equipment, you must get great pictures.'? No...it's the combination of the equipment and the knowledge of the photographer.? However, for bird photography, to say?that a great photographer using 'cheap equipment' will get good bird pictures is absurd.? Let me pick a good point and shoot camera without appropriate features and give it to Art Wolfe - and I will bet my house?he will get virtually zero?usable bird photographs unless the bird is sitting on his windowsill (or he's digiscoping with a highly capable scope and probably a scope mount).? He certainly isn't going to get usable photos of a Golden Eagle 5 00 feet up a cliff in less-than-optimal light.? Ditto with a hyperactive warbler 50 feet away in a thicket popping in and out of dappled light.?



You certainly don't need the absolute top of the line equipment to do bird photography, but without a certain minimum set of capabilities, even excellent photographers are going to find themselves frustrated?with the results because of the nature.? Every photographer needs to learn how to use the capabilities of their equipment ?to get the most out of it, and the lack of appropriate knowledge isn't limited to people with high-end gear.? I've run into photographers who went out and bought a Canon Rebel for general photography ?because they wanted a 'changeable lens' camera, and after talking to them it was clear they didn't?even understand the difference between aperture and shutter priority, let alone some of the more advanced features of the gear.? In general, my experience has been that people who spend in excess of a couple grand for camera equipment also spend a lot of time learning how to use it.?



Reiterating what I said in the first post, camera equipment comes in a huge range of capabilities and related expense .??With appropriately skilled photographers?(which I emphasized in the first post), the better the equipment, the higher the percentage of good shots will be had.? What is your personal?tradeoff between capabilities and budget?? How much time are you?really going to spend doing photography and how does that factor in? ? Several years ago, I documented the first nesting of a species in central Oregon in 40 years.? Even with a 16-meg camera back, shooting in RAW and applying skilled post-processing, it was all I could do to get usable images out of the marginal images captured.? Anything less than the gear I had with me on that trip would have resulted in an interesting sighting report that would have been met with skepticism because it was a highly unexpected sighting by one person ?and would not have been documented photographically.



For anyone who wishes to dispute the incremental benefits of better gear , I would propose an in-the-field experiment.? Let's take someone with an off-brand, non-autofocus 100-400mm slow zoom and an older 5 or 8 ?megapixel digital SLR, handheld, out to the Samish Flats while the Peregrines are still hunting Dunlin.? Their counterpart will have a 500mm prime Canon with a 1.4X teleconverter fast ?autofocus lens on a tripod with a Wimberley head and a 16-megapixel camera back with four or eight frame multiple shot mode .? We'll shoot?in-flight images for a morning and do a comparison of the best ten or fifteen shots after editing and basic post-processing from each photographer ?at the end of the morning and compare results.? I know who my money's on.





John Tubbs

johntubbs at comcast.net

www.tubbsphoto.com






----- Original Message -----
From: "John Puschock" <g_g_allin at hotmail.com>
To: tweeters at u.washington.edu
Sent: Saturday, March 13, 2010 1:56:37 PM GMT -08:00 US/Canada Pacific
Subject: RE: [Tweeters] camera gear


Howdy all,

While equipment certainly helps, I have to say, at the risk of sounding curmudgeonly, that the eye and technique of the photographer is still the most important element in getting good photographs.? A good photographer with cheap equipment is almost always going to get better results than a less-skilled photographer with top of the line equipment.? You certainly don't need the best and latest equipment to get great photos.? I know a part-time pro photographer that uses a Canon 40D and the 100-400mm Canon lens.

No offense intended to anyone, but it seems to me there's been too much emphasis on equipment over the past few years.? I'm still surprised by the number of photographers that I see in the field with the latest pro equipment.? There's nothing wrong with using a Canon Rebel (a few people on the interwebs claim that some of the Rebels have image quality as good as the 7D, though they're saying this as a knock against the 7D) and something smaller than a 500mm f/4 lens.? As others have said, you have to determine what you want to do with the camera.? If you just want to confirm identifications or take pictures for your own personal enjoyment and you aren't too picky, a point-and-shoot, either by itself or used for digiscoping, is probably the way to go.? Keep in mind that it's difficult to bird while carrying around a huge lens on a tripod.? One reason I use a 400mm f/5.6 is that I can hand-hold it and leave it hanging from my shoulder when not in use.?? That frees up my hands to quickly lift my binoculars when needed.

I'd only recommend getting the really expensive stuff if you find yourself limited by what you already have.? If you're convinced you want to get into the "art" aspects of bird photography but aren't already invested in a SLR system, get a decent lens and one of the cheaper DSLR bodies and see how you like it.? Nikon may be beating Canon in image quality at the prosumer price point, but for the budget-conscious, I'd still recommend Canon.? I believe they have a better selection of affordable (relatively speaking) lenses.

One more thing: if you're sharing your photos with others, editing is crucial.? I often say the only difference between a good and bad photographer is that the good one knows what pictures to get rid of.? No one wants to see 10 pictures of the same bird, with the only difference being that its head is tilted slightly differently in each one.? Pick just one or two of your best.

If you're still reading this, you may want to check out my blog.? I had been using a 30D but recently got a 7D, and I've started reviewing it.? Go to http://zbirdtours.com/blog and click on "Canon 7D" on the right side to see the entries.? I've been slacking off on writing more entries, but I'll be doing some more soon.? I promise.?

John Puschock
Wedgwood, Seattle
g_g_allin at hotmail.com
http://www.zbirdtours.com & http://www.birdtreks.com






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