Saturday, February 12, 2005

New 70mm to 300mm Nikkor lens



I'm still weak from being sick, so my family and I decided on a nice mellow day at the Aquarium as our Saturday outing. I was excited because it would be my first chance to use my new Nikkor lens. I shot 94 pictures outside in overcast light; I had to keep the aperture open in order to shoot at hand held speeds. Of the 94 shots, about 20 came out. I had a very hard time with the auto focus. It seemed to focus behind my subject. I tried different settings, and got different results. Manual Focus proved to be a little awkward; all of them were of poor quality. My biggest complaint was focusing time; it took 3 or 4 seconds to reach an acceptable focus. I’m sure I’m doing something wrong.

This shot is of my son from about 20 feet away and tight. He is holding two lorikeets in the outdoor aviary. I like the results I got in this series, and in a a few other similar shots. (like the one below).


I had forgotten what a pain it is to change lenses. I’m going to have to get back in the habit. I don’t even have a good camera bag anymore. I went fishing for an old camera bag, but the one I found looked like something M.C. Hammer would have carried, so I had my wife stick the new lens in her purse.

3 comments:

Johnny C said...

I borrowed a friends nikon once, that had a similar lens. I found it difficult to get good shots without manually focusing either. So I would only use it for basic shots of scenery and it seemed to do the job well. a lot of my b/w came out better too. I prefer to switch from a small 30mm closeup lens for portaits, to a telephoto lens for action, or colorful nature shots. Each lens reacts different to light and appature settings. Those seem like good results. I wonder if night shots will come out good with your new lens?

Oh and you should check out amazon for some nice camera bags.

Anonymous said...

Pretty Lorikeets!

Get a camera bag. We (wives) hate it when you (husbands) stick crap in our purses! Do we look like a pack mule? ;)

- Princess Kimberley

Anonymous said...

BTW, one thing about lorikeets...

I almost rescued a lori, until someone told me that they are projectile poop squirters. EEEWWW!

- Princess Kimberley