April marked the 2 year anniversary of The Zen Birdfeeder blog. That was when I really started taking pictures of birds, for use in the blog but also for our store website and for marketing materials. And I've been digiscoping since May 2007. Here's a recap of the equipment I'm currently using along with some brief comments:
CAMERAS
Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ10PP
A 4.0 megapixel point and shoot camera. Its 12x optical zoom Leica DC Vario-Elmarit lens is equivalent to a 35-420mm/f2.8 lens. This has been my primary camera since 2003 when 4 megapixels was considered a lot! The Leica lens sold me on this camera.
Note: Many of the bird images I take with this camera look a little "washed out". This is due to the fact that I take the majority of my pictures from inside the house through windows. Double pane, and more recently, TRIPLE pane windows. As long as I continue to use my house as one great big blind, this is the price I'm going to have to pay regardless of the camera.
Sony Cyber-shot DSC-N2
This pocket digital camera is my digiscoping camera. It has a Carl Zeiss 3x zoom lens and carries 10.1 megapixels. The Zeiss lens sold me on this camera, and the large touch-screen LCD display is especially helpful when digiscoping.
SCOPE
An older Nikon Sky & Earth Series spotting scope, 15-45x, 60mm objective lens. It's a smaller scope, but I like the close-focus capabilities of it. It has been my scope since I started digiscoping in May 2007.
ACCESSORIES
DIGISCOPING MOUNT
Vortex Universal Digiscoping adaptor (size small). Allows mounting most pocket sized digital cameras to a scope. Available in small or large size (based on diameter of the scope's eyepiece).
I often just leave the Sony camera attached to the adaptor, making it fairly easy to add the camera to the scope.
TRIPOD
Bogen 3001 legs. Many years old, very sturdy. Somewhat short for straight scope (need to extend center post), but height is fine with angled scope.
Bogen by Manfrotto RC-128 Micro-Fluid Tripod Head. I love the smooth movement of the tripod head.
I've been generally happy with my equipment but have been increasingly impressed with the photography I've been seeing on many other blogs. I've also been fairly happy with my digiscoping attempts to date, some of which are shared in my Flickr photostream and also on this blog.
Here's my first-ever digiscoped image, a male Rose-breasted Grosbeak taken May 15, 2007
And here's my most recent digiscoped image, a Gray Catbird taken July 8, 2009.
So I've decided it's time to make some upgrades to my equipment. Here's what I want to accomplish:
1) Upgrade my primary camera to a DSLR. Purchases lens or lenses not to exceed 400mm focal length.
2) Upgrade my spotting scope.
3) Use my DSLR to digiscope.
I will continue to use my existing (a) tripod head, (b) tripod legs, and (c) pocket digital camera (though it may be relegated to snapshots and used less for digiscoping - we'll see).
So instead of buying a camera and choosing a scope, I will use the Vortex Razor scope as the foundation of my search for a new DSLR camera - in other words, I'm building my camera set-up from the scope up.
I will document my process and progress on my blog, my discoveries and frustrations, successes and failures alike. Many people want to digiscope but don't know how and where to start. Online resources are sometimes difficult to understand, using trade terms that everyday people like me don't quite get. I hope to muddle through that jungle and share it with you in laywoman's terms.
And I welcome - no, I REQUEST your involvement in the process. Your comments, suggestions, and warnings, etc., will become an important part of the discovery process. Some of you may have already been down this road; if so, please share your experiences. Others may be photography and camera geeks (I mean that in a good, complimentary way!); if that's you, speak up!
Join me in my journey by following my blog updates. Subscribe to a feed or get notified by email of my blog updates. I will add all these posts to my "Digiscoping" Category (scroll down on the left side for a Category listing) so they'll all be easy to find.
My thanks to the folks at Eagle Optics who helped put the new scope in my hands. My next post will be about my initial impressions of this new Vortex Razor scope.
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