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Description

These two guys always came together, chased away even a Great Tit, and went for the seeds helping each other: while one guarded the scene, the other ate than they changed their roles. Clever! I was a bit suspicious for them, but not too much as they allowed me to go quite close. When I lifted my camera that was a puzzling event, but seeds are seeds—they kept picking. Brave little birds!

It is just usual for me, that there is a tech-related back story, too. Years ago I've tried my friend's Nikon Mirror 500 MC f/8 and I liked that this is a definitely difficult lens to use. So I've bought one, an even older version with single coating and even more difficult one (the C version instead of MC). I use(d) Canon cameras, so I had to get a Nikon-EF converter, too, and I had to cope with the lens that has fixed aperture, manual focusing (reversed to the Canon directions, though it is Canon that does it the unusual way), low contrast and Depth of Field as shallow as the thickness of a thin sheet of paper. Then I sold my beloved 7D and realized that my full frame camera cannot use this lens, because the mirror is blocked by the end of the lens. Cool.
So I went out and planned to experiment a bit with a macro extension ring that goes between the camera body and the lens, therefore the lens cannot block the mirror, and it worked. I had to kiss goodbye to the far end of the focus range but I can use this age old lens again. I took some close-ups of viburnum flowers when these two came to the feeder. And I gave it a try to shoot the almost impossible: shooting really agile birds with a manual focusing catadioptric lens that needs all the light the Sun could produce but won't provide any reference for the sharpness. But it will draw beautiful donut-shaped bokeh rings instead. "Pixels are for free" I lied myself and took some pictures. Here is one of the bests.

This image is my own work. Please don't claim, misuse, steal, publish, reblog, share. This image is copyrighted. Feel free to ask me if you want to use it for your own art. It never hurts and we can find terms of mutual benefits.

Description

These two guys always came together, chased away even a Great Tit, and went for the seeds helping each other: while one guarded the scene, the other ate than they changed their roles. Clever! I was a bit suspicious for them, but not too much as they allowed me to go quite close. When I lifted my camera that was a puzzling event, but seeds are seeds—they kept picking. Brave little birds!

It is just usual for me, that there is a tech-related back story, too. Years ago I've tried my friend's Nikon Mirror 500 MC f/8 and I liked that this is a definitely difficult lens to use. So I've bought one, an even older version with single coating and even more difficult one (the C version instead of MC). I use(d) Canon cameras, so I had to get a Nikon-EF converter, too, and I had to cope with the lens that has fixed aperture, manual focusing (reversed to the Canon directions, though it is Canon that does it the unusual way), low contrast and Depth of Field as shallow as the thickness of a thin sheet of paper. Then I sold my beloved 7D and realized that my full frame camera cannot use this lens, because the mirror is blocked by the end of the lens. Cool.
So I went out and planned to experiment a bit with a macro extension ring that goes between the camera body and the lens, therefore the lens cannot block the mirror, and it worked. I had to kiss goodbye to the far end of the focus range but I can use this age old lens again. I took some close-ups of viburnum flowers when these two came to the feeder. And I gave it a try to shoot the almost impossible: shooting really agile birds with a manual focusing catadioptric lens that needs all the light the Sun could produce but won't provide any reference for the sharpness. But it will draw beautiful donut-shaped bokeh rings instead. "Pixels are for free" I lied myself and took some pictures. Here is one of the bests.

This image is my own work. Please don't claim, misuse, steal, publish, reblog, share. This image is copyrighted. Feel free to ask me if you want to use it for your own art. It never hurts and we can find terms of mutual benefits.