Toronto Zoo
Toronto Zoo was awesome! We decided to leave Friday night (October 8), sleep in a motel with a good nights sleep and be at the zoo first thing in the morning. We spent both Saturday and Sunday there. I had pulled a muscle in my upper back a few weeks before and it was still really bothering me and was worried I would not last long carying a 500mm lens, tripod and a flash on a flash bracket and I use a battery pack for my flash. It all ads up in weight, especially when your walking all day, so that's why I wanted two full days, And I ended up doing pretty good with Nick carying the rest of my gear, so I had a great time. Even with two days I did not cover everything I wanted, There is over 16,000 animals including invertebrates and fish. I did get most of the animals I planned, except for one and it is the one shot I have a place on my wall for, I have wanted a photo of a Mandrill for a very long time. I love the colors on the face of these baboons and a portrait would have been pretty cool but, the african rainforest pavilion was closed for renovations so I did not even get to see one. I plan to go to the zoo every year now so I will eventually get that shot.
I'll post a few photos a day, so far I have edited 16 shots but I'm not sure how many I'll post yet.
I hope you like them, this was my first time at a Zoo.
I'll post a few photos a day, so far I have edited 16 shots but I'm not sure how many I'll post yet.
I hope you like them, this was my first time at a Zoo.
Holiday Beach
A few more shots from Holiday Beach
Turkey Vulture grooming it's feathers
Immature Sharp Shinned Hawk
The Bull Frog ( Rana catesbeiana )
When we arrived at Holiday Beach one day we seen this boy fishing, so I just had to get this photograph.
Sigma 150-500mm f5-6.3 AF APO DG OS HSM Telephoto Zoom Lens
Well, since I have had some time getting used to the Sigma 150-500mm lens, I have found it to be fairly good. For the money, if you were to buy a 500mm lens from, well lets say a brand name like Canon, Nikon, Sony. First, what camera you use, you would have to buy that make of lens for the mount to fit your camera, these, in especially the 500 range, are very expensive. Say around $5.000 and up. Then there is another choice, Third party lens companies such as Sigma or Tamron. I have never owned any tamron lenses, so I cannot give an opinion, although I have read good things, Now Sigma I have in the past owned a 24mm sigma back in early 1990 and I still have it although it is in a drawer with so much of my older equipment and it was a manual lens, I loved that lens.
Now I have this new Sigma lens and have been using it and I really love the zoom from 150mm. I use it so often and find I am not limited to one focal length. The quality, well I would not rate it a 10 but, 10 would be a prime $6.000 dollar lens and would not be fair at all to compare. A 500mm lens with hyper-sonic motor (HSM), and mine is so quiet, I cannot hear it. Optical Stabilizer OS-1 and OS-2, OS-1 is for normal handholding and steadies up and down movement. OS-2 is for panning, for birds in flight, aviation or even sports. APO, Apochromatic, refers to corrections for the fact that light colors have
different wave lengths and therefore focus in different planes.
the lens designer utilizes apochronatic correction to correct for this, and it is a DG lens, DG is a coating Sigma puts on there new lenses so they are ready for digital.
the lens designer utilizes apochronatic correction to correct for this, and it is a DG lens, DG is a coating Sigma puts on there new lenses so they are ready for digital.
Now all this for around a $1.000 dollars, and I know I said I would not rate the image quality a 10 but if you practice good photographic skills such as a Tripod and or proper hand holding technique in the proper lighting, you will get awesome results, so I give it a solid 8.The only thing that makes this lens more difficult to use is the fact that it has an aperture of only f5-6.3, so you need lots of light.I do recommend this lens for anyone on a budget, and as far as sigma goes, I will be buying the 10-20mm lens soon. I found some good prices on the 150-500mm lens if anyone is interested in buying one. I got mine on amazon and paid a little more than this about five months ago. But I do recomend shopping around a little more, there still could be sales at other places on Amazon.
500mm, 1/160sec, f 11, ISO-400, on
a Manfrotto tripod, fill flash was also
used.
The Hawk Festival
I really enjoyed going to the hawk festival at Holiday Beach. They tagged and released a variety of bird species. I took photos of some of the birds.
American Redstart
Red Eyed Vireo
Warbler
Holiday Beach Conservation Area
It only took a half hour around the pond and we saw three different Water Snakes, frogs, Butterflies a Mink and so much more. I love that place. One day I stalked a Blue Heron around the other pond which is south east from the Hawk Tower, for about two hours, they really don`t like people. I would creep up, and it would take flight to the other side of the pond, so I got up and went to the other side. I think he got tired of it and just kept walking by me near the end. I`ll never forget as I pressed the shutter button it looked at me while tilting his head from side to side.
This Northern Water Snake was just swimming about one foot from shore, it looked to be about 2 and a half feet in length.
The Milksnake is listed as a "specially protected species" in schedules of the Fish and Wildlife Conservation Act, 1997. This Act prohibits hunting or trapping of this species, and it cannot be kept in captivity unless special permission is obtained from the Ministy of Natural Resources for the purposes of research or conservation management. I have not found one yet to photograph.
Northern Crescent (Phyciodes selenis)Well, I've been doing nothing but working and taking photos. The last month or so I have been spending most of my weekends at Holiday Beach. I did go to Point Pelee once for an entire day from sun up to sun down, photographing American Redstarts. But the rest of my bird photography has been at Holiday Beach.
So I thought I would start posting some of the pics I've taken lately, it is still Migration time and will be for a couple more months yet, so I will still be doing it full force.
So here I'll post this pic of an Eastern Screech Owl I took at Holiday Beach. I have to get up for work tomorrow so that's all I have time for right now, Tomorrow is another day so check in then and I'll start posting more photos after work later in the evening.
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