In the Field

Just Wingin' It! Findlay Creek, BC, Canada. June 20, 2005.

So...how fast is the autofocus on YOUR longest lens? That's what I was wondering about when I shot this image of a dragonfly in flight using my 200-400 zoom lens (300 to 600 mm equivalent in SLR film terms). To be honest, I was skeptical that I could capture these fleety flyers with this monster lens, but I was more than happy to find out I was wrong!

This dragonfly was one of many that were flitting about above our ornamental pond just outside our house. On occasion they'd hover for about a full second before flying off. Unfortunately, you could never guess where they were going to stop and hover, so to get this shot I had to try to keep the dragonflies within my viewfinder until they chose to stop for an instant. It was AMAZINGLY difficult to do, especially with such a long lens (fortunately I was using my velvety smooth Wimberley gimbal tripod head to support the long zoom). Anyway, I took probably 100 images of the dragonflies that afternoon and most were, of course, just blurry messes. But more than a few came out surprisingly well. So, I had some fun, practiced my "keep the moving object in my viewfinder and in focus" technique, and walked away with some interesting images. I would never have tried this if I was shooting film with a price tag of about 50 cents per shot!

Behind the Camera

Just Wingin' It! Findlay Creek, BC, Canada. June 20, 2005.

Digital Capture; Compressed RAW (NEF) format; ISO 200.

Nikon D2X with Nikon 200-400 mm f/4G ED-IF AF-S VR lens @ 400 mm (600 mm equivalent with digital conversion factor) supported on Gitzo 1348 carbon fibre tripod with Wimberley head. SB-800 flash (fill) with Better Beamer Flash Extender mounted on Really Right Stuff flash bracket. VR turned to "On" and in "Normal" mode.

1/250s @ f5.6; -0.67 stop exposure compensation from matrix-metered exposure setting; balanced i-TTL flash exposure with -0.3 stop compensation on SB-800.

At the Computer

Just Wingin' It! Findlay Creek, BC, Canada. June 20, 2005.

Details to follow.

Conservation

Just Wingin' It! Findlay Creek, BC, Canada. June 20, 2005.

Ten percent of the selling price of this image (Limited Edition Print or Stock) will be donated to Wildsight.

Information to follow.