New Bazooka

The Bazooka is dead, long live the bazooka!

My Sigma 150-500mm which has served me well for 6 years or so was on its last legs (optical stabiliser broken and the zoom locked on 150mm) so instead of a costly repair I decided to upgrade. The Canon 550D which is even older is still working fine but is so outdated that it too deserved an upgrade.

I like to keep with what I know so the new lens is a Sigma 150-600mm and the camera a Canon 77D. Both of these are relatively cheap but will offer a major improvement on my previous (not too bad) photographic endeavours.

From my first use I can see that autofocus is much faster, the lens is sharp at lower f stops meaning I can use much faster shutter speed and the exposure is significantly better. So, all in all it looks like I have chosen well whilst keeping within the budget of a poor bird guide :-)

Birding the last two days has seen a (relative) raptor bonanza. Yesterday at Årnestangen I had eight raptors of eight species (so not exactly numerous) and then added an extra species (Honey Buzzard) in Maridalen. Amazingly enough these species did not include Common Buzzard which is the commonest raptor in these parts! I did add Common Buzzard in Maridalen today though (where I had six raptors of five species) so ten species in two days ain't bad going. The species were White-tailed Eagle (a sub ad), Marsh Harrier, Hen Harrier (my first of the autumn), Osprey, Honey Buzzard, Common Buzzard, Peregrine, Kestrel, Sparrowhawk and Goshawk. Even though ten species is very good going there is still a chance for more as Hobby, Merlin and Rough-legged Buzzard should all be possible now and not to mention that Pallid Harrier..

Here are a few pictures taken with the Bazooka II. The light was pretty poor and I still haven’t got the hang of all settings etc but think it is going to be good.

male Southern Hawker (blågrønnlibelle)

Greylag Goose

Jay

mating Common Darters (senhøstlibelle)

a few Queen of Spain Fritillaries (sølvkåpe) are still going strong

this picture shows of a white bird in flight would not have been possible with the old bazooka

I was a bit rushed with this photo of one of Maridalen's two juvenile Black-throated Divers (storlom) which were having flying practice today. There has also been a juvenile Red-throated Diver together with an adult although these did not breed on the lake but close by on a small lake in the forest

Camera comparison

Friday the 13th gave me a good chance to test the bazooka (Canon 55D with Sigma 150-500mm) against the new superzoon (Canon Poweshot SX60HS).

The pictures here are uncropped

Superzoom

Bazooka

And these pictures have been slightly cropped



Powershot

Bazooka

 

And some pictures in terrible light of distant Ruff and a Dunlin. Both pictures are uncropped but as you see I have magnified a selection of each picture.

 

Powershot

Bazooka

So there is not much in it although the bazooka definitely under good conditions gives better quality pictures (see my recent pictures of the R-b Fly taken with the different cameras on different days) but with birds at some distance the superzoom often offers possibilities for a record shot that the bazooka may not have given.

The difference in size of the two cameras though makes the superzoom a much more birder friendly camera



Suddenly sun, sun, sun

Today was hot and guess what there were few birds…. Spring does this to us, one week all cloud and rain and then the next week all sun (temperatures are forecast to breach 20C). It would so much better if we could have a day of rain, a day of sun, a day of rain and so on.

The warm weather will mean that a lot of summer migrants will start arriving but there will be no big falls and viewing conditions at places such as Årnestangen will be challenging.

Today I had my first Whinchats in Maridalen and at Årnestangen. I took a trip up into Nittedal hoping to find the Slavonian Grebes that attempted to breed last year but their lake was full of flood water and didn’t look too attractive for them. The valley often has flood water which can be good for birds but I could see that farmers have done a lot of work to “improve” their fields so there was no water and the few Lapwings I saw looked as though they were having problems breeding.

At Svellet Greenshanks have just breached the 100 barrier (103) but there were fewer other waders. The water level actually fell 2cm yesterday and with just sun and warm weather forecast we can maybe hope for a gentle rise in water levels with Svellet remaining attractive to waders for at least two more weeks (fingers crossed).

The best birding of the day came sat down underneath Årnes Gård looking out over Snekkervika. Despite shallow water and lots of mud there were no waders or ducks here so my attentions were focused skywards. Six species of raptors were the result with 3 + Common Buzzards, 2 Ospreys, Kestrel, Sparrowhawk, Hen Harrier and Hobby. The Hen Harrier was hunting over distant farmland and was a ringtail but not necessarily the 2cy birds I saw yesterday. The Hobby was an early bird and my and Akershus’s first of the year. I was alerted to its presence by alarm calling Great Tits and found it directly over my head but failed to get anything other than a blurred picture.

I now have the bazooka back and must give praise to Sigma who repaired it free of charge under the extended guarantee given under Norwegian law. The small print spoke of any faults not being covered if the lens showed signs of external damage or dampness inside and given how well used the lens is I was fully expecting Sigma to draw the Get Out of Jail Free card but to their credit they didn’t. I will now try to do some direct comparison shots with the bazooka and the superzoom and compare them properly.

 

Svellet today and too blue skies

the first Whinchat (busksvett) of the year playing hide and seek unsuccessfully

Hobby (lerkefalk). JULES - does this count as a record shot?

The Lapwings (vipe) in Maridalen look like they have chosen a nest site

but I saw three of these beast roaming in the area so the odds are stacked against them what with farmers ploughing up their nest and the farmers cats eating their offspring

Maridalen and THE field today

Little Ringed Plover (dverglo) near Lillestrøm

golf playing Ring Ouzel in Nittedalen

Sparrowhawk at Årnes

Purchases and kit change

I posted not so long ago about what camera equipment I use but as you will have seen from my last two posts things have already changed.

My Sigma 150-500 has got stuck at its minimum aperture which isn't particularly useful. I took it in to find out whether it could be repaired half expecting to hear that it would cost more than the lens is worth but was surprised to discover that even though I bought it in Aug 2012 it was still under warranty so providing they find no evidence that the camera had been damaged externally (wouldn't be difficult with a camera used nearly every day in that period) then I will get it repaired free of charge.

I had however already made my mind up to buy a bridge camera/compact super zoom. After a week now of carrying around the much smaller and lighter 70-300mm I find it difficult to contemplate going back to the bazooka for everyday use. But equally importantly I have heard and read reports from other people and not least seen the photographic evidence that these new superzoom compact camera can take really good pictures and with optical zooms up to the equivalent of 2000mm they offer record shot possibilities that I have not had before.

I have chosen to stick with Canon and have bought a Powershot SX60 which has a 65 x optical zoom (1365mm equiv). I considered a Nikon Coolpix P900 which has an 83x zoom (2000mm) but this costs a lot more without getting much better reviews - except of course regarding the considerably larger zoom but I reckon 65x should be enough.

The cost of the SX60 in Norway is 4000kr ($485). If I had updated my DLSR and lens then I would have bought a Canon 100D and a Sigma 150-600mm at a combined cost of 14,500kr ($1760) which would have been a cheap alternative.
Time will tell how happy I am with my choice but for a quarter of price I have nearly tripled my zoom and now have a camera I can take anywhere.
I will post a review at a later stage when I've given it a good run for its money.
I can give one piece of advice now though for my Norwegian readers: don't buy from Scandinavian Photo - incredibly poor service and no right to return the product. Buy from one of the large electronic stores and have a 30 day no questions asked return option.

A new camera was not my only outlay. My Leica 8x42 are in need of a serious service and repair (the left prism no longer focuses as far as the horizon). The cost of the repairs would seem to exceed the value of the 14 year old bins so I decided a while ago that I would buy a new pair. Initially I was set on Swarovski (they have almost cornered the market such that you could think a birder isn't serious if he doesn't use their brand) but after talking to people who were not as happy with their bins as they were expecting (given the huge price) I decided to look at other makes (it must also be said that I gave up on Swarovski after their sales manager in Norway ignored my attempts to make contact).
So what have I chosen? Opticron Countryman 8x42 for under a third of the price of 'Ovskis. My initial tests reveal a binocular a better and lighter product than my Leicas and so far I am very happy with this purchase.

Here are some shots from Maridalen today showing what the camera can do in slightly better light than yesterday.



Maridalsvannet in wide angle 21mm



5 Mallard taken at 84x optical zoom (1365mm). They are where the arrow is pointing above

a Pink-footed Goose (kortnebbgås)

5 Curlew (storspove)

And here is another video. The video is what has impressed me most so far.

Equipment

When a man passes 40 (a fate that has recently befallen me) he starts looking at his equipment and begins to worry that it is not as large or impressive as it could be and isn’t capable of doing all the things he would like to with the birds. This requires immediate remedy and luckily enough I didn’t need to answer any of the spam emails I regularly receive in order to nearly double the size of my equipment. Mrs. Oslo Birder knew exactly how to bring me up to size and all it took was 15 minutes and a few thousand kroner and I am no longer a paltry 70-300mm boy but have become a 150-500mm man.

Even though I was quite pleased with many of the pictures I managed to take with my basic 70-300mm F4-5.6 Sigma lens my new 150-500mm F5-6.3 Sigma lens promises to greatly improve the quality of the shots I take. The new lens is still (relatively) cheap and cheerful but one great difference to the old one is that it focuses silently and quickly – so much so that I didn’t think it was working! Hopefully my improved size will result in better pictures on the blog.