CAMERAS and LENSES

Cameras

The cameras I have used, in sequence, were Canon EOS 400D, 50D and currently 7D, with a few early shots taken on my wife's 350D.   I am not sufficiently expert to discuss their various merits and there are plenty of sites that do present that expertise, so I am not going to try.   Suffice to say that I am currently very happy with my Canon 7D.   It is a massive improvement on the 50D, both in terms of autofocus in use and image quality produced.   I have no current aspirations for further upgrades.

Lenses

One of the purposes of this site is to gather information on equipment and methods and to share that information.   I started taking digital photographs of birds and insects in 2007 with a Canon 100-400 IS f4.5/5.6 lens.   This was an excellent starter lens for both birds and active insects.   In the past twelve months I have upgraded my lenses to get better results.   For moths removed from my MV trap, in a fairly passive state, and for active insects I now use a Sigma 150mm f2.8 macro lens.   This gets me in closer and is sharper than the Canon 100-400 zoom lens.   For birds, the 100-400mm zoom lacks reach, though it is useful for flight shots and for opportunist pictures where a big lens is not practicable.   I agonised over uprgrading my main bird lens for ages and promoted some discussion via this site; my sincere thanks to those who corresponded.   Partly as a result of the encouragement from these correspondents, I took the plunge and bought the Canon 500mm f4 IS USM lens, which I now use either alone or with the 1.4x extender.   You will see from the galleries on this site the improvement in quality that this lens has produced.