The Long View - a photo on Flickriver

The Long View

            I bought a new lens recently.  Well not a brand new one - we don't do that here - it was the result of a visit to a well known auction site; you know the one.  The purchase had been the result of a bout of indecision, mixed with spending too much time at home during the latest confinement to the local couple of square miles.  My boredom threshold is generally pretty high, but even for me the tedium was starting to cause a certain amount of fidgeting.  

I've had a certain distant view in mind for a while; one that needs a long lens.  Because it's almost an hour's drive away it's been off limits for the last nine weeks, but that should cease to be a problem quite soon - at that point I'll just need the right conditions on a weekend.   I'd also wondered whether I might start adding to my very substandard collection of wildlife images.  Last spring I had some fun trying to photograph the birds in the garden and concluded I needed a lens that stretched beyond my existing 200mm limit. The trouble is - and you'll know this if wildlife is your thing - that to get eye catching images of birds in flight you're going to need to part with a few bob for the right lump of glass to do so.  In fact the 100-400 I'd really like is going to cost more than my camera did, and I'm not convinced I'm going to use it anywhere near enough to justify hiding it in the back of the wardrobe and saying "That old thing?  Had it for years...." when interrogated on the subject by my domestic financial affairs manager.

And then this lens appeared on said auction site at an agreeable price - a price which was reduced by thirty pounds over a weekend of further dithering.  After watching one or two online reviews I reasoned that I could always try it and then part exchange it for the expensive one without losing too much if I wasn't happy with the results.  Lee reminded me that if I were mainly going to use it for landscape then it didn't really make a lot of difference.  Maybe it won't.  By all accounts it's wildlife where the differences are going to be most apparent.  I'm really not sure I'll ever have the patience to try and photograph birds in flight in any case.

So I've been out with it once already on the daily stroll.  Just the one lens on the crop body took up the full length of the bag.  Of course I've been leaving the tripod at home so shooting at 400mm was going to be a challenge even with the ISO pumped up.  Maybe I should have left the hip flask at home, but my attempts to photograph a buzzard flying low over us were a dismal failure.  As we stood on  a crest silently cursing the party who'd decided to stand within five yards of us despite the huge empty spaces all around, I trained the camera back up the valley towards the ruins that remain from the long closed Poldice Mine.  It was only when I looked at the results later that I noticed the soft palette, the light playing on the trees and the fact that there was no sky in the image.  It's a spot where we often linger and listen to the stream below and the birds all around us.  Despite having been here plenty of times before it will always be synonymous with lockdown for us.

I'm looking forward to getting this lens on a tripod soon, although it's going to need an accessory to get the best out of it.  Somewhere on the cliffs near here there's a remote shutter cable lying in the scrub - I've no idea where I lost it, the result of an over excitable afternoon before Christmas I think.  I'd better order a new one quick.

Happy hump day all!

Taken in: UK / England / St. Day / Tolgullow (show map)

Taken on: February 18, 2021

Tags:

Poldice

mine

Cornwall

100-400

Sigma

Sigma 100-400

ruin

Building

light

Kernow

bissoetrail

trees

winter

winter sun

England

Britain

Great Britain

outdoor

landscape photography

landscape

Tolgullow

Scorrier « less

Sets appears in: • Abandoned • Bissoe Trail

Groups appears in: • Cornwall Flickr Users • Flickr Social Club more » • Photography Week • Amateur Photographer Magazine • Flickr Social « less

Camera: Canon EOS 80D, f/7.1, 1/800 sec, 400mm, ISO 2500 (more info) (hide info)

Camera:	Canon EOS 80D
Lens:	100-400mm F5-6.3 DG OS HSM \| Contemporary 017
Aperture:	f/7.1
Exposure Time:	0.001 sec (1/800)
Focal Length:	400mm
ISO:	2500
Exposure Bias:	0 EV
Flash:	Off, Did not fire
Exposure Program:	Aperture-priority AE
Exposure Mode:	Auto
Metering Mode:	Partial
White Balance:	Auto
Color Space:	sRGB
Software:	Adobe Photoshop 22.2 (Windows)
Show full info

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