2023 Richmond Ospreys

April 11: Lots of activity at all 3 nests, but today was mostly an equipment test. All the shots from this date were taken with the Sony 200-600 lens with a 1.4 Teleconverter attached. Although I've owned the TC since buying the lens, I've never used it. The lens is relatively "slow" (long story), so I feared the TC would degrade the photo quality and also slow down focusing. I was very surprised by the captures. Focus was definitely a hair slower than without the tc, but not so much as to be irritating. The biggest issue seems to be photo detail. Many of these shots are similar to my friend, Mark's, since we were shooting next to each other. He shoots Canon and I shoot Sony, but otherwise the only differences between us were the lens used and a tripod. Mark's lens is a high quality "fast" prime. It's heavy and so Mark was using a tripod. My lens is much cheaper and lighter, and I'm terrible shooting off tripods, so I shot hand-held. The detail difference between our shots would be quite evident in a side-by-side comparison. Other differences as well, such as bokeh.

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