No More Mud Patterns ... And Lots of Used Canon Gear

What’s Up?

The clouds covered the sun early on Tuesday morning. I could not resist photographing the large colt family on the small hill next to the bathroom building. I was home and back to work by 7:30am. I answered lots of e-mails, worked on some images, and worked hard on some Used Gear Business. I did my bursts, my swim, and my founder exercises. I thought that my walk would be cancelled by rain, lightning, and thunder. But the storm was past and I headed out at 7:30pm. Only two words can describe my walk: delightfully cool! I saw two Great Horned Owls, the second one was perched in the dead tree in my backyard!

Today is Wednesday 23 June 2021. The weather is calling for cloudy and still to start with more thunderstorms and a high of only 87 degrees. I may or may not go out for a while to look for some flowers. I am getting excited about heading up to Jacksonville on Sunday for the sold-out 4-DAY JAX Mini IPT. I am expecting great things, as long as we do not get stuck on the beach! Wherever you are, and whatever you are doing, I hope that you too have a great day.

This blog post took more than an hour to prepare and makes 179 consecutive days with a new one. Please remember that if an item — a Delkin flash card, or a tripod head — for example, that is available from B&H and/or Bedfords and is also available in the BAA Online Store, it would be great if you opt to purchase from us. We will match any price. Please remember also to use my B&H affiliate links or to save 3% at Bedfords by using the BIRDSASART discount code at checkout. Doing either often earns you free guides and/or discounts. And doing so always earns my great appreciation.

New Listings

Canon EOS 5D Mark IV with Grip

Sold first day of listing!

BAA-friend, botanist “Bug” Bob Allen, is offering a Canon EOS 5D Mark IV body in excellent condition for $1549.00. The sale includes the front cap, one Canon Battery LP-E6N, the Canon single Battery Charger LC-E6, the Canon USB cable, and the Canon BG-E20 Battery Grip (a $199.95 value), and insured ground shipping via major courier to lower-48 US addresses only. Your item will not ship until your check clears unless other arrangements are made.

Please contact Bob via e-mail. Please use the Subject Line: “BAA sale” and include the name of the item.

What can I say? The 5D IV was my favorite ever Canon digital dSLR. I owned and used three of them while my 1DX II sat on the shelf in my garage for the most part. A new 5D Mark IV, with its 30.4MP full-frame CMOS sensor, sell new for $2499.00. If you have been dreaming of a 5D IV (with the grip), grab Bug Bob’s camera body right now and save more than $1K! artie

Canon Extender EF 1.4x III

BAA-friend, botanist “Bug” Bob Allen, is offering a Canon Extender EF 1.4x III in excellent condition for $349.00. The sale includes the front and rear lens caps and insured ground shipping via major courier to lower-48 US addresses only. Your item will not ship until your check clears unless other arrangements are made.

Please contact Bob via e-mail. Please use the Subject Line: “BAA sale” and include the name of the item.

As regular readers know, I use and depend on teleconverters more than any other photographer: on big trips with Canon, I traveled with three 1.4X TCs and two 2X TCs! artie

Canon EF 24-105mm f/4L IS USM Lens

BAA-friend, botanist “Bug” Bob Allen, is offering a Canon EF 24-105mm f/4L IS USM Lens in very good condition for $549.00. The sale includes the front and rear lens caps and insured ground shipping via major courier to lower-48 US addresses only. Your item will not ship until your check clears unless other arrangements are made.

Please contact Bob via e-mail. Please use the Subject Line: “BAA sale” and include the name of the item.

Short zooms lenses in the class can be used to create a great variety of B-roll images: bird-scapes, scenics, Urbex, detailed mini-landscapes, people and photographers, and quasi-macros. Whenever I leave my 24-105 in the car, I rarely walk 100 yards without wishing that I had opted to put it in my vest. Best advice? Don’t leave home without them! Heck, today’s featured image was created with my SONY 24-105m. Bob’s Canon lens, the original version, currently sells new for $999.00 at B&H; you can save a handsome $450.00 by getting in touch with Bob. artie

Canon EF 100mm f/2.8L Macro IS USM Lens

BAA-friend, botanist “Bug” Bob Allen, is offering a Canon EF 100mm f/2.8L Macro IS USM lens in very good condition for $949.00. The sale includes the front and rear lens caps, the lens hood, the Canon Tripod Mount Ring D (this $174.95 value item requires a separate purchase when you buy the lens new). and insured ground shipping via major courier to lower-48 US addresses only. Your item will not ship until your check clears unless other arrangements are made.

Please contact Bob via e-mail. Please use the Subject Line: “BAA sale” and include the name of the item.

This go-to, super-sharp macro lens sells new at B&H for $1299.00 and does not come with the tripod collar (included with Bob’s lens). This package is a bargain at $949.00. artie

Re-Runs

Canon EF 75-300mm f/4-5.6 USM Lens

BIRDS AS ART Record-low Price!
Price Reduced $10.00 on 15 AUG 2020

Long-ago IPT veteran Art Leyenberger is offering a Canon EF 75-300mm f/4-5.6 USM zoom lens in near-mint condition for a BIRDS AS ART record low $99.00. The sale includes the original box, both lens caps, and insured ground shipping via major courier to lower-48 US addresses only. Your item will not ship until your check clears unless other arrangements are made.

Please contact Art via e-mail or by phone at 973-476-6559 (Eastern time zone).

This compact lenses features a versatile 4X telephoto range and a fast, quiet AF motor and is characterized by its light weight. It is well-suited for a variety of subjects, including portraiture, nature, sports, and travel. A Super Spectra coating has been applied to individual elements to reduce lens flare and ghosting in order to achieve high contrast and accurate colors. Additionally, it features a seven-blade diaphragm to produce smooth and pleasing bokeh. It is designed for full-frame Canon EF-mount DSLRs but can also be used with APS-C models where it provides a 120-480mm equivalent focal length range. If you are looking for an inexpensive starter lens for a child or grandchild, you will have struck gold with Art’s 75-300! B&H

Canon 100mm f/2.8 Macro USM lens (with a great extra!)

Art Leyenberger is offering a Canon EF 100mm Macro USM lens in near-mint condition with a great extra for the silly low price of $349.00. The sale includes the original box, the front and rear lens caps, a near-mint Kenko Auto Extension Tube Set DG (36mm, 20mm, 12mm) for Canon EOS lenses (a $129.90 value), and insured ground shipping via major courier to lower-48 US addresses only. Your item will not ship until your check clears unless other arrangements are made.

Please contact Art via e-mail.

This, the original non-IS version of this hugely popular, very sharp macro lens, was Denise Ippolito’s favorite for many years. It is great for flowers and bugs large and small. The tripod collar for this lens requires a separate purchase. This lens, still in production, sells new at B&H for $599.00 (though it is currently on back-order). The IS L version II sells for $1299.00, artie

Only at BAA: Levered-Clamp FlexShooters in Stock!

We have just one Levered-clamp Flex-shooter Minis left in stock. They are available in the US only from BAA. I ordered another dozen yesterday …

Folks with a big lens should, of course, be working with the Levered-clamp Flex-shooter Pro. This new head on just about any decent tripod like the Induro GIT 304L or the Induro 204L (for travel), is dead-solid-perfect for those whose intermediate telephoto or telephoto zoom lenses are their workhorse lenses for bird and nature photography, for all macro lenses with a tripod collar, and for wide angle lenses with a Wimberley P-5 Plate on the camera body. The levered-clamp is super-fast and secure. Though it weighs only 1lb., 2.4 ozs, this elegantly manufactured head is rock-solid. It takes only seconds to level all FlexShooter heads for smooth, square-to-the-world panning, and these innovative and patented spring-counterbalanced double ballheads will completely eliminate ballhead-flop.

We have lots of Levered-clamp Flex-shooter Pro heads in stock. Though they are the best head around for long lenses and for general purpose nature, B&H does not even carry them! I use and rely on mine most ever day that I am out there.

Please Remember

With income from IPTs now close to zero, please, if you enjoy and learn from the blog, remember to use one of my two affiliate programs when purchasing new gear. Doing so just might make it possible for me to avoid having to try to get a job as a Walmart greeter and will not cost you a single penny more. And if you use Bedfords and remember to enter the BIRDSASART code at checkout, you will save 3% on every order and enjoy free second-day air shipping. In these crazy times — I am out at least forty to sixty thousand dollars so far due to COVID 19 (with lots more to come) — remembering to use my B&H link or to shop at Bedfords will help me out a ton and be greatly appreciated. Overseas folks who cannot order from the US because of import fees, duties, and taxes, are invited to help out by clicking here to leave a blog thank you gift if they see fit.

New and Better Bedfords Discount Policy!

You can now save 3% on all of your Bedfords photo gear purchases by entering the BIRDSASART coupon code at checkout. Your discount will be applied to your pre-tax total. In addition, by using the code you will get 2nd day air shipping via Fed Ex.

Grab a Nikon AF-S Teleconverter TC-14E III and save $14.99. Purchase a Canon EOS R5 and your discount will be $116.97. Purchase a Sony FE 600mm f/4 GM OSS lens and save a remarkable $389.94! Your Bedford’s purchase no longer needs to be greater than $1,000.00 for you to receive a discount. The more you spend, the more you save.

Money Saving Reminder

Many have learned that if you need a hot photo item that is out of stock at B&H and would enjoy free second-day air shipping, your best bet is to click here, place an order with Bedfords, and enter the coupon code BIRDSASART at checkout. If an item is out of stock, contact Steve Elkins via e-mail or on his cell phone at (479) 381-2592 (Central time). Be sure to mention the BIRDSASART coupon code and use it for your online order to save 3% and enjoy free 2nd-day air shipping. Steve has been great at getting folks the hot items that are out of stock at B&H and everywhere else. The wait lists at the big stores can be a year or longer for the hard to get items. Steve will surely get you your gear long before that. For the past year, he has been helping BAA Blog folks get their hands on items like the SONY a9 ii, the SONY 200-600 G OSS lens, the Canon EOS R5, the Canon RF 100-500mm lens, and the Nikon 500mm PF. Steve is personable, helpful, and eager to please.

Gear Questions and Advice

Too many folks attending BAA IPTs (remember those?) and dozens of photographers whom I see in the field and on BPN, are–out of ignorance–using the wrong gear especially when it comes to tripods and more especially, tripod heads… Please know that I am always glad to answer your gear questions via e-mail

This image was created on 30 May 2021 on the edge of the marsh to the left of the pier at ILE. I used the hand held Sony FE 24-105mm f/4 lens at 38mm and The One, the Sony Alpha 1 Mirrorless Digital Camera (Body Only). AUTO ISO 1600. The exposure was determined by Zebras with ISO on the rear wheel: 1/80 sec. at f/5.6 (stopped down one stop) in Manual mode. AWB at 6:56am with some clouds on the eastern horizon. Tracking: Expand Spot/AF-C was active at the moment of exposure and performed perfectly. Click on the image to enjoy a larger version Image #1: Dried Mud Patterns

Dried Mud Patterns

I created this image on the same morning that I photographed the intricately constructed Black-necked Stilt featured in the blog post here. With the same gear. The patterns in the mud had been grabbing my attention for several days as the water levels dropped during the month of May.

Today, this same mud flat is covered with six inches of water … Thus — as expected — sealing the fate of the stilts that attempted to nest.

This image was created on 30 May 2021 on the edge of the marsh to the left of the pier at ILE. I used the hand held Sony FE 24-105mm f/4 lens at 38mm and The One, the Sony Alpha 1 Mirrorless Digital Camera (Body Only). AUTO ISO 1600. The exposure was determined by Zebras with ISO on the rear wheel: 1/80 sec. at f/5.6 (stopped down one stop) in Manual mode. AWB at 6:56am with some clouds on the eastern horizon. Tracking: Expand Spot/AF-C was active at the moment of exposure and performed perfectly. Click on the image to enjoy a larger version Image #1A: Dried Mud Patterns — Sliver EFEX Pro (Push Process N+3.0)

Black and White

After I optimized and saved the image, I brought it into Silver EFEX Pro II, part of the Nik Collection. I scrolled through the 37 presets. * 012 — Push Process N+3.0 looked pretty neat so that is what I went with. Do understand that I am not well versed in anything having to do with B&W.

Your Favorite?

Which image do you like best, Image #1 with a bit of color, or Image #2, the B&W version? Or both? Or neither? IAC, please let us know why. That is the only way for me to learn.

Designing and Creating Pleasing and Dramatic Natural History Images A Video Webinar: $30 by electronic download Order your copy by clicking here.

Designing and Creating Pleasing and Dramatic Natural History Images

A Video Webinar

In this 1 hour 28 minute plus video you will learn and be inspired. We cover everything from the very basics to the fine points. After a brief bio, the topics include Behavior, Action, Diagonal Lines, and the Cuteness Factor; Birds in Flight — The Holy Grail of Bird Photography; Mis-Framing!; Basic Image Design/HORIZONTALS: Get the subject out of the center of the frame. Basic Image Design/VERTICALS: The center of the frame is generally fine; The Importance of BACKGROUND; Isolating the Subject; Other Elements of Composition; On Getting Low; Going Wide for Bird-scapes; Super-tight!; Working in Sunny Conditions; Working in Cloudy Conditions; Working in Foggy Conditions; Working in the Shade; Working in Bad Weather; Creating Back-lit Images; Creating Silhouettes; and Creating Pleasing Blurs.

Each segment of the program consists of an average of about 15 images that will drive home the points being made, educate you, and inspire. The instructions and advice, given clearly and concisely, are based on my near-38 years of experience photographing birds with telephoto and super-telephoto lenses. And on several decades of creating educational blog posts.

This presentation is based on the webinar that I did for the South Shore Camera Club in April. You can find some of the comments below along with comments from two of the folks who viewed the webinar the night before the DeSoto IPT began.

You can order your copy of Designing and Creating Pleasing and Dramatic Natural History Images/A Video Webinar by clicking here or by calling Jim with your credit card in hand at 863-692-0906.

Typos

With all blog posts, feel free to e-mail or to leave a comment regarding any typos or errors.