New Species: Fan-tailed Vulture! Why No Teleconverter?

What’s Up?

Early on Wednesday, I tried some pre-sunrise Cattle Egrets-leaving-the-roost blurs from the pier with some interesting results. But nothing spectacular. A quick drive-around did not turn up much in the way of birds, so I headed for the always-dependable vulture trees. Conditions were perfect for flight, but the vultures were not in much of a flying mood. I did some perched vultures and came up with a few interesting frames, including and especially today’s featured image. The color at sunset was gorgeous as the sun peeked in and out from behind some clouds on the western horizon. But very few birds flew by the pier until after the sun was down and the color had faded. None-the-less, it was a peaceful way to spend a half hour.

Today is Thursday 30 December 2021.The forecast for the morning is for foggy then partly cloudy turning sunny with a gentle breeze from the south. I will surely head down to the lake for a least a bit. The female eagle continues to sit low on her nest, incubating her clutch. If you would like some In-the-Field instruction at either ILE or Lakeland on Friday, Saturday, or Sunday — the weather looks good for all three mornings, shoot me an e-mail or try me on my cell at 863-221-2372. Please leave a message and shoot me a text if I do not pick up.

Wherever you are, and whatever you are doing, I hope that you too have a great day. This blog post took about two hours minutes to prepare, including the time spent on the image optimization. This post makes 50 consecutive days with a new one.

Please remember that you can find some great photo accessories (and necessities, like surf booties!) on Amazon by clicking on the Stuff tab on the orange/yellow menu bar above. On a related note, it would be extremely helpful if blog-folks who, like me, spend too much money on Amazon, would get in the habit of clicking on the Amazon logo link on the right side of each blog post when they shop online. As you might expect, doing so will not cost you a single penny, but would be appreciated tremendously by yours truly. And doing so works seamlessly with your Amazon Prime account.

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, is also available in the BAA Online Store, it would be great, and greatly appreciated, if you would 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 for your major gear purchases. Doing either often earns you free guides and/or discounts. And always earns my great appreciation.

Your-Pick In-the-Field Sessions

The beauty of the Your Pick In-the-Field Sessions plans below is that I am free most days from now till mid-January and we can schedule sessions to coincide with the perfect weather forecast. They are ideal for central Florida locals or folks visiting the region for whatever reason. Interested? Get in touch via e-mail or better yet, try my cell at 863-221-2372. Please leave a message and shoot me a text if I do not pick up. Inquire for couples and group rates.

Indian Lake Estates In-the-Field Sessions

Two hours of intensive instruction: $300.00. Add a working brunch with image review: $100.00. Sunset shoot: $100.00. Guest room lodging available. Mix and match.

Sunny mornings with east winds are best. Likely subjects include ridiculously tame Sandhill Cranes along with Black and Turkey Vultures, Crested Caracara, Limpkin, Great Egret, Great Blue Heron, and more. Bald Eagle possible; crane chicks coming soon.

Lakeland or Circle B Bar Preserve

Two hours of intensive instruction: $325.00. Add a working brunch with image review: $100.00. Mix and match.

Sunny mornings with east winds are best at Lakeland. Likely subjects include point-blank American White Pelican, Anhinga, Limpkin, Common Moorhen, White Ibis, a variety of wintering ducks including Ring-necked and Wood Ducks, and lots more.

Cloudy mornings or afternoons (shooting session only) are best at Circle B Bar Preserve. Likely subjects include Great Blue Heron, Great Egret, Little Blue Heron, Snowy Egret, Tricolored Heron, White Ibis, Common Moorhen, Osprey, Red-shouldered Hawk, American Alligator, Wild Boar, and more. If you wish to mix and match, loving at ILE is available.

Sony Alpha 1 Bodies in Stock at Bedfords/free card offer!

Steve Elkins of Bedfords let me know late yesterday that he had several Sony a1 bodies in stock. If one of them has your name on it, please click here and be sure to enter the BIRDSASART coupon code check the box for free shipping to enjoy free Second Day Air Fed-Ex. Right now, in lieu of the 3% credit refunded to the card you used for your purchase, you will receive a Sony 160GB CFexpress Type A TOUGH Memory Card, a $399.99 value!

Brand New and As-Good-As-Ever Bedfords BAA Discount Policy

Folks who have fallen in love with Bedfords can now use the BIRDSASART coupon code at checkout to enjoy a post-purchase, 3% off-statement credit (excluding taxes and shipping charges) on orders paid with a credit card. The 3% credit will be refunded to the card you used for your purchase. Be sure, also, to check the box for free shipping to enjoy free Second Day Air Fed-Ex. This offer does not apply to purchases of Classes, Gift Cards, or to any prior purchases.

Money Saving Reminder

Many have learned that if you need a hot photo item that is out of stock at B&H and would like to enjoy getting 3% back on your credit card along with free 2nd Day Air Fed-Ex 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 check the box for Free Shipping. That will automatically upgrade to free 2nd Day Air Fed-Ex. Steve has been great at getting folks the hot items that are out of stock at B&H and everywhere else. The waitlists 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 a 1, 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.

Important Note

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Please Remember Also

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Gear Questions and Advice

Too many folks attending BAA IPTs 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. If you are desperate, you can try me on my cell at 863-221-2372. Please leave a message and shoot me a text if I do not pick up.

This image was created on 29 December 2021 down by the lake near my home at Indian Lake Estates, FL. While standing at full height, I used the no-longer available GIT305XXL Grand Series 5 Stealth Carbon Fiber Tripod/Levered-Clamp FlexShooter Pro-mounted-Sony FE 600mm f/4 GM OSS lens and The One, the Sony Alpha 1 Mirrorless Digital Camera). ISO 1600. The exposure was determined by Zebras with ISO on the rear wheel: 1/3200 sec. at f/4 (wide open) in Manual mode. AWB at 7:41:39am on a clear sunny morning. Tracking: Spot S AF-C Bird Face/Eye detection performed perfectly. Be sure to click on the image to enjoy a higher-res version. Image #1: The Photo Mechanic screen capture for the original Turkey Vulture preening primary feather image

Photo Mechanic Screen Capture

Note how much I have exposed to the right. Then compare the washed out original with the richly colored optimized image below, Image #1B. Note also the relatively large crop. If you compare the color in 1A with the color in 1B, you will see that I reduced the YELLOWs considerably while striving to leave the early morning light look. I did some of that reduction during the raw conversion via the Color Mixer tab, and some after the conversion by going Command J/Command U to bring up the Hue/Saturation dialogue box and then choosing YELLOWs from the drop-down menu. All (and tons more) as detailed in Digital Basics II.

Shutter Speed Question

Why do you think that I was at 1/3200 second when I could have easily dropped down to 1/1600 second at f/5.6 and double my depth of field? There are actually two reasons …

Why No Teleconverter?

The question has been around forever: are you better off adding a teleconverter (TC) to get more pixels on the subject or shooting your bare super-telephoto and then cropping? As regular readers know, I have long been a big fan of TCs. But with the incredible image quality of sharp Sony Alpha 1 files, I am now somewhat on the fence. And today’s featured image is one reason why. But there are more. Using the bare lens and then cropping will allow you to work at the wide open aperture. This gains you one full stop of either shutter speed or ISO as compared to losing one stop when you add the 1.4X TC, or losing two stops with the 2X TC. In addition, it is a lot easier getting the whole bird in the frame so as to avoid clipping wings, heads, and tails.

The huge advantage of working without a TC is that it is far easier to make sharp images than it is when adding a TC. Why? Gear shake errors are a factor of the square of the focal length. Add the 1.4X TC to your super-telephoto lens and sharpness problems will almost double. With the 2X TC, your gear shake errors are magnified by a factor of four.

With today’s featured image, I could have gotten a lot closer, but doing that would have increased my angle of inclination. Thus, I opted to stay well back, leave the 1.4X TC in my pocket, avoid shooting up at a steep angle, and then crop. See the result immediately below, Image #1A.

This image was created on 29 December 2021 down by the lake near my home at Indian Lake Estates, FL. While standing at full height, I used the no-longer available GIT305XXL Grand Series 5 Stealth Carbon Fiber Tripod/Levered-Clamp FlexShooter Pro-mounted-Sony FE 600mm f/4 GM OSS lens and The One, the Sony Alpha 1 Mirrorless Digital Camera). ISO 1600. The exposure was determined by Zebras with ISO on the rear wheel: 1/3200 sec. at f/4 (wide open) in Manual mode. AWB at 7:41:39am on a clear,sunny morning. Tracking: Spot S AF-C Bird Face/Eye detection performed perfectly. Be sure to click on the image to enjoy a higher-res version. Image #1A: Turkey Vulture preening primary feather

The Optimized Image: Fan-tailed Vulture

There has been a preening Turkey Vulture on the tippy-top perch of the dead tree for a week. I am not sure that it has been the same bird, but I would not be surprised if that were the case. Anyhoo, I have created hundreds of images of preening vultures on the same perch over the past few days. This one, with the tail spread so beautifully and a nice view of the bird’s head, was the best by far.

Tracking: Spot S AF-C Bird Face/Eye detection performed perfectly. Be sure to click on the image to enjoy a higher-res version. Image #1B: The RawDigger screen capture for the original Turkey Vulture preening primary feather image

Fine-tuning Your Exposures

When you work with the same subjects day after day, often in the same light, evaluating your raw files in RawDigger allows you to fine-tune your exposures to perfection. With the vultures, it is important to expose as far to the right as possible to open up the darkest feathers so that they reveal the fine feather detail. But you need to do that without burning (over-exposing) the very light-toned bill tip of the Turkey Vultures or toasting the legs of either species. RawDigger has enabled me to do that consistently.

In the screen capture above, note that there are a total of 822 OvExp pixels. Out of 51 million, that is close to zero. By enlarging the image, I was able to see that the Pink OvExp warnings were on the very bright shafts of three feathers. Those were eliminated easily during the raw conversion by moving the Highlight to the left. All in all, I would call this a perfect exposure.

RawDigger — not for the faint of heart …

Nothing has ever helped me learn to create perfect exposures to the degree that RawDigger has. I think that many folks are reluctant to learn that most of their images are underexposed by one or more full stops and that highlight warnings in Photoshop, Lightroom, Capture One, and your in-camera histogram are completely bogus as they are based on the embedded JPEGs. Only your raw files tell the truth all the time. Heck, I resisted RawDigger for several years … Once you get over that feeling, RawDigger can become your very best exposure friend no matter what system you are using. On the recent IPTs and In-the-Field sessions, we have demonstrated that fact. Convincingly.

The RawDigger (pink) Adapted Histogram

In the RawDigger e-Guide, you will learn exactly how to set up the Adapted “pink” RawDigger Histogram and how to use it to quickly and easily evaluate the exposure or raw file brightness of images from all digital cameras currently in use. RawDigger was especially helpful to me when I struggled with R5 exposures and when learned my new camera body, the Sony Alpha a1.

RawDigger e-Guide with Two Videos

The RawDigger e-Guide with Two Videos

by Arthur Morris with Patrick Sparkman

The RawDigger e-Guide was created only for serious photographers who wish to get the absolute most out of their raw files.

Patrick and I began work on the guide in July 2020. At first we struggled. We asked questions. We learned about Max-G values. We could not figure out why the Max G values varied by camera system. IPT veteran Bart Deamer asked lots of questions that we could not answer. We got help from RawDigger creator Iliah Borg. We learned. In December, Patrick came up with an Adapted Histogram that allows us to evaluate the exposures and raw file brightness for all images created with all digital camera bodies from the last two decades. What we learned each time prompted three complete beginning to end re-writes.

The point of the guide is to teach you to truly expose to the mega-Expose-to-the-Right so that you will minimize noise, maximize image quality, best utilize your camera’s dynamic range, and attain the highest possible level of shadow detail in your RAW files in every situation. In addition, your properly exposed RAW files will contain more tonal information and feature the smoothest possible transitions between tones. And your optimized images will feature rich, accurate color.

We teach you why the GREEN channel is almost always the first to over-expose. We save you money by advising you which version of RawDigger you need. We teach you how to interpret the Max G values for your Canon, Nikon, and SONY camera bodies. It is very likely that the Shock-your-World section will shock you. And lastly — thanks to the technical and practical brilliance of Patrick Sparkman — we teach you a simple way to quickly and easily evaluate your exposures and raw file brightness using an Adapted RawDigger histogram.

The flower video takes you through a session where artie edits a folder of images in Capture One while checking the exposures and Max-G values in RawDigger. The Adapted Histogram video examines a series of recent images with the pink histograms and covers lots of fine points including and especially how to deal with specular highlights. The directions for setting up the Adapted Histogram are in the text.

If we priced this guide based on how much effort we put into it, it would sell it for $999.00. But as this guide will be purchased only by a limited number of serious photographers, we have priced it at $51.00. You can order yours here in the BAA Online Store.

Typos

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