A New Camera Lens, A Sigma 150 to 600 mm telephoto

                    (Whooper and sandhill zoomed in on the computer from the image below)

 I decided that I would purchase a larger lens for our Canon T5i camera. After all we spend so much time using it to take images of birds and bears but they often lacked the resolution when they were far away. Saving up my “Mad money”,

I went mad and bought a Sigma 150-600 mm telephoto lens, (there are better lens out there but I don't have eleven thousand dollars).

                                                    (whooper crane and sandhill crane)

Lenses have changed a lot.

                                                   (ever seen a whooping crane do yoga)

This one required me to also purchase a docking station, which hooked up to the computer, allowing me to update the latest software in the lens. Yup, the lens has writable software.

                                                                    (sandhill cranes)

When the lens arrived, I was surprised at its size and weight.

                                                               (vermillion flycatcher)

                                                           (juvenile eastern meadowlark)

It still allows me to take images/pictures off hand, as long as I have a fence post or something, I can rest it on. I got lucky and found, thanks Betty, a heavy-duty tripod so I will use the tripod when the situation allows.

Of course, the weather the next day was foggy and so I had to wait for the sun to peek through before I would expose the camera lens to the elements.

                                                  (rosette spoonbills displaying for a female)

Renita agreed to be my spotter and drove over to the Big Tree area on a quest to take images of birds.

I decided to use the auto focus settings, something I do not often do anymore, and let the camera decided the iso, shutter speed, etc., etc., etc.

                                                         

                                          (whooping cranes landing, note tag on left bird's leg)

There are so many possible settings that that you can change manually, and you can even rewrite the software, (Not for a while yet).

Luckily, the sun stayed out and the birds cooperated. I am extremely pleased with the first day’s images! I am already looking forward to seeing bears and I must remember to stay at least 10 feet away, lol. Clear skies