In other news, the telephoto lens arrived today. It's big. A big honking huge lens. In case you're also looking for a telephoto lens, it's a CrystalVue SharpShooter and I bought it from ckcpower.com because they threw in the adapter ring for free. The instructions (which are cursory at best, although I appreciate an instruction sheet including the sentence "That is about all.") say it includes a rubber eye ring for use as a monocular lens. Because you know, I've always wanted a monocular lens.
It was late, dark and rainy so I didn't even try to see how far it can zoom, but I did get a nice shot of a bunny in the yard. I should have gotten a shot without the telephoto so you could see the difference. You'll just have to take my word for it, the bunny was really far away.
The only bummer about the telephoto is that it absolutely cannot be used without a tripod. The lens unbalances the camera, making it impossible to hold it steady in my hands. Plus the focus is so tight that the camera needs to be really steady. I tried bracing the camera against a fence (this is my favorite trick for getting photos in low light) but it was no good, with the extra weight on the front I couldn't hold it still enough. I even had some trouble keeping it steady on the tripod! The ground was soft from the rain and the tripod kept shifting. But I had read a trick for steadying tripods that really worked: rest one hand on the apex of the tripod (where the three legs meet) and pull down hard, while pressing the button lightly with the other hand.
Luckily the bunny seemed to have the "freeze" response much better than the "flight" response: he sat perfectly still the whole time I was outside working on this. He made it much easier to get the shot.
It's nice that the lens arrived so fast because maybe I can use it for my photography class homework. We're supposed to take photos that address our "personal lighting challenge." Well, my personal lighting challenge is that I don't know a damned thing about lighting. I don't know enough to have a personal challenge. So I thought I'd just take some random photos and see what lighting problems occur. Maybe I'll go to the park and take surreptitious photos of people with my new lens. Is that unethical? I'm not going to publish them or anything. Well, I probably will post them here.
What I really want is for the owls to come back so I can get a nice crisp zoomed in photo of them. Maybe I could put raw meat scraps on top of the neighbor's treehouse where they were before. I kid.
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