Hi Markus,
I'll preface this by saying that I've only had an SLR for less than four
years and am far from being an expert on the subject. I have taken a lot
of bird photos in that time though, and none of them were taken with
lenses longer then 200mm (here are some recent ones
http://photosynth.ca/photo/f/birds/index.html ). When I was starting out
I really wanted to get one of those cool looking 400mm lenses, but after
much research I decided to go against most of the advice that I had
found (that being to get the longest lens that you can afford regardless
of very limiting maximum aperture), and got a K 200mm f2.5 ($300us) and
a 2x TC instead. I am very happy that I did so because, though the image
quality with the TC on may not be quite as good as a real 400mm, this
setup offers much more versatility, is the same speed and length (with
the TC) for a comparable price, and most of all, it's fast (without the
TC). For the kind of light that a lot of wildlife photography is done
in, a lens's speed can be more important than its length. Plus, if you
decide that you really want to get into wildlife photography and buy a
bunch of good glass, it's still an essential piece of kit and will never
really need to be upgraded.
Hope this helps,
Francis
P.S.
I think lens speed is rather underrated on the PDML. Though it seems
like one stop is fairly insignificant, it actually doubles the amount of
light getting to the sensor and thereby reduces motion blur by 50%.
Markus Maurer wrote:
Hi Pentaxians
I do not have a "real" tele lens for bird photography but would like to try
to get some cormorant shots soon and therefore seek for your advice:
I understand that around 400-600mm on film would be a good start for such
big birds, do you agree?
Anyway, all I have at the moment is listed below, the flashes I own will not
be powerful enough for more than 12-20 meters fill flash. I'm prepared to
invest in a better lens when I like that kind of photography but for a
start:
Which lens or combination would be the best for that task, I know that all
of the combinations will be rather slow?
a very old Soligor 350mm F 5.6 M42 tele
Tamron SP 70-210 3.5-4 + Tamron SP 1.4
or Tamron SP 2x converter
Pentax M 200mm + Pentax A 2xS converter
Pentax A70-210mm + Pentax A2xS converter
or still the Tamron SP 500/8 mirror lens despite it's shortcomings?
Or just forget about bird photography with that poor equipment?
thanks for any recommendations
greetings
Markus
