So last night I took about an hour out of my evening to chase around a bunny rabbit. They are really really hard to even find in the dark much less get close enough to take a picture. Their extremely round eyes make flash photography almost impossible because of the redeye. I was about 5 feet away when I took this picture. It is the best one yet but they weren’t exactly ideal conditions. I shot this at ISO 3200 because of the distance to the subject. I think I need a better beamer to get a little bit more reach out of my flash.

I just bought a second hand Canon 2x teleconverter for my telephoto lens so that I can have a little bit more reach for my wildlife photography until I can finance a bigger lens. I have done some research on it and it seems like most of the info out there is fairly subjective so I hope that things turn out well. The most common complaints are that the lens will become slower, softer, and show less contrast. But that is true when you put a UV filter in front of your lens. This baby is optical quality glass that should perform wonderfully. I will leave a review when I learn more.

Here is another picture from this last summer. I purchased a cheap Canon 80-200 lens for 80 bucks at Walmart and found it to perform like a champ. The lens was not the fastest or most accurate at focusing but the optics are fantastic for the price. This picture was taken in the middle of a summer sun shower. The backlight makes for an amazing quality of light and it highlights only some of the leaves in the background. In the full size version you can see raindrops streaking across the frame.

I cant wait for Spring to be back…

Last Saturday I helped put on a fun program for Winona State University called The Bowling Extravaganza. The University rented out an entire bowling alley and hosted a private event for all of the students that attend the University. I brought my camera with to capture some of the action and to play with my flash and some of the cool features.

The 580EX has a neat stroboscopic function where it can create short and fast bursts of light to create a kind of time lapse stop action effect all in one picture. When using this feature you want to make sure that you use a slow shutter speed with a steady camera and a fast moving subject.

I am still trying to learn the best combinations to make the correct exposure in certain situations. When I am successful I will be sure to post my results. I don’t know what kind of applications this would have other than showing bullet paths in mid air or showing the movement of a basketball player going up for a basket. Actually that is pretty sweet.

I am looking forward to my time off for Thanksgiving Break this next week. I could really use the time to recoup some lost energy.