How I wish I had a 1.4x teleconverter mounted!
I was shooting birds in flight at a mangrove area in San Juan, Batangas, way back in July 2009. Light was low and I needed the brightest aperture I can come out with, so I mounted the bare 500 f4 IS on the 5D MII.
Certainly not my intended subject, this bird flew in and started foraging among the foliage near my position. It was very active in nature, hence I had to shoot right away with whatever gear I have set up, no time to add a TC.
Philippine flowerpeckers are quite very small, with the largest just around four inches in total length. In this lilliputian family, the tiniest is the Pygmy Flowerpecker at circa 3 inches total length.
Despite the deficient focal length used, there’s still enough detail left after massive cropping for a decent-sized web display, or for small prints. As posted here, the bird should appear a bit larger than lifesize on a 96-dpi display.
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Pygmy Flowerpecker (Dicaeum pygmaeum, a Philippine endemic)
Habitat – Forest, edge and second growth.
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Shooting Info - Pinagbayanan, San Juan, Batangas, Philippines, July 14, 2009, Canon 5D MII + EF 500 f4 IS, 500 mm, f/4, ISO 800, 1/800 sec, 475B/3421 support, manual exposure in available light, major crop. And here’s the full frame (resized to 800×533) from which the version above was cropped, showing the extreme detail gathering capability of the 5D MII’s 21 MP sensor. |
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Uncropped full frame, resized to 800x533. |
