Sun 9 Dec 2007
On a crisp but sunny late Fall day, I went over the hill to Natural Bridges State Beach in Santa Cruz. This time of year the monarch butterflies are migrating and they congregate in the park. I had heard about this a few years ago, but didn't make it during one of our rainier winters. With a nice day and a good zoom lens, I was eager to try some wildlife photography. Photographing moving animals requires a different skill from landscape photography and I want to practice a bit before my adventures later this month.
Photographically, I found that manual focus can be useful- provided you get the focus correct. Depth of field is challenging at these focal lengths. Digital is great since I don't care that most shots don't come out.
Following the butterflies it was off to a more heart rate raising hike (at Forest of Nisene Marks State Park), but I didn't bring the camera for that part. I did get to see the epicenter of the Loma Prieta earthquake which was a good follow on to last month's earthquake hike .
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December 10th, 2007 at 7:36 am
Nice shots. How did you like your new lens?
December 10th, 2007 at 11:36 pm
Lens is great. 70-300 give a good reach even when things are far away. The biggest challenge is getting the focus spot on because the depth of field is so small. Even with a smaller aperture, it was tough. I did some with manual focus to help, but some of them even I missed the focus slightly. The butterflies are so small that they are hard to get except when they are stationary or in the big clumps.
December 16th, 2007 at 6:10 pm
To calculate depth of field, this website is good:
http://www.dofmaster.com/dofjs.html