Bird photography using a spotting scope

I am an avid birder as well as amateur photographer and am at the

point of buying a spotting scope. I currently have a Canon EOS ELAN

II with a Tamron 28-300 zoom.

 

I would welcome comments on the pros and cons of using a scope for

photography since this is a big investment for me. I

am trying to consolidate money spent on birding equipment and

photography equipment.

 

I am considering a Leica Televid 77 spotting scope. Will purchasing

the newer APO lens with this be worth the huge difference in price

(about $600)in terms of improving the quality of color and resolution?

Or is the general opinion that photography through any scope will be

no better than internet quality no matter which lens is used?

Would also welcome comments on the portability issue of carrying a

scope vs carrying an appropriate camera lens.

 

I am obviously a novice at this and would appreciate any assistance.

Although I am not a professional photographer, I want more than a

72dpi image from my purchase. However there will be times when I will

be using the scope without a camera and want to be sure I have that

option too.

 

Thanks all.

You might want to read <a href="http://www.photo.net/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg?msg_id=000Yai">this thread</a> and also do a general search on "spotting scope".

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The basic answer is that all spotting scopes suffer from the fact that (a) they are not designed for photography, so their adaptation to photography is usually something of a compromise and (b) they are photographically slow meaning longer shutter speeds hence more problems with vibration or the use of fast film, leading to lower image quality.

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Is the APO worth it? I don't know. My guess is that for photography, given the limitations of spotting scopes as lenses, the answer is likely to be no.

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As an exception to the general rule, the Televue Genesis telescope makes an excellent f5 500mm telephoto. However it's heavier (10lbs) and longer (almost 1m) than most similar telephoto lenses plus it's designed for photovisual use. Not something most birders would really consider a "spotting scope"!

Go for the APO version, it definitely worth the difference.

 

I don�t know what are you planing to do with the images, but even with the APO telescope the lack of resolution will not allow you to get many publishable images (except in technical magazines). But, if you are planing to share your images on the Internet or to use them as a record of your observations, then it will do the trick, and it�s the best price for the biggest magnification

 

There are many people starting to use fieldscopes attached to digital cameras, and they get some nice results.

See for yourself:

 

http://www.md.ucl.ac.be/peca/test/a.html

 

http://www.vdn.ca/~ledy/portfolio1e.html

Short answer:- If you want to capture images from birdwatching trips, go digital with a 'scope. If you want to do bird photography invest in 35mm gear and big glass.

 

Long answer:- Some people have had limited success with 35mm cameras and telescopes. Biggest problem is effective aperture of at least F12, plus the image is relatively modest, compared to the telescope view - the camera setup is usually the equivelent of a 800mm lens only (it is not the same image size as seen by eye thro' the 'scope), finally the Leica camera adaptor is very expensive....

 

Off Topic in this forum, but an up and coming area for birdwatchers is to use digital cameras with telescopes, the results are surprisingly good even with relatively cheap digital cameras and hand held to the eyepiece. For the price of the Leica adaptor you could buy a reasonable digital camera - you won't win any competitions with the results, but it is a very good way for capturing "the moment" try a web search under "digiscoping". Web sites are blossoming concentrating on this form of photography.

 

Several UK birdwatching magazines advertise products for Leica scopes to affix digital cameras to 20-60 leica zoom lenses. Effective max.magnification with a 3x zoom camera is 180X, ie equivelent of a 9000 mm lens (I think)- 15x the 600 f4 brigade.

 

Advantage of the APO will only really be noticeable at twilight or murky conditions - image is brighter and there is less light distortion and colour fringing, but most of the time you will not notice the difference. As with all things optical, you pay for max. quality

 

NB I tried 35mm work with a cheaper Kowa 60mm spotting scope, I gave up after one film, the results were terrible compared to a standard 400mm F5.6 lens and 2 x converter......

 

KR

 

Mike

What about buying some big photographic glass, and putting a telescope eyepiece converter on it? I believe such things are available for most popular mounts.

To follow up on what Bob said... TeleVue also makes a 70mm scope called the Ranger, which I have. It is a two-element lens with ED glass. It is used with standard 1 1/4 inch astro eyepieces. It weighs approx 3 lbs, which makes it small enough to use as a spotting scope. It is an f/6.8 scope, I believe, much faster than traditional spotting scopes.

 

Before you scoff, the birder webzine "Better View Desired", the last I looked, said that this is the the sharpest spotting scope they have ever tested, bar none. They speculate that it is because of the absence of a built in prism and the need to expose through eyepieces. I have one and I like it very well. TeleVue makes a field flattener for use as a photo lens. I believe it also acts as a reducer, shortening the focal length and making the f/stop lower (brightening the image). I do not have the field flattener and have not used this scope for photography myself, however.

 

The Ranger has some disadvantages as a birding scope, though. Most significant are that typically, you would use this with a 90 degree mirror, which will reverse the image L-R (easy to get used to) and that it is not weatherproof.

 

I am not saying this is the scope for you. I am suggesting, though, that you may want to check it out. Good luck.

Chasseur d�Images ran a test some time ago, and showed that the best APO scopes with photo adaptors would yield an image quality comparable in the center and much worse on the edges to a sigma 400 f5.6 APO Macro used with a 2x converter (800 f11).

 

 

If you are going to buy a scope anyway, then the 400f5.6 is not an option, but this should give you an idea of the resulting quality.

 

P.S. � consider the Kowa TSN 823/4 Prominar. I have used this side by side with the Leica APO with the old 20-60x zoom and it is quite better (and cheaper). Chasseur d'Images test results show the same. Don�t know about the new Leica zoom though.

The APO would make a big difference in the quality of the photos. However, I agree with Mike, that digiscoping would be the best way to go if your primary goal is for documentation rather than 16X20 enlargements. I have made some good 8X10's digiscoping even without the optimal equipemnt (I use celestron c90 and Nikon Coolpix). I find the fixed objective lens much better than zooms, look through the 20X fixed in the Leica APO Televid to see what I mean! Seems that Nikon Coolpix has been used most often because the 28mm lens matches the eyepieces well. Mostly the camera mounts are handmade jobs, but commercial ones are becoming available. Digiscoping is cost effective and much lighter....try buying a 5000mm lens for your 35mm camera, and have you ever tried carrying around that extra 600mm 2.8 lens around with you birding, forget it. Believe me for that long lens you can get the Leica spotting scope and Coolpix 995 for less than half the price. Have you even tried using the Nikon venturer or similar binos, take the Coolpix shot through one of the lenses mounted on a tripod? Don't expect miracles, but even that isn't too bad for documentation purposes.

See the website http://www.angelfire.com/pe2/digiscoping/Page_6.htm

Dean

Digiscoping should be a consideration for you. It is a large topic, I have

a site on it: http://www.coolpixpage.com.

 

APO scopes, are corrected for chromatic aberation (blue/red fringing around areas of high contrast in the image.) This type of aberation is more noticable in images than it is when just viewing through the scope because the brain seems to ignore it, I think. However, softare is now available that does a good to excellent job in reducing it in postprocessing. This can allow the use of a less expensive scope.

 

Portabiliy of the digiscoping system, is one of its great advantages over 35mm equipment of similar magnification capability. A good spotting scope with a 32x ocular plus the 3x zoom of the 990, for example, achieves the equivalent of 4000mm 35mm lens.

Birds are such small objects that you could purcahase an expensive 600mm lens and still be disappointed because you need to get closer. In additon, the total cost is probably in the range of one tenth the price film equipment with that range.

 

With the advent of reasonably priced 5 megapixel digicams and the extradordinary quality of the APO scopes many people are getting professional quality nature images who in the past would have been excluded because of the entry price. Of course, it is

not the ideal solution for everyone, it is slower to do that 35mm and takes some practice. Getting a great nature shot is not as simple as just pointing a lens at an animal or bird regardless of what you use to take the image, or what the theoretical resolution is, or how fat your checkbook is.

 

Check out my site for more on this if you are interested. It is non commercial.

has comparision images with 35mm equipment, a gallery of birding and nature

images submitted from Digiscopers from around the world, tips, digital camera

news and some other stuff I can't remember now.

 

THAD.

http://www.coolpixpage.com<div></div>