richardellingworth

One snag I have found with using a Canon crop-sensor DSLR for wildlife photography is that the Canon long lenses (400mm upwards) are made for full frame cameras. They are EF lenses (which work on both full frame and crop sensor Canon DSLRs), rather than EF-S lenses (which only work on crop sensor Canon DSLRs). EF lenses focus the light onto a circle that will cover the full frame sensor, but when used with a crop sensor this circle of light is too big, so you end up with a cropped image. This can be considered a good thing in that the apparent magnification is greater (a smaller section of the circle covers the entire sensor), but the downside is that you are using a lens that has more glass than you need for a crop sensor, making it bigger, heavier, and more expensive. It will also have been designed to work at its best on a full frame camera. But I must stress, it will work. One other problem is that if you have any interest in shooting video, you won't be able to see anything through the viewfinder whilst doing so, because of the way a DSLR works. This is a major problem. Trying to follow a moving target whilst using the rear display is way more difficult than using the viewfinder. This is one area where a mirrorless camera has the advantage. Other than that, as it was a gift, I would be more than happy to use it.