Equipment Advice

[masonfl]

Sorry if this is repetitive. I scanned the archives but didn't see what I was looking for. Point me to an existing thread if my questions are answered somewhere already.

I have a Swarovski ATS 65 HD and have done some very basic handheld digiscoping with a Canon Powershot S400. I'm interested in upgrading my camera to a better camera that will work with the Swarovski digital camera adapter I purchased. My budget is up to $1000 but I'd be happy to spend less if there is a better value.

I'd be interested in any recommendations any of you may have.

PS. Attached is one of my handheld attempts from this Spring in Sawmill Canyon in the Huachuca's.

Thanks.

Mason Flint
Snoqualmie, Washington

[Yelvertoft]

Hello Mason,

Welcome to Birdforum.

There's a couple of ideas in this thread:
http://www.birdforum.net/showthread.php?t=34144

You could keep your current camera and use the Baader adaptor (bit of a waste of the DCA you've bought, I admit), or buy a Canon A95 and Canon adapter LA-DC52D to attach the A95 to Swarovski DCA.

Regards,

Duncan.

BTW, very pretty bird. Keep practicing.

[jiminlondon99]

You may find this link useful?

http://birdforum.net/showthread.php?p=328742#post328742

Having moved from a Canon T90 SLR to various compacts e.g. C2040, C5050,C730 and a Coolpix 4500 I am now back to an SLR. IMHO the price & performance of the latest SLRs leaves only one choice for getting he best pictures. Some of the benefits are depth of field, write speed, accurate optical viewfinder and I suspect a longer shelf life? Plus, you get to keep the lenses if/when you upgrade!

Having said that the C730 with its 10x zoom, lives in the boot of the car (I was offered £60 trade-in)......just in case?

Best of luck
Jim

[masonfl]

Many of my photographer friends (but not digiscopers) love the Nikon D70 or similar quality cameras from others but I'm not clear on whether they're good for digiscoping... Also, the Nikon is pretty pricey. I saw that Costo has the Olympus EVOH-E300 with two Zuiko lenses (14-45 and 40-150) for $949. They also have the Canon EOS Rebel XT with an 18-55 mm lens for the same price...

Thx.

[jiminlondon99]

I use the 350d/Rebel and tend to leave it on the scope and tripod and carry it over my shoulder, not something I did with the Coolpix and the DCA adaptor. So for me the SLR is much faster to set up and use, so I get higher percentage of better pictures. You loose the flexibility of the zoom on the scope and camera but to some extent I can compensate for that by shooting at the maximum 8MP setting then cropping the picture.

As for the other options you may find this site helpful;
http://www.dpreview.com/

Good luck and remember if it was that easy a choice we wouldn't need this web site?

jim

[Henry B]

Jim,what what scope and eyepiece are you useing? I also have the 350d and Opticron es80 scope with the 23x hdf ep, My efforts have been poor but this is due to my inexperience,any advice would be helpful regarding settings etc. thanks hb.

[yossi]

I use the Nikon CP8400, which at the zoomed-in position (maximal tele) outputs great 8 MP pictures. I zoom with the scope eyepiece. With the Swaro zoom eyepiece you can get 1700-5100mm tele range. The advantage of the CP8400 is the EVF that allows you accurate focusing, something quite difficult to achieve with a sun-lit LCD.

[jiminlondon99]

See the link in my first post above in this thread for more information. I use a swaro 65HD without an eyepeice, Swaro have an adapter to fit the camera to the scope so it becomes an 800mm fixed aperture lense.

[masonfl]

So, it it my imagination or are very few of you using Digital SLR's? One would think that the camera manufacturers would want to encourage/make it easy to use the SLR's because their higher priced. I'm interested in using a Digital SLR because I want to use the camera for non-digiscoping purposes as well.



It also seems that most of the cameras being used for digiscoping are older models. For example, the newer Nikon Coolpix cameras are panned and folks seem to mostly use the 4500 or other older models.

Clearly I have a lot to learn...

[Andy Bright]

It also seems that most of the cameras being used for digiscoping are older models. For example, the newer Nikon Coolpix cameras are panned and folks seem to mostly use the 4500 or other older models.

Clearly I have a lot to learn...
The thing is, digiscoping is primarily a method for birders as opposed to those with photography as a priority... digicams such as the Nikon cp9**/4500,Kyocera and Canon Powershot range are ideal for the birder as they are compact and lightweight, a birder will already be lugging a scope/tripod and binos around with them, most dslr's are rather large by comparison and certainly not pocket sized (Canon 350d maybe just).

The smaller cameras have their advantadges over the dslr's for digiscoping and image quality for prints of something like 10x8 or less compete with those from a dslr.

cheers,
Andy