Initial digiscope images

[Camberley red]

Hello there,

following the purchase of a nikon coolpix 4500 for my son's birthday, dad had the opportunity to try out said camera with his swaro 65mm and 30x eyepiece on a recent holiday to Southern Brittany. Attached are the first reasonable pictures taken using the camera with a LCE adaptor, up till now I could never get a sharp image, but various fiddling about with the camera settings has produced the following:

Melodious Warbler

I have croped and compressed the image which has caused some pixelation!

all the best

Paul

[IanF]

Good effort for starting off wih Paul. Plenty of detail in the bird showing it's plumage features and a nice pose too. I know what you mean about the pixelation, the images never look anything like as good when heavily compressed.

[peter hayes]

Excellent start Paul! Which settings did you use on the 4500?

[Camberley red]

macro with centre weighting on the metering, autofocus and best shot. The only problem with best shot is the time between pressing the shutter and the picture actually being taken, that seems to make it pot luck on the bird pose front. It took 5 goes to get the image I posted (ie pose and sharpness about right)

I do not have a shutter release device yet which adds a bit of shake to the whole process, but at least I was able to focus using the camera screen effectively as the early morning light was really good. I posted a couple of other efforts in the digiscope gallery, which I probably cropped and compressed to much? I haven't played around with paintshop on any of the images yet, still learning that particular beast.

good birding

Paul

[peter hayes]

Thanks Paul.

[IanF]

Good point Camberley red. I tend to try to time the actual pressing of the shutter. It certainly helps with Warblers as they will sit and sing for several minutes. Shutter lag and slow recording to card is a bane. I take it that you had the camera set to record sequentially - it's a lot easier for this type of shot. I don't bother with 'best shot' mode.

[Camberley red]

Thanks Ian, I don't think I did have it set up like that, but will try again and make sure that it is in that mode. I'm just getting used to all the menus, its quiet a task.

Paul

[Andy Bright]

Good attempt, Paul.... very nice bird as well.
I only use BSS for very still birds, I'd generally use continuous shooting mode for this sort of shot (trying to get the bird in song)
BSS is usually very rapid? Taking a series of shots and only saving the one with most detail in it. Continuous shooting mode will take 5 or 6 shots but it will seem like an eternity before all those shots are saved to the card and allow you to take another batch.
Andy