Leica Apo 62 / Coolpix 4500 Help ! (1 Viewer)

I recently bought a Leica Apo 62 for principally for birding but with the option of using it for digiscoping, based on a review in "Birwatching". I have recently got the "recommended" Nikon 4500 and whilst I am happy with both the camera and scope I am not achieving the results I would have hoped for. I am struggling to get enough light to the camera and can only really use it on 16 x ( I have the zoom eyepice) and around two or 3 on optical zoom. This is okay for snapping close range garden birds but pretty useless on the Ythan estuary close to where I live. It appears impossible to keep lower f numbers and higher shutter speeds at greater magnifications. The light up here in Aberdeen can usually be described as "murky" most of the time !

I tend to use the 4500 in manual mode and also deliberately underexpose as the Nikon seems to overexpose ( ironically ). Chuffed with the scope, but seriously thinking about getting a Apo 77 as this seems to work well for other people.

Have any of you expert digiscopers got any tips as to how I can optimise the Apo 62 / Nikon 4500 before I go and blow ( another )£ 800 !

Should have known better than to trust a mag review.

Cheers,

Lindsay Cargill

Hi Lindsay and on behalf of the Moderators and Admin,welcome to Bird Forum.

I'm sure that when of the many experts see your request,an answer will be forthcoming.

In the meantime,there have been numerous posts on the subject of digiscoping and it may be worth trying the Site SEARCH function for some information.

Cheers,

I should have added that I am using a digimount adapter to connect the eyepiece to the 28mm thread on the Nikon - seems to work well, but need to use gaffa tape to fix the zoom over 16 x. The stretchy thingy that comes with the adapter is too difficult to pull over the eyepiece !

LC

Lindsey,

Check out Richard Bledsoe's results with the same set-up. He is from CA with better light, but his results are excellent, especially as he hand-holds his camera. Perhaps he can give you some tips. I would really like to buy a Leica 62 but don't want to regret the purchase if I decide to try digiscoping.

Steve

There is a pic he took of a kite with the zoom on 48. It came out well.

Steve

Hi Lindsay & Steve,

I've just ordered a Coolpix 4500 to attach to my APO 62, after testing it last night, indoors in artificial light, hand-held against the scope. There was a wee bit of shake, but I'm very confident that as soon as I get outside at the weekend I'll get great results. If I don't, I'm equally confident that it'll be because I'm doing something wrong with the exposure/zoom settings.

Rather than spend all that money on another scope (which is also much bigger & heavier!), why not take your existing kit along to the nearest shop and try the fixed 16x wide-angle eyepiece rather than Leica's zoom? The zoom eyepiece is great, but the 16x WA is brighter AND has much larger field of view. I think it's a great thing to have in addition to the zoom, and it's got to be worth at least one f-stop in terms of photographic brightness, AND it'll cost less than £150.

Or even try one of those 'Eagle-eye' eyepieces? They're low magnification (use the zoom on the camera to achieve high-magnification), vignette-free eyepieces designed specifically for digiscoping. See:

http://www.ephotozineshop.com/BINS&SCOPES/digiscoping/eede.html


Richard's shots are fantastic, and have helped me make up my mind about which camera to buy. After shopping around I managed to save £60 on the camera, so I'm tryingto tell myself that this saving will subsidise the cost of the stupidly expensive remote-release cable...

Good luck,

Al

Hi Al, I'd have to disagree with the advice to get a 16xWA lens to supplement the zoom.The zoom at 16x is more than adequate for digiscoping and from reading his post,I thought Lindsay was wanting MORE magnification for estuary birds etc.

The 26xWA may be an option.This eyepiece offers a larger field of view than the zoom at 16x and in fact is virtually as wide as the 16xWA.

I've not used the 26xWA for digiscoping,but for viewing it is certainly a bright image.

Well, this is where I might have to bow to your experience, but when I was fiddling last night with the camera and 16x, 26x and zoom eyepieces, I found the 16x to be the brightest and easiest to work with, and when the camera's zoom is set to maximum telephoto the magnification is very impressive (to me anyway).

I thought that was the recommended method - use low-power on the scope and high-power on the camera? That's what I picked up when reading the glowing reviews of the Eagle-eye system. But I've yet to put all of this into practice, and I'm very keen to hear from those who have. Maybe using high power on the camera reduces brightness more than high power on the scope; I didn't really test that properly - it would have been good to shoot at the same magnification using all the different variables, but I didn't think of it at the time. Duh.

The zoom at 16x was lovely and bright and crisp, but the field of view is VERY small compared to the fixed 16x WA eyepiece. The 26x also has a great field of view, but was less bright than the 16x, and given the superb magnification that can be achieved by simply zooming the camera I figured the 16x would be more versatile in the field?

Al

I think we are speaking at cross-purposes somewhat,Al.
I don't disagree with what you have said,but was solely addressing Lindsay's problem of more magnification.
He said that 16x on the zoom and 2 to 3 optical zoom was insufficient for his needs for long distance snapping,which is why I thought that the 16xWA would not make much difference.

Oh... sorry. Lindsay also said that he was 'struggling to get enough light' to allow the full use of the zoom, so I thought brightness was the priority...

Al

Hi Trevor and Al,

Sorry I have not got back quicker - I actually wrote a reply offline this morning but lost the whole lot when I tried reconnecting ! Here goes again.

I did see the pictures you referred to and was suitably impressed. However, California and Aberdeen do not share the same climatic conditions ! I think the very same chap posted to a list member on Eastern Seaboard USA that the 77 might suit the lighting conditions there ???

Fundementally the biggest problem I appear to be having is one of focus, but in relation to the fact that I am working at lower scope and optical zooms, thus the subject is often quite small and hard to accurately focus on ( its also bloody hard anyway as I am sure you are aware ). I am having to work at low zooms to avoid seriously underexposed images. I would prefer to have shutter speeds of 1/60 to 1/125 of a second to avoid "bird blur" and this appears not possible on anything over 16x mag and 2 or 3x optical zoom, even in quite good light. Basically if I can get 1/30th I am doing well.

I tend to shoot in manual mode as apperture priority tries to set shutter speeds of anything from 1 sec to 1/15 sec depending on circumstances - no good. On the lower mag/zoom settings in Manual I can get appertures of f3.6 - 5.1 and shutter speeds of 30th to 125th sec but unless the subject is real close then its hard to focus/ subject is too small. Shutter Priority is no good as the appertures the camera sets do not allow enough light in.

Regarding exposure / zoom settings my wife is a professional photographer and she has done all the light meter stuff etc and reckons that this setup is struggling. I had considered a wide angle eyepiece but then most of the really good pics done with a 77, and some with 62, come from using the zoom. One or two stops can be compensated for in the camera anyway - In ideal situations I tend to underexpose them slightly as advised by Andy Bright on his very good website !


Today,another session dig'ing Pergrines has ended with poor results. Bird sitting around 170 yards away( not far ! ), reasonable light, crap pictures ! This is on 16x with optical zoom half way ( 32x ). Subject way too small to get good focus, images a bit dark. Did achieve lowish f numbers ( 3.6 - 5.1 ) and shutter speeds of up to 1/60th, though 1/30th was average. Any higher mags would have resulted in ludicrously slow shutter speeds and black images.

I do understand that part of being a photographer of wildlife is getting close to your subject - 170 yds from a peregrine isn't bad ! To get much closer you'd have to go to game fair !

Stuff I have shot in the garden is all good though !

This is what I mean about the apparent limitation of this particular setup.

I am going to do three things.

1)Buy a 77 possibly with a 32WW - cant afford Swarovski 80

2)Get one of those Xtenda View thingy's - though I believe they are out of stock. I have tried the slide viewer mod and it doesn't work for me.

3) Sell the 62 ! ( maybe - it is an excellent scope)

A closing thought. Steve Dudley, who compiled the scope reviews in last months Birdwatching stated that he " used the Apo 62 for birding and digiscoping". He is in a Warehouse Express ad in this months issue clearly using the 77 ! Hmmmm. Digiscoping with the 62 in his back garden maybe.

If anyone has cracked the 62/ 4500 combo ( in Britain where it rains ) then please share the secret !



Yours in frustration and anticipation,

Lindsay

lindsay,

i hope to be of help in this discussion. first the theoretical, a fellow on the yahoo digiscoping group had a zeiss 65 with which he did some outstanding digiscopes in a northern country i don't remember if it was holland or norway or what. he then talked zeiss into lending him the 85mm version and did some side by side tests and reported that the difference was one shutter speed difference. e.g. 125th sec versus 250th. so before you buy the larger scope the question is will increasing the shutter speed by that amount make or break the shots you have been trying to get?

next, digiscoping is just like any other form of wildlife photography in that the closer to the subject the better. you can get the shots that are too long for the telephoto lens but for really sharp satisfying shots , closer is better. if i was to shoot a falcon at 170 yards i would expect a record type photo and nothing more even in strong light. it takes a lot of time and patience but you will get close to some birds and those will be great shots.

technique, focusing is a major pain with the tiny view screens on the cp series cameras. if the bird will sit for you try this, zoom up to high magnification (32 to 48x) and with the camera lens set wide open (apertured control) fine tune the scope focus while looking at the view screen. then zoom out to 16-24x and take the shot. try auto focus with the yellow flower lit on a cp series camera. this will hold down the magnification to a level that is optimum. my common settings are about 16-17mm camera zoom and 16-24x scope zoom. too much magnification will only soften the focus on your shots so let those far away birds go.

andy has posted some good settings for digiscoping in this forum and i would add that i use in camera sharpening set to high and low contrast to help from blowing out the highlights.

well anyway, theres more to this than one would think just going into it.

regards,

richard

Richard,

Thanks many for your advice. As I said in my previous post I understand the importance of getting close and realise that most digiscoped photos probably have the subject in range of 20 - 80 yards. Possibly less at times I suspect.

Regarding the shutter speeds, I am struggling to get 1/60th sec consistently nevermind 125 or 250th !!! At a 30th the images can still suffer from blur caused by wind / bird movement.

I have tried your method of zooming up on the scope but the LCD screen is often way too dark to make anything out, nevermind actually focus on something, even in decent light ( for here ).

To be honest, I ( rather naively it appears ) thought that digiscoping would allow me to photograph birds outside the range of my modest garden - as I said the shots of spuggie's ( sparrows ) and finch's in the garden are all fine, but if that is the limitation of digiscoping, with this setup at least - ouch !


Best

Lindsay

lindsay,

your mention of the limitation of digiscoping in your post today reminded me that i saved a sharon brown post from the yahoo group digiscoping birds. her thoughts on unwinnable battles helped me to realize those limitations. i have copied and pasted that message below.

richard


I'm happy with my set-up now, after many frustrations. I'm now enjoying
digiscoping & am getting a good ratio of keepers. Here are the things I've
changed, much of which was learned here:

-Tightened a loose connection on my tripod

-Counter-balanced my scope/camera so it's not necessary to lock the oil head

-Got rid of the image-righting diagonal prism (I shoot upside-down &
backwards - fortunately there's enough field of view with a C5 to do that
fairly easily)

-Made a shutter release bracket & started using the remote release without
exception

-Quit shooting at more than about 1/2 zoom on the camera

-Took off the camera's strap (Big difference! Thanks Laurence!)

-Made a shade for the front of the scope

-Made an LCD shade - one of the biggest improvements

-Shoot only when others around me are not moving - surprising how much the
ground can move around here

-Last but not least - Stopped fighting unwinnable battles and accepted the
limitations of digiscoping. I no longer expect great things from shots taken
at sundown, of very distant birds, at full camera zoom, in strong wind
(unless the birds are on the ground & quite close), or with the sun anywhere
other than behind me.

I'm still learning (and expect to continue learning), but since y'all have
heard my struggles, here's a post which I hope will help others who are
struggling.

Sharon Brown
South Carolina, USA, where it's "frigatebird weather" out there, and I'm
stuck at work

Cheers Richard,

Some of the things I haven't tried yet so will give it a try. Will keep plodding away. Have ordered an APO 77 so will see if it makes a difference, though after seeing the results of Paul Hacketts Red Footed Falcon, a bird which I saw personally at the location he shot it, I am going to have to get closer to the subjects to get good results. I dont know how the fellow birders that I was with watching ( and trying to snap ) a Pied Wheatear near Collieston, Aberdeenshire yesterday would have thought if I had jumped in the field and started chasing the bird trying to get that close up shot. Might well have ended up wearing the Apo on my head methinks ! I guess getting too close, could, under certain circumstances raise ethical issues regarding the birds welfare. As it is the bird did not come closer than 70 yards and was too small and pixellated - on 16x with 2-4 optical zoom. Great exposure though, even managed 1/500 th ! but difficult to focus on an object that small.

Again, thanks for your advice, will let you all know the difference, if any, the bigger scope makes, just to close the thread.

Best wishes,

Lindsay

Got the 77 and preliminary results suggest that it is much more suitable for my needs. I am achieving shutter speeds of 125th and faster more regularly than with the 62 and in pretty dull conditions to boot.

However, I have learned that you have to be close to your subject to acheive optimum results, and my initial expectations of digiscoping were, shall we say ambitious ! That said my minimum with the 77 is 20x mag, plus around 2x optical zoom keeping the yellow flower lit. The 8x difference for me over the 62 ( eg 40 x versus 32x combined zoom) seems to make a difference and is helping achive a better focus ratio, as well as better framed pictures. I can also sneak up a bit more using the zoom eyepiece and get away with it.

In conclusion the 62 does work and can produce very good results, Richards hand held photos are an absolute testimony to that. However, I am glad to have the 77 and feel it is far more verastile in a variety of conditions and is allowing me faster shutter speeds at 8x more magnification than the Apo 62 under same conditions.

I will use the 77 for digiscoping and keep the 62 for general birding or very close digiscoping work.

Hopefully this spells some form of closure to the thread. Thanks for all who have helped me with their suggestions.

Lindsay

Low light comparisons APO 77 to APO 62

Hello Lindsay,
given the lower magnification of the 62, the exit pupul should be larger than the 77 on its lowest magnification (X20) Does the 62 beat the 77 at dawn or dust, or does the size of the objective lens rule?
regards,
Johnno

Lindsay Cargill said:

Got the 77 and preliminary results suggest that it is much more suitable for my needs. I am achieving shutter speeds of 125th and faster more regularly than with the 62 and in pretty dull conditions to boot.

However, I have learned that you have to be close to your subject to acheive optimum results, and my initial expectations of digiscoping were, shall we say ambitious ! That said my minimum with the 77 is 20x mag, plus around 2x optical zoom keeping the yellow flower lit. The 8x difference for me over the 62 ( eg 40 x versus 32x combined zoom) seems to make a difference and is helping achive a better focus ratio, as well as better framed pictures. I can also sneak up a bit more using the zoom eyepiece and get away with it.

In conclusion the 62 does work and can produce very good results, Richards hand held photos are an absolute testimony to that. However, I am glad to have the 77 and feel it is far more verastile in a variety of conditions and is allowing me faster shutter speeds at 8x more magnification than the Apo 62 under same conditions.

I will use the 77 for digiscoping and keep the 62 for general birding or very close digiscoping work.

Hopefully this spells some form of closure to the thread. Thanks for all who have helped me with their suggestions.

Lindsay

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