I thought that the Lens-Artists Photo Challenge: Something Old, New, Borrowed and Blue was going to be quite a hard challenge.
Until I thought of one photo that covered three out of the four, Old, New and Blue. All I needed was Borrowed and in the end the photo I picked for Borrowed also covered Blue and tied in with the first.
An adult Eurasian Blue Tit on a frost rimmed twig in the winter. Taken with a Borrowed 800mm lens and Nikon camera when I was toying with the idea of swapping my 600mm lens for an 800mm.
Old and New Eurasian Blue Tits in a specially constructed nestbox in Cheshire, England.
19 replies on “Lens-Artists: Something Old, New, Borrowed and Blue”
Wow, David. This is perfect. You hit all the criteria in one shot! I love the color blue of this beautiful bird. Fabulous shots.
Thanks Patti. I thought it worked rather well for the challenge.
It definitely did. That subtle blue of the bird’s feathers is still in my mind.
Now I’m wondering if I could have written the same post featuring Mountain Bluebirds.
Umm…something to ponder!
Wow. Great photos!
Thanks John. I thought that they worked quite well for the challenge.
Incredible captures, David!! Perfect for this challenge theme!
Thanks Amy. I thought they were rather appropriate for the challenge.
Absolutely lovely, David. They worked well for the challenge, and as always, amazing detail. Now I know half the secret to that – a 600mm lens! (The other half being your skill and your experience of 40+ years. 😉) Do you use a tripod? And does it have vibration reduction?
Thanks Hannah. I owned a couple of 600mm lenses in the 1980s and 1990s. I didn’t swap the 600mm lens for an 800mm, the 800mm was just to big and heavy to haul around with the rest of my kit day in day out.
Yes, I bet!! You don’t have them any more? You used the past tense.
No, I sold the first when I found a Nikon 600mm that had been converted to Olympus OM mount. I sold the Nikon soon after getting the Olympus 350mm.
I currently only have a Nikon 55-200mm telephoto lens. I need to upgrade given the photos I take of water fowl, and for that matter, closeups of flowers with butterflies and bees. I probably need a macro for the latter, though I follow a fellow amateur photographer who gets amazing closeups with only a 300mm telephoto.
I am able to rent lenses from our local large photography store, which I will do before I buy. But do you have any recommendations of what lenses I might start with? The lenses are expensive to rent, but not nearly as expensive as actually *buying* the wrong lens. I know the store will have recommendations, but I am also soliciting opinions as well.
I’m sorry but I don’t really know what’s available for Nikon these days. In the days of manual focus and no electronics in lenses it was often possible to get, say a Canon lens converted to fit a Nikon camera so I paid more attention to what was available.
I would suggest asking on a photo forum, especially a Nikon forum. I can’t recommend one as I haven’t really paid attention to photo forums for a few years now.
Thanks David.
Oh my goodness David, that shot of the baby birds is exquisite!
Thanks Tina. Although in this case they’re New birds.
😊