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Bird Photos: Studies: Digital SLR vs. Digiscoping

Occasionally, I capture images with digiscoping and a digital super telephoto SLR set up side by side. While I haven't done a concise "apples to apples" comparison between both processes, it may interest some of you how they compare informally.

A couple of caveats: I don't feel that I have quite mastered the combination of the Canon 10D and the Canon 500mm supertelephoto lens. Because the 10D has a magnification factor of 1.6X, a 500mm lens is effectively a 800mm lens. With a 1.4 teleconverter, the combination is up to 1120mm. This may be at the root of my problems. I don't have a lot of experience shooting with this much magnification so my technique may not be steady enough. Likewise, with the high level of magnification with digiscoping (and being too cheap to invest in an adapter and cable release), the effect of camera shake, heat shimmer and over magnification easily degrades the image. Additionally, the powerful tools in PhotoShop can skew the results of a manipulated image. The colors, contrast and sharpness can be tweeked to improve, or destroy an image. "Garbage in, garbage out" applies here. While you can clean up a bad image, you can't make it into a gem. Or, let me be more precise, I can't make bad images into gems.

Digital SLR camera with a super telephoto lens

    
   
 

This was shot using a digital Single Lens Reflex (SLR) camera, a Canon 10D. The lens is a Canon 500mm telephoto lens coupled with a 1.4X tele-extender. Since the Canon 10D has a built-in multiplying factor of 1.6X, this combination is effectively a 1120mm telephoto lens (roughly 20 to 22X magnification with 50-55mm being 1X). Image tweeking involved manually adjusting levels and unsharp masking.
   

Digiscoping: using a digital point-and-shoot camera with a spotting scope
   
 

This was shot using a digital point-and-shoot camera, a Nikon CoolPix 4500, through a Kowa TSN82 fluorite scope. I don't remember exactly, but I think the scope was set somewhere between 20X and 35X, with the CoolPix at max. 4X optical zoom. Unless I'm completely mistaken, this is somewhere between 80X and 140X, and translates to between 4000mm and 7000mm on a 35mm format SLR camera. Image tweeking comprised of manually adjusting levels and unsharp masking.
   
 

Using the same digiscoped image, I let PhotoShop's Auto Levels function correct the color. Sometimes it does a good job. Unsharp masking was also applied.

These images are not good bird photography, but they can be useful for photo documentation, or to assist with identification. I should point out that I can capture great images with a 300 mm IS (image stabilization) on the 10D, without and with the 1.4 teleconverter (480mm and 672mm, handheld!). It may be that the 500mm is just too much lens.

PLEASE DO NOT DOWNLOAD ANY IMAGE WITHOUT ACQUIRING PERMISSION TO DO SO. You may create links to these pages. All images on this page are copyrighted by Les Chibana. If you'd like to learn more about these image, grab the pigeon on the left and send a note.
 
 

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