Photo of the Day

Baboon Mother and her Baby

Chitabe Camp, Okavango Delta, Botswana. July 2009

Nikon D3, 200-400mm f/4 VR, 1/10 @ f/8, ISO 250

Comments

[Patti Schulze]

Andy, this image is stunning! The pan is great and the baby looks tack sharp. Good job.

[Aravind]

A beautiful capture Andy. Just curious, did you take this hand held? Also did you crop in post or was the image framed that way on camera?

[Andy Biggs]

Thanks for the comments! Aravind, I was using the 200-400mm lens on a gimbal mount on a Novoflex QuadroPod. Normally I use a shorter lens hand held, however my recent move to Nikon means that I don't have a slow (f/4.5-5.6) zoom any longer. Nikon's 80-400mm isn't good at focusing, so the 70-200mm f/2.8 is what I use. The problem with the 70-200mm is twofold: not slow enough for daytime shots, as it only stops down to f/22 and also not enough zoom. I would prefer something in the 200mm to 400mm range, like the Canon 100-400mm.

[Aravind]

I recently picked up the 100-400 again (had one a while ago which got sold) and I'm floored. Canon has changed something in the last couple of years because this new one is as sharp and contrasty at 400mm wide open as the 500 f/4 wide open. Definitely don't feel like I'm compromising IQ in using this lens anymore.

Is there a particular reason you chose the QuadroPod rather than a tripod? How did you like it?

[Andy Biggs]

Southern African safaris are in open vehicles, and east African safaris use pop-top roofs. There are many different methods of stabilizing a lens in an open Land Rover, and almost all are compromises. A tripod interferes with switching sides in the vehicles, as at least 1 leg is in the way. A monopod isn't very stable, and a bean bag only works for specific types of angles. The QuadroPod was loaned to me by Novoflex and I think it is the perfect solution so far. It has issues, such as the high cost, but it really works well.

I will be writing up a review on the unit soon.