Crab PotsMax Stansell Photography This weekend I went on a wildlife photoshoot at Pocosin Lakes National Wildlife Refuge with my photography club.  We usually go on workshops to shoot once a month, and this month we went on a wildlife shoot.  At this particular spot is a bird migration spot for many water fowl.  Water fowl of all kinds migrate here from up north.  Tundra Swans, Canadian Geese, Snow Geese, and many species of duck also migrate here.  This time of the year it's a great place to take photos of birds.  Neal Jernigan, a local wildlife photographer who leads workshops (and is also a member of the club), took us there.  We had a great time, although the Snow Geese had already left for the north.  But we still had lots to shoot. PelicanMax Stansell Photography  Birds, ducks, landscapes, and all kinds of stuff.  We started at Lake Pungo and saw some birds, but not like we saw last year.  Last year we saw tens of thousands of birds in one field.  We also saw some bear last year, but alas they weren't around this year.  Because the wildlife at Pungo wasn't great, we went to Engelhard, North Carolina, a fishing community, and took some great shots by the docks of the shrimp boats.  We then had lunch at a local restaurant that was great.  We always try to eat at a local spot.  We then went to Lake Mattamuskeet and shot birds until it was time to shoot the sunset. A super day was had.

Mattamuskeet SunsetMax Stansell Photography Now, I'm not a wildlife photographer, and this is a chance to get me out of my comfort zone.  Wildlife photographers use a lot of large lenses, and my biggest one is my 70-200mm f2.8.  I do have a 2 X converter that will make it a 400mm f5.6 lens, which is still on the small size for wildlife photographers.  What's good about going out with a group is that you can borrow equipment and learn from people who do different kinds of photography.  Most photographers love to give advice, help others, and talk about how they do things. (We don't really get the chance to do so.) White HeronMax Stansell Photography

Shooting wildlife seems to be all about getting good focus.  With the long telephoto lenses, you would think that it's easy to get great  focus all the time, but you would be wrong.  It's very difficult to get focus on a fast-moving object like a bird or moving animal.  I have nothing but respect for the wildlife photographer who can get great focus on a fast-flying bird.  And not to mention composition on a moving target is almost impossible for me, but to the seasoned wildlife photographer it can be done easily.  

So try your hand at wildlife photography, even if it's just birds in your backyard.  Keep shooting!

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2016-01-24-MSP-172_3_4Max Stansell Photography Hey everyone!  In this blog I want to talk about mirrorless cameras and how they have brought back vintage lenses.  Lenses that were used in the film era were great lenses with superb glass in them.  If you have been buying lenses lately, you know how expensive they can be, especially for really good glass.  Vintage glass on the other hand can be had for a mere few dollars and can be found in flea markets, garage sales, on eBay, or even your own closet.  In my film days I shot with Pentax, so I have some Pentax lenses that I used back then.  I've never parted with them, so I have a good variety of lenses.  To get them to fit on my Sony, I only had to get an inexpensive adapter that you can get from Amazon or eBay.  On the old film cameras that were manual focus, there were aids to help you focus a split screen or a prism that would help you focus, but on today's mirrorless cameras we have what is called "focus peaking."  Focus peaking is when you're manually focusing and your camera lets you know where you're in focus at by turning that part of the photo a color like red or yellow so you can see where you're in focus.  You can even magnify the image to fine tune the focusing so old eyes like mine can focus manually without too much problem. 2016-01-24-MSP-152Max Stansell Photography

Today I went out on a little photo walk/shoot at my local state park and into my town with nothing but vintage lenses and my Sony A6000 just to see how well I could focus with these old lenses.  I took four lenses with me to this exercise in photography.  

These are the lenses I took.  ​Pentax 28mm f2.8, Vivitar 35-70mm f2.8, Nikon 50mm f1.4, Pentax 80-200mm f4.6.  This was truly a exercise in basic photography.  This was like when I first started taking photos with my first SLR which was all manual.  The only decisions I had to make were what shutter speed, film speed (ASA/ISO), and aperture focus and shoot. The only difference was I could see instant results.  I did find that certain lenses I liked better than others.  

2016-01-24-MSP-035Max Stansell Photography The Pentax 28mm lens was something I just got off of eBay for 40 bucks (probably paid too much).  The results turned out good, but the focal range just wasn't what I thought it would be.  It was just in an uncomfortable range for me.  The lens was plenty sharp enough and worked well.  Solid metal construction.  Maybe a good lens for street photography.

The Vivitar 35-70mm lens is one of my old favorite lenses, and the focal length was a great one in full frame.  However, with my crop sensor it was a smidge too long.  My old faithful push-pull zoom lens worked well, and I used it quite a bit while walking through town.  Solid metal construction, sharp lens, worked well. 2016-01-24-MSP-120Max Stansell Photography

The Nikon 50mm 1.4 lens is the fastest of my manual lenses and is great for isolation.  This would be a great portrait lens for the crop sensor being equivilant to 75mm.  Solid plastic construction, very sharp lens, and I can use it with my D800 and D7000.

The biggest suprise of the experiment was the Pentax 80-200mm. This lens was the cheapest build of the four lenses with very inexpensive plastic and with a minimum f-stop of 4.6, the slowest of the bunch.  But for sharpness this was the clear winner and will be in my bag for when I need this focal range.  Above 100mm I don't use too much, but this lightweight lens will go with me backpacking as well as around town. 2016-01-24-MSP-108_09_10Max Stansell Photography

Will I be using these lenses all of the time?  Except for the Pentax 80-200, probably not.  I have auto focus lenses that take me from 15mm to 150mm, and I have a 60mm macro that I didn't mention that I can use on both my Sony and Nikon systems.  The overall experiment went well.  If you're looking for some different lenses for your mirrorless cameras, start looking at vintage glass.  It can be inexpensive (as low as 5 bucks) in a yard sale or bid on one on Ebay or pull some of the old friends out of the closet that you used with film.  These old lenses are very high quality and durable (most of them are built like a tank) and very fun to use.

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2016-01-16-MSP-048Max Stansell Photography I got to ride on a CHOO, CHOO!  I took a day trip to the NC Transportation Museum.  It is a fun Museum to visit especially for the kids!  Lots of Trains and everything associated with trains.  We even got to ride on one.  The museum is located in Spencer North Carolina at a old train repair depot.  It took us a few hours to drive to from our house but it was a easy drive.  Spencer is a small town just beside Salisbury NC just off of interstate 85.  Trains aren't the only thing they have there there are Cars, Trucks, and everything associated with Automobiles.   2016-01-16-MSP-014Max Stansell Photography They have a section dedicated to Winged flight as well.  They have a large building that houses all of the ongoing restoration projects and even has a full sized Piedmont Airliner in this building that they are working on.  This is a very interactive museum especially for the kids.  They even have a Thomas the train here as well.  On site train rides are given with history of the site while you ride.  They even have some longer trips scheduled in the warmer months that can take to Asheville NC and to Virginia.  I don't know all of the details of these trips but you can contact the museum for those who are interested.

​ 2016-01-16-MSP-145Max Stansell Photography Photography wise its a great place to get detailed shots and people shots.  I had fun going around trying to get some good ones.  I used my Sony A6000 for this trip and got good results altho this was a trip that me and my wife took so I wasn't really concerned with the photography as much as I would have been by myself.  But enjoyable , we had a good time.  Take time to visit your local museums there are many kinds and good photography can be had but a good time most defiantly will.

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