In October, thousands of Snow Geese are seen in the Vancouver area on their migration to points further south. We were experimenting with a mirror lens when a flock passed overhead. Several exposures were made, but the lens has a very shallow depth of field, so most were too fuzzy for our liking. This particular picture, however, is nicely sharp and shows that the lens does do a very good job. Capturing birds in flight is tricky and anyone attempting to do this should expect a low proportion of good images.
For those people interested in digital cameras, the 1600 x 1200 image of this picture has the original, unprocessed pixels cropped from the camera's image file. The only difference between it and what we have on our computer is the JPEG compression (the red channel has been blurred in the sky areas).
The lens used for this image is a 500mm reflex-Nikkor which has a fixed aperture of f8. The rest of the image information can be seen from the camera's stored data below. (The lens doesn't have the electronic connection the camera needs to supply correct focal length and aperture information)
File name :DSC_1642.JPG File size :2.4MB (2531441 bytes) Date and time :Thu, 11 Oct, 2001 11:07:14 AM Image size :3008 x 1960 Resolution :72 x 72 dpi Number of bits :8 bits/channel Protection :Off Camera ID :N/A Model name :NIKON D1X Quality mode :FINE Metering mode :Center-weighted Exposure mode :Manual Flash :Off Focal length :0.0 mm Shutter speed :1/2000 seconds Aperture :F0.0 Exposure compensation :0.0 EV Fixed white balance :Auto Lens :N/A Flash sync mode :N/A Exposure difference :-0.6 EV Flexible program :No Sensitivity :ISO500 Sharpening :Low Curve mode :Normal Color mode :Color Tone compensation :N/A Latitude(GPS) :N/A Longitude(GPS) :N/A Altitude(GPS) :N/A