Birds with A55/500mm mirror/2xTC

I just posted this 3 minute video of birds shot last week.
The combination of the 500MM reflex and the 2xTC was being used for the first time.

This put the effective focal length up to about 1500mm, 500X2X1.5(crop).
It is almost equivalent to a spotting scope at about 20x.
All shots were on a good tripod, or on a mono pod.

Forget autofocus.  And manual focus without peaking was difficult.
But when it was on focus it was quite acceptable.

I kept some of the OOF video, just for the content.
I did use a sharpen filter, and did a color correction in Premier Pro 5.5.  (Fast Color Corrector)
There is some sparkle from over sharpening in some places.
Sun was hard mid afternoon.

I am OK with this first try, but now know what I have to do to get the focus right.

The A55 is being replaced soon by an upgrade, A99 or FS100 or ??? depending on what comes out at NAB from Sony in April.

Video here:

https://vimeo.com/60772612

Mike

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