Lens for dragonflies and butterflies ???

C

Cesium

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I have a Canon 40d with the 17-70 IS lens and also the 100mm f2.8 macro ( what a great lens !!). I am now looking for something with a longer reach for pictures of dragonflies and butterflies.

The Canon 100-400 is a to heavy for me and I am not keen on the push pull zoom. I was thinking more of 300mm max length zoom.

The Canon 70-300 IS lenses (DO or not) both only focus to about 1.5 meters which is not that close.

Suggestions would be very welcome about what other lenses I should consider. I Think IS will be important for me. I do not have to stick to Canon by the way.

What do you use for this sort of pictures ?
 
I would say your 100 Macro might be the best choice ... :cautious: ... especially with the f2.8 ... ;)




:p
 
Joe's suggestion would be fine but there are other considerations.

Butterflies don't really need 1:1 reproduction and very good results will be obtained with a longer prime or zoom (70-200 range) if a 25mm tube is added. This will reduce the minimum focus distance and hence increase the native magnification whilst giving you some zoom flexibility. You won't find an IS macro lens but could use an IS zoom/tube combination.

Bob
 
Thanks for the quick replies.

I realise I do not need a true macro for this (the 100 mm I have is fine for that).

I will probably end up with one of the Canon 70-300 and possibly an extension tube. But I was just wondering if anyone uses a ??-300 zoom which has a closer focus than the 1.5 meters on the Canons and also that they actually use and would recommend.
 
Last year was my first year using the 300mm f4'L' for shooting Damselflies, Dragonflies and Butterflies, a fantastic lens for the job, nice and light, fast focus, IS, and takes a 1.4x convertor for when you need a little extra, and I understand it takes extension tubes well too so I'll hopefully be trying those out with it this year too.

Optically it's a stunner too.

I'd say it's a perfect lens for what your after

Alan
 
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