With a bit of time left over at the end of the day and the sun still beaming down on the Isle of Wight I decided to test my reactions and ability to multi-task! I only use manual focus lenses and have two that could conceivably render a reasonable image of a bird at distance. One of our bird feeders is located about 20 metres from the nearest point that I could shoot them and hope to not disturb their behaviour or scare them away completely. In my lens arsenal is a Nikon 400mm f/.5.6 AIS ED IF and a Nikon 180mm f/2.8 AIS ED. I also have the legacy Nikon 1.4 and 2.0 teleconverters so I decided to try the 180mm with the 2x TC-201 converter. This also required the Nikon F to Nikon Z adapter which resulted in a very long and fairly heavy combination, especially on the little Nikon Z FC.
I can say with certainty, there’s a reason that bird photographers use fast, autofocus lenses.. Maintaining focus on a tiny Blue Tit whilst it swings frantically back and forth on a bird feeder is quite a task but it’s just about doable with a little patience. The above image is cropped only about 20%, just to remove some unnecessary background. Other than that a little sharpening with Topaz Labs Sharpen AI is all that’s been applied. I’d like a bit more detail, if I’m honest, but it’s still not bad considering the use of a 2x teleconverter, a 40-50 year old lens and everything in manual mode, including the focusing.