Digiscoping With LE-Adaptor
by John Laumer, Philadelphia on 08. 9.05
Seen any camera stores in the mall that carry telescopic lenses for digital cameras? We thought not. Yet, that's what's needed to deliver quality pictures from a great distance. "Digiscoping", based on methods of marrying your digital camera to a conventional optical device, is an off-the-shelf solution for TreeHugger closeups of birds, concerts, and sporting events. CAUTION: before you read on, promise us you won't try it around commercial buildings, large industries, or with a transportation hub or major corridor in the background. The Homeland Security types have engendred a putative mindset that may result in equipment confiscation or threat of legal charges. Hopefully shots of birds in the woods are no problem. There: now, with that out of the way, we may proceed.
A detailed definition and explanation digiscoping is found here . Includes links to great examples.
There is an established market for bioculars with built in digital cameras; but, our cursory evaluation suggests these are destined for the closet-fill corners of gadget history. The only thing worse than wasted "stuff" is stuff that's fluff, and therefore wasted.
The better way is to adapt a decent digital camera, which you may already have and spent a lot of time learning to link to your computer, to fit with a decent spotting scope. For a good sampling of spotting scopes, try this link to Cabella's catalog, which is huge. If you buy something from them, by the way, you'll get amazing catalogs for years.
The "adapting" part is where things might bet get tricky without some help. The LE-Adaptor company offers the cleanest solutions we've seen to bridge a digital camera to a scope. TreeHugger suggests you keep the production of more stuff down by going for a used spotting scope that fits a known LE-Adaptor or similar product. A quick look on Ebay verified that there are plenty of used scopes available.
If you're afraid of becoming a Crowned Geek of Digiscopy (a species that Audubon and Agassiz both missed), by indicating your interest in this, it may of some relief to know that you are in good company. A 2001 report released by the Department of Interior's U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service found that "66 million Americans spent more than $38 billion in 2001 observing, feeding, or photographing wildlife". The report, called the 2001 National and State Economic Impacts of Wildlife Watching Addendum relied on data collected in the Service's 2001 National Survey of Fishing, Hunting, and Wildlife-Associated Recreation.
It's fine to admit you like birds. Photographing them won't detract from your status as a full-fledged TreeHugger. We promise.
and above all, RESPECT THE BIRDS & the norms of birdwatching eg muted clothes (colours & noise eg no noisy jackets/shoes), quiet, don't disturb birds esp when breeding/nesting, leave the place cleaner than you found it & other commonsense.
====response by author follows====
This is very good advice. And it is all the more reason to use a long lens as it will help you stay as away from the nests as far as possible. The more quiet you are the more you will see and enjoy.
"...you'll get amazing catalogs for years."
This sounds more like a threat than a benefit. Paper catalogs make me sad. Especially when the companies sending them have perfectly good websites.
===author's reply===
Good point. I'm sure you can ask to keep off the mailing list.
you can also go micro... attaching your digicam to the eyepiece of a microscope and gaze at another level of structure in the natural world. several years ago, i took my camera and eyepiece to a local machine shop and they made a threaded adapter for me for $40.
this place has also been selling various digicam adapters much like the one you feature:
http://www.ckcpower.com/
they even have setups for digicams lacking threads.
hello folks .
this may be kinda low tech but my tasco monocular has a rubber eyecup that fits right over the lens barrel of my kodak easyshare 2 mp camera if you fiddle with the zoom and the focus on the lens you get a reasonable picture.
plus the rubber holds it on tight enough that you dont have to hold onto it if your using a tripod
{a small hose clamp lightly tightened could make it more secure but will cause damage if you try to turn off your camera and the lens retracts}imsur a better camera and a better scope will give better pictures but its ok for those unexpected rare bird sightings.
Is it less "treehugger" to use film? I'm sincerely asking, not axe-grinding. (FWIW, I use a digital camera.) In theory I think digital media would use less material, but I'm not sure that's true in practice yet.
Birding and nature photography are great "gateway" hobbies to hook people on greener living.
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Agree with your gateway hypothesis.
The 'which photo tech is better question' is a simile to the grocery store bag enigma: plastic or paper? Depends on the metrics, who's saying, and other factors. My main concern is that there is not one or two camera and storage media standards: there are many more. And with the shake down coming among these, there will be a huge amount of closet fill from the expired technology. Add to that the film cameras and its huge.
Second issue is that what digital takes away from film and chemicals in the way of material and energy throughput, plus toxic exposures, we trade off for more throughput in digital storage media, printers, cables, ink heads, wasted print paper (from amateur "processing") and the panic buying and printing that will come when people see the loss of archival quality from prints in short order.
On the plus side, good digital cameras cut down on the amount of images that get printed at all. Camera stores forced us to print every exposure: something that is slowly going away as people audit their results on the fly. The abiltyy to review images instantly also takes away from the propensity to "take another shot just to be sure you got it". In the long run I think this will make a huge difference.