I have good news - the camera is here! And what a camera it is! It's such a nicely built piece of precision engineering that it might almost be German, but not quite. It takes some rather fabulous pictures and I'll give you a couple of examples of them further down. I haven't tried out the video capability of it yet as I haven't got a tripod and microphone yet, but they are next on the shopping list I assure you.
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| The fabulous, magnificent, awesome 60D! |
It's a really nice camera, with an 18MP APS-C sensor, a flip-out 3" LCD screen that's really handy for filming, and various modes. I'm using a Canon 28-135mm lens on it, which I bought second hand, saving around £125 over buying it new. I think this is a good plan when buying a lens as they don't really go off, as long as you buy one from a reputable source. It's a good all round lens in my opinion, as it can do fairly wide angles, but also a fair measure of zoom if need be. I have it in a Lowepro Toploader Zoom 55 bag, which has space for it with the lens hood on, or if you reverse the hood you can fit another lens underneath. I have a Canon 70-300mm lens in there for when I need that bit more zoom. It also has space for spare batteries, SD cards and any other small accessories you can think of! As an SD card I am using the SanDisk Extreme Pro 16GB card, which is the fastest SD card out there as far as I'm aware. I will probably have to get a second one, as it can only hold around 44 minutes of Full HD video according to the manual, but it should be good for around 2000 photos!
Now for some test shots from the camera:
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| My cute little cat, trying to attack my hand! |
I will upload a few more tomorrow when I've taken it outside.
Moving on to the session now. On Tuesday afternoon Merlin asked me if I would be up for a session after school the next day. I said yes, so we left school at 1:25, and were underway to Wylands at 2:00 on the dot, after an episode of forgotten shoes from Merlin! We soon arrived, got the rods out and sat down in our communal seating area - an area between out two swims from which we can see and get to our rods. After about half an hour, I was into a small fish. I soon landed it, and it was around 4lb. Here's a picture for you:
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| My little 4lb common from New Speci |
As you can see, it wasn't massive but it was a good start and I felt that it had definitely been worth making the effort to come down in the cold!
After another hour or so, I got another run, and hooked into a fish. It felt fairly decent, but unfortunately it only stayed on for a few seconds before it came off. Both these runs came on the Liquid Baits Bun Spice, which really is a top bait - I can't stress it enough. We took it to a lake that it had almost certainly never been used on before, and it is just catching fish after fish, even in these freezing temperatures that we are experiencing!
Just as we were starting to pack up, Merlin hooked into a decent fish. It turned out to be an 8lb 15oz common that gave a great fight. I recommend you check out his video of the session, as it's a good laugh and you'll get to see his fish!
I'm going to call it a day here, I've been playing with the camera all afternoon and clearing out shelves to make a home for it, so I'm fairly knackered. I hope to see you soon with another blog, but for now, tight lines and wet nets!
