open phones

[Tad Eareckson]

Kinda bummed out - more than usual - today.

First issue... The camera's metering system - I'm pretty sure now - is way the fuck off. I set the ISO to allow moderately fast shutter speeds to stop the birds tolerably, the aperture is fixed ('cause the lens is a scope), and I adjust exposure with the shutter speed. Center the needle and I pretty consistently get ugly washed out crap. Increase the shutter speed a healthy bit and I start getting beautiful rich colors. And there's no way to recalibrate or trick the camera into centering the needle where I want it to be.

Yeah, I can compensate but that leaves me pushing the left edge of the viewfinder range and having a lot of wasted space on the right. Pisses me off. And seems to be a common issue with a lot of cameras.

I'm also realizing just how unsuited for digiscoping this scope is in angled configuration. I knew there'd be issues and had thought of workarounds but nothing like some serious test driving to really start finding out what you're dealing with.

I know I'll be OK with something that stays nicely posed for awhile (a potoo who stays frozen so you'll keep thinking he's just a broken off part of the tree would be ideal) or keeps returning to the same perch but I also now fully realize that I'm gonna miss a fair percentage of shots that I wouldn't have with...



...a straight rig.

Back end module sells for close to 2.4K, weighs a ton, takes up luggage volume, sucks for regular birding. And the concept is supposed to be that you can just slap a camera on the back of what you're using for birding to get high quality shots. And Swarovski doesn't bend over backwards to get you fully tuned into exactly what you're getting into.

I mentioned a Scarlet Macaw that came in low and close from over the marsh at Palo Verde with a low sun behind us. One of the most beautiful sights I've ever experienced. Might have been able to hit him with the ATX, would've had a much better shot with the S. But, it's just now occurred to me, in all probability I'd have totally struck out with whatever I might've been using and trashed the experience I had unarmed.

A lot like the eclipse. The geeks all tell you to leave the photography to the super well prepared and equipped supergeeks and spend all your precious minutes and seconds experiencing what's happening.

Also... The view you get through the digiscoping setup is crap compared to the one you get through the scope alone. You're looking at a rectangle cut from the middle of a circle and lose a ton of light/brightness on top of that.

Put the camera with just the 43mm APO adapter on the tripod and took some test shots. Makes for a pretty decent wide angle lens. Forgot to try it with the thirty for comparison. On the to-do list.

Got a used remote shutter release off of eBay for under twenty bucks this morning, due Friday. I'll be happy to have it as it doesn't take much to get things vibrating working with that much length and magnification.

Got the first backyard Indigo Bunting of the season this afternoon - on film - while practicing. They come in for a couple weeks then totally vanish to nest locally. Should be seeing Rose-Breasted Grosbeaks too any day now. Their appearance window is about the same.
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Correction - 2019/04/25 2019/04/25 19:20:00 UTC

And there's no way to recalibrate or trick the camera into centering the needle where I want it to be.

There actually is - but only in:
- P : Program A(uto)E(exposure)
- Tv : Shutter Priority
- Av : Aperture Priority
modes - and I'm gonna be working in M(anual) for the foreseeable future.

[Tad Eareckson]

Did the 2019 Maiden Lawn Mow Wednesday. Not lotsa area but brutally steep and a good bit overdue. Held up reasonably well - leg wasn't really an issue. Yesterday started being able to go down steps somewhat normally - before it had been one step down with the left, bring the right down to its level, repeat... Think I've got about 25 degrees to go before I'll be able to match the right's max bend with the left.

One of the social circle folk put up a hummer feeder Wednesday after I told her that they should be very much around now. She reported getting lightly mobbed immediately, hung mine out Thursday but no signs of anything to date.

No shortage of Blue Jays however. Been a nonstop (save for darkness) feeding frenzy since Thursday - never seen anything like it here before. Haven't noticed them being openly aggressive towards other birds but have yet to see another Bunting - let alone a first Grosbeak. Sharing the wealth OK though with Doves, Grackles, Cowbirds, Cardinals, White-Throated Sparrows, Red-Bellied Woodpeckers, White-Breasted Nuthatches.

Gotta thank the Jays though for giving me lotsa target practice opportunities. Also for helping me realize that digiscoping with an angled setup just isn't doable if you wanna go out into the real world and come back with much in the way of worthwhile results.

I dislike twelve o'clock (back end straight up) for most birding situations and despise it for camera. You need the camera and the scope barrel to be at the same level. And that leaves you with nine o'clock. But the angled geometry works such that...

You're shooting out horizontally and you get the camera clamped level. Pitch up for something in the trees and the camera rolls starboard side low. Pitch down for something on the edge of the pond and the camera goes starboard side high. You're only perfectly level at the exact pitch angle for which you've set. Totally unacceptable.

There are two very lightly used STX Eyepiece Modules up on eBay right now. I plan on owning one of them by late tonight. Yeah, I'm starting to feel like a heroin addict. Thought just occurred to me that I can probably pick up a used 65mm objective module pretty cheap and thus be able to have two scopes going at the same time. STX-85 digiscoping and ATX-65 birding - or - ATX-85 birding and STX-65 birding.

Sister had been on an 04/23-28 DC area mission with a friend from Guadeloupe whom she'd met on a sea turtle nesting project on the island. Got together with them Friday. Picked them up off the Metro, lunch, toured around Annapolis.

At lunch we talked about Tempisque River crocodiles. And on that boat trip I was doing a lot of thinking about how quickly and totally dead I'd have been without the boat. But I learned from little sister that the trick is to not splash. Slip underwater, swim smoothly until you need to breathe again, silently break the surface, breathe... Still hope I never hafta put that to the test.

Swung around Bay Ridge...

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Strong, smooth, straight in, Ospreys parking up high... Massively soarable. As long as you don't let yourself get low you've got a safe shot to a safe knee deep landing area. Oh well.

Hit the Naval Academy, set the scope and scope-and-camera up for some field practice and show-and-tell. Sister and friend short so I collapsed the lower-most leg sections and extended the center column. Wind was a bit ferocious there too and illustrated the cost of extending the center column rather than spending the extra time and doing the job right with the legs. Image was bouncing all over the place.

Speaking of bouncing all over the place... Got my remote shutter release Wednesday - just a little button (with a locking switch) on the end of a cord. Boy it's nice to be able to take a shot without touching anything that - for the purpose of the exercise - matters.

Yesterday afternoon went to an art exhibition at Saint John's College in Annapolis. Photo of a Chestnut-Mandibled Toucan a short walk into the gallery with the photographer nearby. I pulled the little ziplock out of my backpack and asked him to try to identify the little black feather I'd picked up off the Arenal Observatory Lodge deck in the aftermath of that horrible glass strike incident. His photo was from the vicinity of the Saladero Eco Lodge near the head of Golfo Dulce on the mainland side 23 miles a bit south of east from our Vista Drake Lodge stop on the Osa Peninsula. We talked digiscoping for a while afterwards.

Still majorly bummed about the metering / exposure / LCD monitor situation. That's so fundamental and so off, crippling, intolerable. Pretty good bet that that's the reason such a pristine condition camera showed up on eBay. Don't wanna deal with returning it to the seller, starting this drill over again, finding some other major headache or collection of. Hopefully I'll be able to send it to Canon and get it set right for another hundred bucks after I've gained modest degrees of understanding how it works and competency.

[Tad Eareckson]

I'm now the owner - as of 2019/04/30 02:34:57 UTC - of a pristine looking STX Eyepiece Module. Estimated delivery eight days from now and no sign of movement yet though.

New they sell from all the dealers for $2369 and there were two very lightly used pristine ones on eBay. 323786329545 was up for Auction, 352643845407 was Buy It Now or Best offer.

There were 56 bids on 323786329545. They'd slowly climbed up to a bit south of $1500 and stayed there for most of the afternoon and evening. I'd set up Auction Sniper to grab it for a bit over $1900 with four seconds lead time and planned to immediately buy 352643845407 for the asking price if I lost out.

But someone else made an acceptable offer and took it out of my game hours before. So I increased my bid to a little over $2100. Much over that and ya might as well get a new one. Fell sound asleep toying with the idea of cancelling Auction Sniper and bidding manually. Woke up an hour after the end of the auction and found that it was mine and what it was costing me - $1816.55 to own and get it here plus another fifteen to Auction Sniper.

People who bid with over ten seconds to go are total idiots.

Of course I'm a total idiot too for buying it in the first place. I'd need to be 25 years old, in great health, and a professional guide to justify this extravagance. But it's kinda fun to learn how to drive this stuff and debunk the manufacturers' promotional material. And maybe I'll eventually get a few spectacular shots of some spectacular targets. Hell, even that damned Roadside Hawk at Palo Verde would've guaranteed me some pretty cool images.

I've amended the "Swarovski ATX spotting scope system" topic/document with a section on digiscoping. No, have yet to shoot anything not in the backyard (although I did get a Red Fox yesterday afternoon) but I'm pretty sure I've got some info that won't be found anywhere else.

Hoping I can at least get a tracking number before too long.

[Steve Davy]

But it's kinda fun to learn how to drive this stuff and debunk the manufacturers' promotional material.

Fun and also frustrating, similar to what I am dealing with on these stupidly designed RC helicopters.

Ball links where they don't need to be, threaded links that should be turnbuckles, redundant swash dive linkages, tail rotor belt dive pulley on top of the main shaft gear (come on guys), radial bearings where thrust bearings should be, main shaft gear mounted with a tiny screw that will "Z" bend in a crash (have fun getting that fucker out!) should be a collet, gotta remove the canopy in order to swap batteries (give me a break!), three bearings on the main shaft (ya only need two, idiots), main shaft bearing spacing dictated by the dimensions of the servos... And then there are the insidious flybarless flight control systems and their interfaces and manuals.

PS - If ya install a collet on the main shaft gear and use a couple of Teflon washers you've got an adjustable clutch and thus should not be blowing out gears. Kinda like we did on the RC cars twenty years ago.

[Tad Eareckson]

The problem is obviously that these things are being designed and constructed with way too many parts. Get Paul Hurless to give you a sketch of how to do this right and start over from scratch. Or Ryan could probably show you how to do it with nothing more than a six inch length of 130 pound Greenspot precision fishing line. And whatever route you go do be sure to get a final assessment from Jim Rooney - what with his keenly intellectual professional pilot perspective.

My new toy started moving late yesterday afternoon from a bit north of Boston and landed just north of Philly this morning at 05:02 local. Should be able to start breathing easier not too far into tomorrow after I sign for it.

Fortunately - for me - the problems I'm dealing with aren't the ones you are - save for that near catastrophic tripod center column and the camera metering issues. All the current Swarovski labeled stuff in my stable is solidly and beautifully engineered. It's mostly the omissions, misleadings, half-truths in the promotions and documentation that are providing me the unpleasant surprises and headaches.

But I think I have things pretty well sorted out now - undoubtedly a lot better than hundreds of regular and digiscoping birders with zillions of hours of field experience with this stuff. And yesterday (2019/05/01 16:00:00 UTC) completed a massive overhaul of my scope article. And I'm sure that has a lot of solid information not to be found anywhere else.

[Steve Davy]

It's mostly the omissions, misleadings, half-truths in the promotions and documentation that are providing me the unpleasant surprises and headaches.

Reminds me of this:
http://www.horizonhobby.com/product/helicopters/blade-helicopters/bind-n-fly-helicopters/fusion-270-bnf-basic-blh5350

Optimized Servo Geometry
Proven optimized servo geometry provides exceptional response and control, while improving servo efficiency and minimizing mechanical loss to the swashplate.

That installation has zero effect on swash-plate control when compared to the many other designs that I have seen. But it does make the machine more difficult to manufacture, assemble and maintain. The upside is that it is a bit more compact and allows for a more centralized center of mass, but they don't advertise that benefit.

At least they put the motor in the right location, but then didn't take advantage of that by installing the electronic speed control such that the wires don't need to be six inches long. Also, doing so would allow the battery to be installed without removing the canopy.

This stupid crap bugs me so I have to go in and fix it, but that is part of the fun with these little buggers.

[Tad Eareckson]

So thankful I only had to expand my vocabulary a reasonably tiny bit to get into these scoping and digiscoping projects.

Signed for my new toy component at 12:21 local early this afternoon. When I'm appointed Earth Dictator for Life plastic packing tape is gonna sell for five dollars a foot. Most discouraging considering that this guy was a digiscoping birder.

Pristine shape, as soon as I was able to tunnel my way in I swapped it in and shot a few more birds. Fuckin' ATX was pure unadulterated hell in this application. Glad I got myself tuned in with practice on the backyard stuff rather than while attempting to nail a Magpie Jay or Fiery-Billed Aracari.

Blue Jays have slackened of a fair bit - maybe 'cause the feeders ran dry Wednesday. And I clocked the Grosbeaks in at 12:50 yesterday afternoon. Missed a nice shot of the first pair in nice light 'cause of the fuckin' ATX issue. I'm way too anal to be able to push the button before things are perfect on my end - even when it's just digital.

Did some more article revisions subsequent to my last post and came to a few crushing realizations regarding digiscoping.

- Any view I get through the camera and scope is gonna be major crap compared to the view I'd have gotten through the scope alone. And ditto for any photo.

- I won't be able to share the scope with anyone. It'll be way up high just above the apex of the tripod with the legs fully extended and the center column fully retracted for max vantage with max stability and using the straight rather than angled eyepiece. Getting it back into regular people viewing mode would eat up a fair bit of time, effort, skill precision.

I guess if I were in a tour group that was gonna stay together for more than a couple days - à la Alaska - I could train a small pit crew and we could probably get the switch time down to under a minute.

Also in the little bit of practice time I've had so far... While, yeah, the ATX really sucks for digiscoping in general the STX really sucks for higher angles in digiscoping mode every bit as much as it sucks minus the camera. I have the camera adapters on both eyepiece modules now and they're gonna stay there.

Had a Catbird out back yesterday. Used to be nesting season regulars but I don't know how many years it's been since the last time.

[Tad Eareckson]

Moderately heavy rain all day - dark, cool, depressing...

I'd left the hummer feeder up for about a week, gotten no indications that anything was coming in, pulled it about Thursday. But when I went out the front door this morning there was one checking out the empty feeder area. Ran back inside and grabbed the clean empty feeder, ran back to the door, showed it to the bird - then perched on a nearby high exposed twig. Took off.

Quickly stirred up a mix and hung it but haven't yet had any indications of success.

Got involved in writing up procedures for reconfiguring from viewing to digiscoping and back modes and came up with a few substantial tricks to boost efficiency. I wonder if I can get a Nobel Prize for figuring out that tripod legs extension adjustments can be easily effected with the entire tripod/head/scope assembly...

32-14811-14824
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...upside down and resting on the top of one's left foot. (No, you can't do it with an angled eyepiece at the usual twelve o'clock set but I use 10:30 for everything anyway.)

Got the times down to well under three minutes and I'm sure I can get better if I practice enough to get everything instinctive. An assistant could help a little but most of what needs to be done needs to be done sequentially by a single individual.

A little more optimistic now about achieving a nice balance between seeing/sharing experiences and saving.

[Tad Eareckson]

If that damned hummer ever took a sip it was just once right after I put the feeder out. No sign of anything since then and pulled it this morning. But I'm getting nice Five-Lined Skinks out on the front steps whenever the sun's hitting them (which it hasn't been again today).

Been practicing the scope reconfiguration drills obsessively and got both times down to under 1.75 minutes. And I think I'm doing close to the minimum possible with my best times - no mistakes, fumbles, freezes while I try to remember what's supposed to come next and why. And I think I have all the actions further refined for max efficiency.

Of course I'm running the drills in the comfort of the living room and on a flat surface where equal legs extensions translates to perfectly vertical tripod. Out in the real world with sloping irregular surfaces... Guess I'll need a little practice in that department - but I'm thinking that with this issue even a totally untrained assistant would be a major plus.

[Tad Eareckson]

Tad Eareckson - 2018/01/17 17:14:42 UTC

Day 02 - 2017/12/29

There's a Father Crowley Point overlook pull-off on the north side of CA-190 at about 4250 feet and I took it - with the day's light just about done. Parked and switched off the nav.

Back in the car, fired up the Garmin, told it Ridgecrest, it told me to turn LEFT. Back east to the Panamint Valley for a 79 mile trip to Ridgecrest. Continuing on the previous route would've taken another 94. So I turned left and backtracked eleven miles and descended about 2670 feet to the junction of CA-190 and Panamint Valley Road.

Felt bad about having burned and pretty much wasted all that altitude climbing fuel...

That overlook was right where that F/A-18E slammed in yesterday.
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2019/08/03 15:15:00 UTC

Lt. Charles Z. Walker - 33
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2020/11/26 15:20:00 UTC

http://news.usni.org/2020/05/28/navy-concludes-experienced-pilots-brief-lapse-of-judgement-root-cause-of-star-wars-canyon-crash
Navy Concludes Experienced Pilot's 'Brief Lapse of Judgement' Root Cause of 'Star Wars' Canyon Crash - USNI News

Sam LaGrone - 2020/05/28 18:03

http://news.usni.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Screen-Shot-2020-05-28-at-2.44.24-PM.png

http://live.staticflickr.com/65535/50648757732_c58972f4ce_o.png

An undated photo of the Super Hornet that crashed on July 31, 2019 into the Rainbow Canyon at the Death Valley National Park. US Navy Photo

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2020/11/30 23:00:00 UTC

Scene of the disaster. Entered the canyon from the west/upstream end in a left turn, full afterburners down inside, 550 Knots Calibrated Airspeed / 633 mph. Plane vaporized, seven French tourists burned but the report says not too seriously. We'd have probably heard about it otherwise.

After zooming in through the two series of photos - bird's-eye and approach into and through the canyon - there are shots with impact marked. ID the points and go backwards for a fair understanding of what was happening. Impact is visible and easily identifiable in all approach shots. (Not to mention bird's-eye obviously.)

I'm pretty sure the shot of the doomed plane isn't from this canyon. Too dry to support the vegetation we're seeing above.

1S-1
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36°21'47.66" N 117°31'57.30" W - 42585 feet

Length of the Canyon from head to mouth as the Raven flies over all the bends - 5.0 miles. I don't think he spent a mile and a half in the Canyon. Elevation drops from 4340 to 1580 for a loss of 2760 feet. Note that in the next valley to the east we go down to -282 - lowest point on the continent.

1S-2
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36°21'33.13" N 117°31'27.65" W - 30878 feet
1S-3
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36°21'36.27" N 117°32'51.63" W - 18731 feet
1S-4
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36°21'29.83" N 117°33'22.95" W - 12584 feet
1S-5
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36°21'19.37" N 117°33'11.42" W - 08672 feet
1S-6
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36°21'13.45" N 117°32'56.75" W - 06838 feet
1S-7
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36°21'16.40" N 117°32'44.17" W - 05444 feet

Same photo showing impact point:

1S-7I
http://live.staticflickr.com/65535/50666404321_90ae6f59d4_o.png

36°21'16.40" N 117°32'44.17" W - 05444 feet

Telescope Peak, 11048 feet, is the high point on the horizon and the highest point in the park. WAY easier to see than to arrive at.

2A-01
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2A-02
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2A-03
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2A-04
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2A-05
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2A-06
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2A-07
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2A-08
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2A-09
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2A-10
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Same photo showing impact point:

2A-10I
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The view we were expecting to have / wish we'd had instead:

2A-11
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For the super anal types (like Yours Truly)....

The coordinates from the report are 36°21'16.40" N 117°32'44.17" W and illustrated by the crosshairs in 1S-7I and 2A-10I. (Go to full rez using the URLs for much better looks.) The elevation is reported as 4102 feet which is 24 lower that what's shown by Google Earth so you need to move down the wall a wee bit for that to match. (Not, of course, that either of those figures could've been either defined or determined with anything at such levels of precision.)
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http://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/173-general-photography/386078-death-valley-extra-added-attraction-star-wars-canyon-top-gun-airshow.html
Death Valley extra added attraction - Star Wars Canyon (Top Gun Airshow) - PentaxForums.com

http://live.staticflickr.com/65535/50680428692_89bd1c941a_o.jpg
F-15 Eagle