Mokka mit Schlag

I’m still looking for a good, general purpose lens with an emphasis on nature shots so I rented a Canon EF 70-300mm f/4.5-5.6 DO IS USM for 10 days. That was too long. Within 20 minutes, it was obvious this was not a good lens. It’s incredibly blurry at all lengths from 70-300mm and all subject distances. It’s decidedly inferior to the cheaper Tamron 28-300, which, while not satisfying me, does well on at least some subjects. If the Canon works on anything, I didn’t find it. Besides general lack of sharpness, it also had very poor close focus and was too long at the short end to do decent portraits. If this lens is good for anything, I didn’t notice it.

The results are vaguely plausible if you reduce the size of the image, which tends to sharpen things up:

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Question Mark Butterfly, Polygonia interrogationis
Sandy Hook, New Jersey, 2009-09-26

It occurs to me that a lot of the moths I’ve posted lately have been rather, small, brown, and dull; even if from a taxonmoic view they’re quite diverse. Thus I was really happy to find these showy Ailanthus Webworm Moths on Saturday’s Brooklyn Bird Club field trip to Sandy Hook and Richard W. Dekorte Park:

Atteva punctella, Hodges#2401
Sandy Hook, New Jersey, 2009-09-26
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American Copper, Lycaena phlaeas
Sandy Hook, New Jersey, 2009-09-26
1/250 s, f/11, ISO 100, Canon 100mm macro with ring flash

Augochlora pura
Prospect Park, Brooklyn, NY, 2009-09-20

I first wrote about this almost 20 years ago on the NYMUG BBS, but some otherwise intelligent folks still haven’t gotten the message, and persist in making fools of themselves in public while the pirates laugh their asses off. Software/music/book piracy is not theft. Legally, theft involves specific actions under the law. Distributing unauthorized copies of purchased books/music/software is illegal in most jurisdictions, but it is not now and never has been theft. Anyone who says otherwise (and they are legion) is blowing hot air; and everyone who isn’t in the content business (as well as some of us who are) at least implicitly recognizes this. Trying to convince folks that piracy is theft is as hopeless as trying to convince people the world is flat. The reality is just too obvious for such wrong ideas to take hold. The copyright industry is attempting to preserve a doomed business model by name calling. <sarcasm>Yeah, that’s going to work.</sarcasm>.
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