Algonquin Provincial Park
I love going out to shoot in overcast, drizzly weather conditions and my favorite lens to use on these days, if I am not shooting waterfalls with my wide angle zoom, is my Nikon 80-400mm VR lens. I love to use this lens to extract images from within the landscape and to shoot blurs. The Nikon 80-400mm VR lens has one major drawback to it though, and that is the poorly designed tripod collar. When I first began using this lens, many years ago, I immediately became aware of the vibration transmitted through the lens by the camera’s mirror. Vibraton that will compromise image quality. Fortunately there is a solution available. Kirk Enterprises offers a tripod replacement collar that firmly cradles the lens eliminating the vibration problem. You can view the replacement collar here. When I use the lens to shoot blurs I like to use it in the 200-400mm range and often I will handhold the lens for camera movement blurs. When I am relying on mother nature to create the blur via wind or flowing water, I lock the camera and lens firmly to my tripod by means of the replacement tripod collar. Some of my recent intimate landscapes and blurs can be seen below that were created with this lens during this year’s autumn outings. Head over here to see my favorite image from my Lake Superior Provincial Park trip in September. Don’t forget to hit the ‘like’ button :).
Lichen Covered Dead Tree
Autumn Reflection in Horseshoe Lake
Torrance Barrens near Gravenhurst, Ontario
Handheld Autumn Birch Tree Blur
Torrance Barrens near Gravenhurst, Ontario
Andrew McLachlan 
Love the blurring. Thanks for the information.
Thanks a bunch, much appreciated!
All beautiful Andrew, I think my fave is the last one. Thanks for sharing your tips!
Thanks for the comments Denise and the suggestion to add a little more contrast to the autumn reflection. Have a great trip to Alaska!!!
They’re all beautiful images, but I also really like the misty reflections in the last image. I would never have guessed that the second last one was a blur – I thought it was a reflection at first. Nice work.
Hi Mike, thanks very much for the kind words. I appreciate them very much!
[…] and landscape photographer in Barrie, Ontario (a fellow Canadian!). I was hooked when I saw this recent collection of autumn landscapes. Follow the link – it’ll be well worth your […]
Andrew, I very much like your pictures, having been told of your blog by Mike Moruzi – I’m the FATman he’s mentioned on his blog a couple of times recently. The shots above are extremely vibrant and beautiful >>> I certainly wish they were mine!
But something else to say too >>> we both use the 80mm-400mm VR Nikkor – and I’ve certainly encountered the collar problems you’re talking about. Mostly in fact, I use the lens hand held, because I’m too lazy to use tripods that much (despite owning a rock solid Gitzo). However thanks very much for the hint about the Kirk collar, I’m certainly going to think about it.
Of course the 80-400 is large and heavy, and most of my shots now are taken with the 70mm-300mm VR Nikkor, which is considerably lighter. I seem to “see” photos at x6, so the 300mm is perfect for me.
Very good being in touch with you.
Adrian (aka FATman)
Thanks for the kind words Adrian. I appreciate them very much.