Canon 70-200mm 2.8 lens practice photos plus Canon Powershot A650 shots while playing golf.

I recently splurged and bought an expensive Canon lens....the Canon 70-200mm 2.8 L series lens. It's soooooo heavy. Two days ago I took this lens outside my backdoor and shot some of the shots below, hand holding this almost 4 pound lens (fitted with a Really Right Stuff L84 tripod bracket for collared lens attached.)

All of the photos came out "soft" - not in crisp focus. Bummer. I intended to post the photos anyway, but couldn't. I was embarrassed. Here I spent all this money and couldn't even shoot a decent in-focus hand held shot in good light.

After a little thought, I decided, I am going to post these photos for the reasons listed:

• First reason - so hopefully, some day I'll look back and say, "Wow, have you improved Linda."
• Second reason- to help keep me accountable to practicing. I don't like looking bad in front of people, so I'll be posting practice photos to keep me on track with this out-there-for-all-to-see stated commitment.
• Third reason - I need to get over expecting to get better without putting in the time and effort. I posted a great blog entry in Facebook today by a woman blogger I so identify with. Her blog was titled: "Work First, Tools later." My pattern is to buy the gear and believe by having the gear, I'll get better. Silly, I know.
• Fourth reason - To be an example to my ladies that I only ask of them, what I ask of myself.
  

Yesterday, after a frustrating round of golf, with many good shots, but lots of triples and a quadruple or two, I mentioned to Ray that maybe I should start posting my golf scores in this blog. "Why, he asked?" And before I answered, he said, "Yeah, you should." He knows I try much harder and do better when I am accountable to people. Sooooo, I shot a 99 yesterday. Ouch!. More golf scores to follow in this blog as I play.

Ok, here is a photo I shot with the Canon 70 - 200 2.8, around 6pm. I had a lens hood on and was shooting almost in the direction of the lowered sun. What caught my eye, was the silhouette of the sunbathing bird in the reflected light on the water.

This egret flew as Ray hit his shot while playing on the Pete Dye course. Photo is shot with my small Canon Powershot A650, zoomed in some. As the bird flew off, I quickly tried to capture it by panning, following the bird with my camera. Obviously the shutter speed was too fast and didn't blur the background, just my cute little bird.

Shot outside our back door with the large Canon 70 - 200 lens. I tried moving closer but I could tell the bird's comfort level was decreasing with my approaching presence.

Canon 70 - 200 lens

Shot with my small Canon Powershot A650. Looked a lot better when I was actually seeing the reflection as we left the green.