Photographer Rob Haynes has been featured in both international and national wildlife & birding magazines as well as national newspaper titles. He regularly licenses his work for barn owls and animal charities to raise funds for conservation. He inherited his love for wildlife through his grandfather who taught him as a child how to get close to nature but to also respect its surroundings and to show your appreciation by using photographs as a way to preserve the memories. His early photographic influence’s were Eric Hoskings who revolutionised bird photography.
Rob shares with us his experience of using the SIGMA 150-600mm | Sports lens plus TC-1401 1.4x telelconverter to record the summer activities of the family of foxes that made their home in his back garden.
My summer with the SIGMA 150-600mm f/5-6.3 DG OS HSM | Sports + SIGMA TC-1401 1.4x Teleconverter
My Summer was spent focusing (literally!) on a small woodland copse backing on to our Office in Worcestershire, it’s quite amazing what you see in a tiny microcosm of the English wild wood and my experiences with my Sigma 150-600mm | Sports Telephoto lens and the new TC-1401 Teleconverter combo was a summer I will fondly remember.
The late Spring visitations of a lone Fox Vixen led to a story of seeing a young Fox pairing with her mate and growing relationship developing with the culmination of a young Fox Cub arriving in summer, there is nothing quite like the sight of a wild fox in tip top condition arriving in a woodland clearing early morning and I remember that first visitation of a beautiful face appearing through the bushes….
It was a surprise to see her and I managed to fire off a few frames thinking it was a ‘one off’ encounter, the next day she appeared again around the same time, I guess looking to steal the bread we leave for the Birds and Squirrels that live in the wood, the Sigma Sport with the versatility of the zoom feature copes brilliantly in these situations being able to adapt to the movement and distance as the subject moves.
We named her Foxley and she came regularly to check out our little woodland copse.
The fox needs to feed her young and her frequency around the copse looking for scraps of food indicated her need to feed young, one morning we were visited by a little face in the entrance to the copse, it was her young Cub just watching Squirrels and Rabbits that live in the wood.
A young Cub in beautiful condition same colouring as mum !
Always a difficult situation to shoot into a dark wood at dawn with sketchy light and a darkened background but the Sigma Sport delivered without a problem wide open at f/6.3 and 1000 ISO, sharp and clean.
As days went by we had frequent visits from Mum, Dad, and Cub and I was able to build a collection of images that tells a story of love amongst a little wild fox family existing in a woodland copse and thriving in a urban town.
The SIGMA 150-600mm f/5-6.3 DG HSM OS | Sports lens is without question a great companion for wildlife photography. Add the SIGMA TC-1401 Teleconference plus the custom settings features you have with the SIGMA USB Dock for the Sports lenses and you have a powerful kit that simply delivers great images in almost any conditions.
I love this lens, it’s amazing…..
#lovingmysigmasport
Rob Haynes
In Rob Haynes kit:
Rob Haynes works exclusively with SIGMA Lenses, a choice made many years ago and with a ‘gear list’ that reads like a SIGMA product list. Rob has invested in the very best SIGMA has to offer, from ultra-wide angle such as the SIGMA 10-20mm F3.5 EX DC HSM, to the SIGMA 180mm F2.8 APO MACRO EX DG OS used as a short telephoto, plus a SIGMA 70-200mm F2.8 APO EX DG OS HSM zoom lens, a SIGMA 300mm F2.8 APO EX DG lens which he considers a stunning performer, to the SIGMA 150-600 DG HSM OS | Sports or the ‘Beast’ as he has named it and which never leaves his full frame Nikon D700 camera. Haynes uses the 150-600mm | Sports with a Nikon D300 cropped sensor camera which he pairs with the new Global Vision tele converter, the SIGMA TC-1401 1.4x teleconverter, for distance work. He also utilizes the custom settings of the SIGMA USB Dock to calibrate the lens just as he likes it!