The amount has already been reduced because it would “bankrupt” the sector if they actually paid out the true cost to the consumer plus interest and this seems like more posturing to lower it further.

Its still too soon for jokes like that

Is that your shot? Cause its amazing.

Yeah I like all birds of prey, just not when they bird block me watching something else while camping just out of my focal range for a good shot:

APC, I wanted the weight and size savings. The pixel density is bonkers on the current Fuji APC sensor, scales up to something equivalent to 100 megapixel density for full frame.

The whole feature set on the cirrent fuji range is made and only getting madder. Its almost too customisable, including how the auto focus works. With a fixed target position I would rather use focus lock, just more reliable.

I was in about ten minutes, very busy morning with lots of birds, then a sparrow hawk turned up and it went quite for a couple of hours.

Camera is a Fuji XT50, lens for this shot is a Tamron 150-500mm, so 225-750mm full frame equivalent. Its long but you can never have a long enough lens, lol. XT50 allows a decent crop being 40 megapixels to get me closer, main reason I went for it.

This shot was about 200mm, or about 300mm full frame, so not that far way, only about 8m or so.I was in a permanent hide up the bank for this one, hoping to get a camo net to cover me and the camera/tripod soon as it makes such a difference if they cant spot you.

There was a spot closer still I would have liked to done a remote trigger from but I need a second camera body for that, preferably one I can tether to make it more reliable and usable.

I cant believe how different it looks from its European cousin, more like a thrush?

Thank you! Yeah all the shots I post are my own, will try to make that more obvious next time lol.

They have made it worse and worse by doubling down each time they get blocked punishing OAPs for wearing a T Shirt supporting the group. Its now got to the stage multiple senior members of the sitting government need to resign over this, not just the PM if they can’t make this stick.

Yeah I want them and the shitty football they have played for much of the year to lose, they are basically Pullis era Stoke with an actual budget but somehow even less imagination.

I hear you with camo, one of those things you only want on for the shortest amount of time.

The netting is meant to if you are sitting or crouching, similar profile to one of those pop up camo tents. Its not going to help with a super cautious bird but its enough to stop a chunk of them worrying.

I was about 8 to 10m away, so pretty close. If i had a second body I could have had that with my 50-150mm less than half that distance and used my remote shutter for the diving shots while I did the close ups remotely. Needs two of you really, as you need one to hold a long stick (tripod is good backup) and the other to do the manual focusing lock on the camera.

It would have been too close if I sat there with the camera, would have scared them off completely.

Panning is easy with a good gimbal, has to be if I can do it.

I take it as a huge compliment, please feel free! Great choice of tattoo as well

Thank you!

Yeah camo netting is my next purchase, anything to break up my person shape.

That one is manual focus using focus lock so the camera does the hard work focusing and i get to stop it refocusing and missing shots when shootingwith burst. I focused on the branch as thats roughly in the same focal plane as the kingfisher likes to dive.

Its not going to work everytime but it works more than it doesn’t for fast shots. Issue with this one is i just wasn’t fast enough panning down with my gimbal, kingfishers are so fast.

A jump to a xh2 would help as that has nearly double the mechanical shutter shots per second on my xt50, 15 vs. 8. I don’t trust the electronic shutter at higher speeds as it can roll so I can’t go higher for burst mode.

Shot was at 4000th, f5, ISO8000. I would have liked at least f8 if not f11 to increase the area in focus even more but there just wasn’t enough light.

Thank you! I did try yo get a diving sequence that I could stack but closest I got to the water was this one shot:

I had to look up the belted, has such a cool mowhawk! Do you cover your kayak with a portable hide?

Ikeas flat pack is actually pretty decent for how well it goes together compared to other budget brands. Sure Ikea has reduced quality over the years, we still have a dinning room table thats made from solid pieces of actual beech rather than the vinyl wrapped cardboard that they sell as table tops now. Dont even get me started on the switch from metal to plastic cam locks.

Their builds are usually one of the simplest for flat pack due to better than average build tolerances, some actual QA (although its not foolproof), and well thought out design. I can usually build Ikea furniture without looking at the instructions because it reuses so many of the same concepts, its the Lego of flatpack.

Some basic extra steps with some wood glue, some clamps if it doesnt sit square while the glue dries, and an appropriately coloured gap sealer really goes a long way for improving the final build quality.

Only thing I don’t like with Photolab is that there is no Linux client. I ended up getting a Mac because I liked the latest version of Photolab so much for my workflow. Deepprime xd3 is just ridiculous at cleaning up my high ISO photos.

Are you using assisted culling in Lightroom for culling? As yeah, thats just missing from Darktable and you would have to use another (opensource) tool to do that.

However if you are still manual, I dont agree once you have learned the keyboard shortcuts, that’s as fast for me in both, or in my current tool of choice, photolab. Even just using 1 to 5 to do basic culling with auto advance is a game changer for manual review.

Editing really depends on your workflow, if you have a lot of similar shots you can just copy and paste a working set across everything thats similar and then manually tweak. Even if the shots aren’t the same just applying the usual set of modules with some sensible defaults across photos is very helpful. I used to keep one back from my last set as a template.

This is nothing to do with actual child abuse or real incest porn, and they know it, this is the next step in their war against VPNs and those circumventing their internet “age” real ID checks.

This will give them what will be an ever expanding big stick to clamp down on anybody they cant force to use their ID checking system, anybody using smaller providers (VPN or Porn) to avoid the checks will be suspect of criminal activity and will have equipment seized.

The first step was to push the larger providers to comply or get out, the next step is to start to tackle the smaller providers and consumers who at least want to try to stay legal.

Its never about 100% success with clamping down, its about getting the majority to comply and having useful tools to deal with those who do not, especially as they now stand out far more.

Like with Harriers you can age a cormorant by its eye colour, European ones go from brown to jade green as they age, so I guess this one is a young adult

So thats an average of about £90k per person per year in the womens team, just seems a bit of a joke really. I am not saying it is or it isnt much different from the average in the womens game, just that its very low compared to the money in the mens game. Gallagher is meant to be on £200k ish a week as an example.

I think picking Levy, who for all his faults actually generated quite a lot of income and did a good job running the business side of the club, is a bad take. Compared to other CEOs of other companies with similar revenue he isnt paid that much out of wack. Comparing a single mens player who earns more than £110k a week who did pretty much fuck all last season would be a better one.