u/TheTimTamTamperer

Hi guys,

I'm looking for some advice on a telephoto lens for my Canon R7.

I know this topic—and these two lenses in particular—have been discussed a lot here, so I apologise for beating a dead horse.

I need to make two disclaimers at the start of this post:

1. I am a self-proclaimed "all the gear and no idea" person. I invested in an R7 to give myself room to grow, despite only being in my first week of photography, rather than starting with an R10, R50, or R100. I wanted to grow into a camera rather than grow out of one. I intend to follow the same philosophy with a lens, so I'd prefer people not to try to talk me out of buying an expensive lens. I'm willing to spend a few thousand dollars on something good.
2. I used AI to help me write this post, fix grammar mistakes and writing, as I struggle with written English. I hope that's okay with everyone.

I apologise if I repeat myself—it's currently 3am, and I'm very tired.

My main use cases are fast-moving military jet photography and wildlife (birds, insects, and mammals).

I'm extremely torn between the Canon RF 200-800 and the Canon RF 100-500.

I've read through previous threads comparing these two lenses, but many of the comments seemed to come from people with different use cases to mine.

My current setup is a Canon R7 with the 18–150mm kit lens, and I'll be getting a tripod soon.

My main interests are bird photography and aviation, especially fighter jets and warplanes.

I'd estimate my usage will be 60% aviation and fast jets, and 40% wildlife (birds, rabbits, kangaroos, cows, and anything else that decides to appear).

One concern I have is low-light performance. I've noticed that the R7 with the 18-150mm performs quite poorly in low light, and when combined with high shutter speeds and burst shooting, many images were essentially black.

For fast jets, I intend to shoot at 1/1000 or 1/2000 with rapid bursts. I'd prefer not to go above ISO 2000, so I'm concerned that neither the RF 100-500 nor the RF 200-800 will let in enough light at those settings.

My main concerns with the RF 100-500 are:

1. The range. With the APS-C crop sensor, I'd effectively have 800mm, and I could use a 1.4x teleconverter for 1200mm, but I'd strongly prefer to avoid that.
2. The maximum aperture of f/7.1 slightly concerns me for fast jet photography with high shutter speeds.

My main concern with the RF 200-800 is:

1. Image quality at the long end. I've seen some people say that sharpness drops off significantly beyond 600mm. Is that actually the case?

If so, I may be better off with the 100-500, because if I wouldn't want to use the 200-800 above 600mm anyway, I may as well stick with 500mm.

What i mean by this is that my main concern is that on the very high shutter speed, not enough light is being allowed in, is this just not as much as a proble as im imaging? i have so far only tested the burst fire and 1/2000 shutter speed inside in relatively mild lighting, and all the photos came out pitch black, so maybe in sunlight outside at an airshow its not an issue?

Important question:

Has anyone used 500mm (800mm equivalent on APS-C) for aviation spotting? Is that enough for aviation and birding, or would I benefit from 800mm (1200mm equivalent)?

I also haven't had time to look into Sigma or other third-party options yet. If there are better lenses for my use case, please point me in the right direction.

Thank you warmly for your help
-TimTam

Hey guys,

I'm seriously considering a career with NSW Police and was hoping to hear from officers working in metro/city areas rather than regional locations.

What does your actual annual pay look like, including overtime, penalties, and other allowances? I've seen the recent NSWPF pay rises and know that a Probationary Constable starts around $97k, and I've looked through the published pay scales. What I'm really interested in is what officers typically earn in practice once overtime and penalties are factored in. How much overtime is available?

To everyone else:

Please don't comment about how much you hate police, why it's a terrible career, or try to talk me out of it. I've done plenty of research, spoken with multiple officers, and have family members in emergency services. I'm specifically looking for information about pay.

I understand regional officers can earn considerably more due to on-call arrangements and callout payments. However, I'm interested in metro/city policing, as that's where I'll likely be working for quite some time.

Thanks.

https://preview.redd.it/ck77d4i0a08h1.png?width=2560&format=png&auto=webp&s=80aa79c60d18456b489a0fcfc52a0914105b419a

Fabric Java 26.1.2

Hey guys,

I'm draining a 256-diameter circle. As you can see, I've used the 5x5 sponge method for about a quarter of it so far, but that alone has taken roughly 24-36 hours.

I considered using ilmango's AFK ocean monument draining machine, but it seems incredibly slow. It takes around 20 hours to clear a 60x60 monument, so doing this entire area would likely take well over a week.

My other idea is to build a this flying machine to handle the job. That's currently my leading option, but I'm struggling to find a reliable and efficient honey farm. I'd need a fairly substantial amount of honey blocks for the build.

My concern is that by the time I build a honey farm, wait for enough honey to be produced, and then build the flying machine, I could have just finished draining the area manually.

So, how would you guys approach this? And does anyone have a good honey farm design they'd recommend?

Thanks!

And to add in, I don’t even understand how people can get these jobs. Like the FIFO jobs seem to be so elusive and harder to catch then god damn chucky the doll

It’s very upsetting to me to have young blokes 10 years younger than me out earning me by 100k or whatever in trades and having 200 k in their super by 25 - 30

and then these guys also piss it away on nose candy, pokie machines and land cruisers instead of putting it to good use

Comparison is the sin of happiness I know.

Hey guys.

I want to put 100 a week maybe 200 a week into an ETF
I want to just set and forget, automatic transfer from bank and automatic purchase of 200$ worth of the ETF

I don’t wanna check on it regularly or at all
I just want to forget about it then use it in idk 5-10 years when I buy a house or need it for something else

Obviously right now I can afford for $200 to go missing each week and it’s not a big deal but in the future if circumstances change I’ll reduce the payment

I’ve seen so many posts about DHHF, VGS, VAS, Blah blah

What’s a safe, good one? If it is legit DHHF then good I’ll go with that. But people’s opinion seems to sway too much on this topic

Thanks