Canon, takes a licking and Keeps Ticking.

[Paul]

Well got out Saturday and made some rounds through the Sandhills to make sure my 100-400 is ok after taking a good beating while falling down a hill and seems to be nice and sharp still. Not much moving at -25 but found a couple of things to shoot.

Having breakfast:

[finnbay]

Nice shots, Paul. I really think the fencepost is top notch! I've had a couple of instances where I've had the same experience - bad drop - fear of damage, etc. The worst was at night and -25 shooting last year's eclipse. Left the gear on the tripod when walking back to the house and had the plate inexplicably come off. Mark II, 300L 2.8 and a Kenko 1.4 all crashed to the ground and exploded. Picked up the pieces and wanted to cry! Luckily only the teleconverter broke. I was taking shots for a week to make sure everything else was okay!

[Dbl]

Glad to hear things are working including you Paul! I like that bunny shot, nice work.

[Catmendo]

Nice work Paul! Glad to hear that your gear survived!

[Paul Izyk - toi]

Yep.. What everyone else has said.. Man you really got lucky there..

Now on the background in the first picture? What ever you did or didnt do it turned out great..

Zeke

[Steve Foss]

Love that bunny shot, Paul, and I'm glad you and the lens are OK.

I was there for the Finnbay debacle. Darn cheap Kenko TCs! Actually, it was mighty good that's what let go. Easiest part of the three-piece combo to replace.

Paul, keep an eye on the 100-400. There could be increased wear/additional damage that's not evident yet. Particularly if the zoom ring starts to get sticky or the lens has a hard time sliding in/out to zoom, get it into Canon right away. Sometimes a hard ding/fall on the hood will put pressure on the sliding zoom joint/ring and it'll start to fail down the road. You could eventually find that using the manual focus ring will also tighten the zoom ring to the point where you can no longer manual focus or zoom.

Don't ask me how I know this.

[Paul]

Thanks for the advice there steve.