Dot Sight for Sony A7riii

[mikehawthorne2]

I met someone today who swears by a dot sight for bird photography.  Has anyone used a dot sight on a 200-600mm lens and if so, what are your thoughts.

[Angus C]

Hi Mike, 

I have OM System EE-1 Dot Sight I coupled this with a Sony to Canon Hot shoe Adapter. The set up works well. i am still getting used to using it so wouldn’t like to advise either way. I’ve met a few people who swear by dot finders. Others who had tried to use them had formed habits using the viewfinder, they couldn’t get used to it.

As bird photography was new to me I decided it would be worth it as i was all over the place! 

There is a large birding community on Alpha Shooters.com you might find asking the question there will get a better response.

 

[TrekRover]

Dot finders are amazing! In my opinion they are a must if you're trying to do BIF shots. The benefit of the dot finders is that you can easy spot and track a moving bird without having to look at the view finder (assuming your auto focus settings are all set up correctly). Typically if you're viewing through the viewfinder your view is all magnified due to the telephoto lens. viewing through the dot finder is much easier because your view is not magnified and therefore easier to spot the bird.

Just make sure to calibrate correctly. I think they work fine with the 200-600, but if I recall correctly some issues with the 600mm f4 (lens is too big, though I think this can be corrected by adding a expansion shoe adapter). 

The concept of a dot finder is very similar to a spotting scope for high magnification deep space telescopes.

Edited October 4 by TrekRover