Question (Poll) for those that handhold 300mm 2.8

With hood or without?

I use to own the 300 and when hand holding it I was holding it at the quick button area. I do the same with the 200mm. I always have the hood on any of my lenses since I do not use filters!

With the hood--protects the lens when things go wrong.

If you give me one, I will use it for a year or two and let you know

--Evan

I always use the lens hood. Hand-holding or not.

Always hooded...seldom hand-held!!

With hood, always hand-held

I Don't own an F2.8 but I do shoot @300mm quite frequently handheld @ f5.6 or more without IS And I have had some fairly good results.

Why you don't want to use the hood? Unless I was shooting baseball from chain link fence where I want the glass right next to the fence, always use the hood.

Even with a 400 2.8, hooded. And my monopod is wimpy as hell so I handhold.

Always hood on, some hand hold, some mono pod

The only time the hood ever comes off my 300 2.8 is when it's being packed for air travel.

dudemanppl wrote in post #11555155
Even with a 400 2.8, hooded. And my monopod is wimpy as hell so I handhold.

Get any bogen entry level monopod for $50. More then enough to hold 1 series and 400mm f2.8 without any issues.

Always with the hood, I sometimes hand hold at 300mm or 420mm but use a tripod when using at 600mm.

I don't believe the hood weights that much at all. It shouldn't matter. Oh, I hand hold my 500L twice. No, the weight of the hood didn't matter.