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ZEISS DTI thermal imaging cameras. For more discoveries at night, and during the day.

83x anyone? The new Nikon P900 (1 Viewer)

This weekend I took a lot of pictures to practice and test how to operate this camera and to choose the best light conditions for bird photography. Like somebody said, very high sunlight conditions are not as good as overcast. There is too much glare in hi-noon direct sunlight and the camera doesn’t get the contrast right. So did we compare with a friend's Pentax APS and long zoom. The same glare problem apply with it. The APS does have beter image quality but only noticeable if you crop the picture from the same size. If the P900 zoom in instead of cropping a picture to get the same effect it is hard to see the difference.

At first I ignored the digital zoom and had it set on optical only. I then took this pictures to compare the full 4x digital zoom to 2000mm optical cropped to the same size. It was resized for the forum limits and some detail lost. The bird was 15m away. Here you can judge for yourself. What do you guys think?

For me, the P900 is a definite keeper. If I want something else it will be a Canon EOS 5DS R with a 150-600 zoom with the lowest f-stop available. But .... for the price and size/weight I will rather be happy with my P900.
 

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This pair of Striped Kingfisher was taken from 40m away just after sunrise on a very cloudy morning. Just to show the low-light performance is not too bad.
 

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Zoom shot

Took this shot back in October, light overcast, range 95 mtrs.

Den
 

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It does count. That is part of flight only few birds can manage.

I see the focal length was 800mm eq. Must have been close to you.

Nice shot.
 
Thanks for that link. I was trying a few bif shots but that was all blurry. It will take the correct settings and A LOT of practice.
 
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Finally got a photo of a bird in sunlight. This was at 2000mm and handheld, its been cropped in a little bit too.
I am quite impressed by this little camera. The bokeh is very nice considering its a p&s.

I am happy the p900 can do the 3 jobs I wanted it for. (fake scope, record shot camera for long distance walks and decent enough video at further distances than my dslr combo)
 

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I was thinking of iq compared to other cameras. Somebody here compared the P900 to the sx50. The P900 picture was at ISO 320 and the SX50 at ISO 80. Then he complained the P900 picture is not as fine as the sx50's. Also some of the other p900 examples some camera shake is visible and taken at full optical plus 1.4 digital and not at optical only.

Furthermore, he complained about file size. When the sx50 convert optical to digital zoom the file is half the size. So does the p900 do when digital zoom is more than 2x.

If a person out of ignorance does not know how to properly operate something, don't blame the equipment.
 
Video of a scarce Long tailed Duck in the Isle of man. Taken yesterday.
It was at the max optical zoom and it seems at that distance moving water looks pretty bad on youtube. (I also tried vimeo and same thing)
On my PC it looks good so not sure what that is about.
https://youtu.be/DRPz2OOPZlI
 
The P900 can certainly do well in the right conditions. I was really impressed by the exposure on this. I didn't have to fiddle with anything.
 

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Big Thank you To Nikon UK !!

Not been happy with the sharpness of focusing on my P 900 for a while. Unsure as to whether it was me or the camera . . .

When the Brunnichs Guillemot turned up here on Orkney I headed off to get some award winning photos - and the camera just would not focus properly.

On to the relevant web page at Nikon Uk, filled in the form and sent it of.

Instructions and pre-paid postage label quickly back, and off went the camera.

Arrived Nikon repairer on the Wednesday, repaired under warranty and on its way back to me on the Friday.

The fact it took a while to get to me was the carriers problem and not Nikons, but as a result, a number of e-mails went back and forth to Nikon Customer Serrvice and they were brilliant.

Of course the weather has been dreadful since I got it, but the few snaps I have taken are fine - just need to put it through its paces on a fine day.

Very pleased with everything Nikon have done.
 
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I wanted to protect the front element of the lens from dirt and sea mist for when going to the coast and bought and put on a uv filter. The result was absolute crap at the long end of the telephoto zoom with very soft focus / blurry pictures. I removed and returned the filter.
 
Spiekeries said:
I wanted to protect the front element of the lens from dirt and sea mist for when going to the coast and bought and put on a uv filter. The result was absolute crap at the long end of the telephoto zoom with very soft focus / blurry pictures. I removed and returned the filter.
Click to expand...

Sometimes not always its the quality of the filter,i have an fairly pricey one and lose no detail at all,i did also add a lens hood though.
 
I could not get a high level filter locally so bought wat was available. As is the job of a salesman he assured me is was a good brand. He said nothing when I took it back and just returned the funds.

Only problem is I did not test it immediately when returning home. The next morning there right in front of the house in perfect sight was this beautiful Lizard Buzzard with his morning catch busy eating. It was some time I was trying to get him and there he was, 60m from me in the open. I took a lot of shots and he showed all his angles while eating. They all came out dull. I wanted to cry and don't even want to show it.

Here is some test pictures I took afterwards sitting on the same group of branches, only the buzzard was on a thicker branch with no twigs around him. The one with filter on the right.
 

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