83x anyone? The new Nikon P900 (2 Viewers)

Chris Oates · Apr 7, 2016

Paul Higson said:
Pleased with this photo of a White billed Diver - it had just resurfaced. Distance - about 50 metres, at full normal zoom ( not the extra blue bit . . .)

Great pic of a great bird - we had one here once and the 'record' pic was of it pooping.
I see a few folk not happy with the P900 but as long as you accept it's never going to equal big sensor camera I thinks it's perfect for the birding I do - I find it easy to use and easy to track flying birds with. I readily admit that I hate the slow card write, buffer filling up but I can just about live with that for the amazing usable reach the lens has. A pal has a Nikon D800 which he uses for ship photography - he saw what my P900 could do with ships at distance and immediately bought one.
The Manx & the Gannet were a fair way off in a Force 7 blow not bothering to stay still for me - I've owned most of the superzooms and the P900 despite it's shortcomings is the best yet. (in my opinion)

Chris Oates · Apr 7, 2016

Richard Scott said:
A couple of recent ones - Long-tailed tit (1200mm) and Pochard (2000mm). Both handheld.

There's something about LTT - mostly as I don't have them here - little ball of fluff on a stick with a rather sad song.

ceasar · Apr 7, 2016

Chris B. said:
I think it's unlikely and/or impossible for Nikon to add Raw to the P900. Adding Raw is not just a firmware update; they'd need to address the extra processing required in the electronics. Cameras which do record in Raw have additional circuitry on the motherboard plus a heavier duty power supply to facilitate this. I suspect that Nikon's next iteration of this camera will have Raw...

FYI

Nikon will be releasing a new Coolpix B700 which has Raw. Here is a recent comparison of it with the P900.

http://cameradecision.com/compare/Nikon-Coolpix-B700-vs-Nikon-Coolpix-P900

Chris Oates · Apr 7, 2016

ceasar said:
FYI

Nikon will be releasing a new Coolpix B700 which has Raw. Here is a recent comparison of it with the P900.

http://cameradecision.com/compare/Nikon-Coolpix-B700-vs-Nikon-Coolpix-P900

Interesting - personally RAW would never be a reason to change cameras - I do appreciate that some folk like and use that workflow - I've had RAW cameras but never used the feature - to be brutally honest I've got better things to do and JPEG is fine for my needs.

Spiekeries · Apr 7, 2016

For me RAW ad a lot to a camera's practical value. In this case the lens zoom and speed compared to others added a bit more. If it was only 1600mm compared to say the Canon's 1400mm with RAW I would have a Canon instead. I am not a brandname enthusiast, I want the best end result quality within the direct competition. Without RAW I feel a bit restrained.

Yilane · Apr 7, 2016

UV filter

Got the UV filter today and tested it a bit. I see no difference between the images made with or without it. No AF problems either, from macro to infinity. So I'm happy with it. (It's a Hoya Fusion Antistatic filter.) See attached pics. The pigeon was shot at 350 mm, the cherry blossoms (about 15 m away) at 2000 mm handheld.

Spiekeries · Apr 7, 2016

How far was the pigeon? Try something (a leave or anything ) at say 75m with and without the filter . If there is still no difference I will try a Hoya as well.

Yilane · Apr 7, 2016

UV filter

Pigeon was close, maybe 6-7 m.
I made a few pics of a rooftop that may be about 60-70 metres away. I tried to crop the same part and applied only a single sharpening step with the same settings to all of them. The first two were made WITH the filter the second two WITHOUT it. If anything, the first two seems to be a bit sharper but that may be only my hand shaking a bit. Lighting may have changed a little because the sky is full of small wispy clouds. I hope this helps, but I will try to make some more "birdy" test shots if the weather permits (rain is forecast, though).

Yilane · Apr 7, 2016

One more

This blackbird was about 15 m away. I did some PS magic to show the details

Sorry for the harsh noon lights, I had no sunset at hand 8-P

Spiekeries · Apr 7, 2016

Thanks for the pictures Yilane. I cannot see any difference between the pictures to blame the filters for. I think I must try to source a Hoya somewhere in SA. Nothing available in my hometown.

Yes I can see some camera movement. My wife made me a bag I filled with rise I use to put the camera on for such long shots. I do have a tripod from 30-odd years back but prefer the bag. I recently bought a monopod for field use but don't manage to hold the camera steady while standing. I kneel down to get better support to stabilise the camera on the monopod. Even with the good image stabilisation of this camera, with this zoom ability, keeping it steady is still very important, not so easy. Many of my otherwise good pictures are spoiled by camera movement.

Here on this forum was a guy complaining about image quality of this camera and returned it after a short period of time. It was not a problem with the camera but mostly his inability to keep it steady at maximum zoom among other mistakes.

peteh · Apr 10, 2016

This is my go to long walk camera. It is so handy compared to lugging around a 7dmkii + 500mm just in case there's something I need to get a record shot.

Got this Wheatear on a long walk today.
Even with the horrible background it has come out quite acceptable imo.
When this camera has light behind it it is a lot better than in poor light. There's a big big difference. Whereas in DSLRs there's not that much difference quality wise.

Spiekeries · Apr 10, 2016

A DSLR is as good as 1) the lens in front of it and 2) the photographer behind it. For the same person it is down to the lens. I am afraid that the good lenses combined with a good body required for good bird photography is way above the financial bracket of the bridge cameras and what many people can afford. You cannot compare the lot.

Spiekeries · Apr 10, 2016

I shot this Ashy Flycatcher today. The sun was low behind trees and the bird was under dense foliage with very little light as a result. I kept the ISO at 100 and the camera wanted to shoot at 1/5 of a second. I put it on shutter priority and on 1/30 of a second. The picture came out quite dark so I had to do some post processing to improve the exposure. Just to show this camera can take reasonable pictures in poor light and PP does help.

nikonmike · Apr 11, 2016

At the end of the day this camera is great for those that cant afford or dont want the DSLR long lens set up,grab shots like these could be better on a DSLR raw shot but its not bad.

peteh · Apr 11, 2016

Spiekeries said:
A DSLR is as good as 1) the lens in front of it and 2) the photographer behind it. For the same person it is down to the lens. I am afraid that the good lenses combined with a good body required for good bird photography is way above the financial bracket of the bridge cameras and what many people can afford. You cannot compare the lot.

If you were replying to me. You have misunderstood my post.
I wasn't comparing dslr to the p900 but the differences in each one between their quality with sunlight and without. . Let's say on a sliding a scale of possible quality with 10 being the best.
3 p900 poor light
6 p900 sunlight
9 dslr poor light
10 dslr sunlight.
Hope that makes more sense.

But as I have said in previous posts. I really enjoy using my p900 mainly when I can't be bothered to take my proper gear out with me.
It reminds me of the quality of digiscoping so it's like the potential of digiscoping but in a tiny package

Yilane · Apr 11, 2016

Bird ID

Just a quick thought: yesterday the P900 has proved that it is capable of what my main reason for purchasing it was. We had heavily overcast skies and I saw a raptor quite far away. With these light conditions all I could see through my bino was that it was probably a harrier. So I shot a few BiF pics. These had also shown only a silhouette but some image manipulation made it clearly visible that it was a marsh harrier. So, the ability to shoot good pictures if the conditions are right is just a nice bonus for me

(Sorry, the pictures are just too bad to post.)

Spiekeries · Apr 11, 2016

OK Peteh, post some of your 7d pictures so we can compare ourselves.

Spiekeries · Apr 15, 2016

Today I walked on the farm and here came this magnificent Long-crested Eagle flying past me and landed in a tree not far from me. It initially sat behind some branches and then moved to another more open branch. I could see it was a male and some of the best photo opportunities came up. Unfortunately I did not have my camera with me. Like is often said; the best camera is the one you have with you. O-well. Some you get and some you don't.

Chris Oates · Apr 16, 2016

Poor old Spiekeries just above

Gannets today fishing for Mackerel demonstrating 'ground effect' flying - handheld 1000mm bird prob 200ft away - quarter crop - it'll do for me.
More I get used to the camera the better and easier it gets - I leave it on 2 FPS in 'P' mode with that AF-F thing on and all the VR stuff on.

Pity the BF makes a mess of picture viewing.

Spiekeries · Apr 16, 2016

Nice one. I mentioned a few times about the reduction of picture quality on BF, but I guess it's purpose is to keep file size small for server capacity.

83x anyone? The new Nikon P900 (2 Viewers)

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