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

[Spiekeries]

Today was a overall good day. Nothing extraordinary happened but I just enjoyed it. In the morning the doves and sparrows waited for me to fill the feeder like they always do. This one posed so I could take his picture.

 

[Spiekeries]

Later in the day I saw a Bishop pecking to something in the air and reviewing the pictures later I saw it was flying ants. He just sat there eating the ants flying past him, no effort. Here he has one in his beak. Even the sunbird enjoyed the feast and the swallows was so full they didn't want to eat anymore.

 

[Spiekeries]

Then nature showed is was time to go home.

 

[Spiekeries]

And end the day sitting on the stoep and enjoy a glass of wine while watching the sun set. Overall just a good day.

 

[Yilane]

Nice pics, especially the first one (at least birdwise, because the last two are also nice). You live in a beautiful place. I had to check where Nelspruit was and that was when I started to drool... so close to Kruger and a lot of other reserves. Must be a fantastic place for people who love animals.

 

[Spiekeries]

Yes I love living here and enjoy not only the wildlife but nature in general. Over 60% of the country's birds are to be seen in this province, including the migrants. A lot of the game are seen on game farms around us without the need to go to Kruger park, although we do go often. My younger brother live in the Kruger park and we visit them quite often as well.

The second 3 photos above are not good but being far away and handheld at 2000mm at least it show what's happening, pictures I would otherwise not have.

 

[Yilane]

A few shots

At last I had a chance to do some shooting. When the weather is hot and the subjects are far the keeper rate seems to be abysmally low (I will have to try with a mono- or tripod, but atmospheric vibrations seem to be one problem, and the P900 may have problems focusing on far away objects when the background is diverse.) This is the best shot of a pied avocet I managed to make. The bird was... well, at least 80 m away.

 

[Yilane]

BiF

 

[Yilane]

Parent and child

Lapwing

 

[Yilane]

Last

Whinchat

 

[Yilane]

And some more

from yesterday.They were all pretty far.

 

[Spiekeries]

Nice. Yes, the atmospheric influence like light intensity, light angle, heat, moist and dust all have an influence on picture quality on ALL cameras and lenses. Still, even if the quality is not the best it is better than no picture at all. A lot of pictures get deleted by pro's with their pro equipment because of this.

 

[Spiekeries]

http://www.chardinephoto.ca/blog/2013/8/heat-shimmer

 

[Spiekeries]

http://www.the-digital-picture.com/Photography-Tips/Heat-Waves-and-Photography.aspx


Extraction :
" What can you do about this problem? Heat waves are an image quality factor that you generally can't spend money to put behind you. For example, a sharper lens and a better camera are not going to be helpful. "

Olso:

http://www.moosepeterson.com/blog/2009/04/07/heat-shimmer/

 

[Spiekeries]

I think you get the idea. Don't get put of by apparent "focus " problems which is actually atmospheric situations, it is there with any camera and lens, no matter how expensive or big.

 

[Yilane]

No, I did expect something like this I just reported on what I found although the word "abysmal" may have made the impression of my being disappointed. Nothing like that. Despite the poor quality I could identify several small birds from quite far (my binoculars had only showed some brownish blobs), so I am happy with the P900.

 

[Spiekeries]

I did not think you were disappointed, I just wanted to explain for other rookies like myself by means of other people's wisdom why we sometimes get poor quality pictures. I wish each picture I took was a keeper but it is not.

Here are two for my own records, not the best. I was on a work trip and could not spend time to get better pictures. The Spoonbill had the sun behind him and the reflection on the water spoiled it some. The Secretary Bird was next to the road and wouldn't turn so I could get a good picture. This is a screenshot from a video I took.

 

[Yilane]

Record shot

Nice birds.

This weekend the p900 has proved its capabilities again. A took a short trip to a nearby marsh and saw through my binoculars a small grebe on the water. It was just a black dot, but as some people had seen a black-necked grebe there I took a few shots (there are usually some little grebes at this place, and with the bins I could not tell which species this bird belonged to). It was terrible weather (heavy clouds, rain, wind) but after some image manipulation I got the record shot below. I've never seen this species before in our area so I was pretty happy (2400 mm equiv, cropped)

 

[Spiekeries]

I am fairly new at birding and decided beforehand that I will only put birds which I photographed on my list. Since I started second half of last year and mostly since I got my P900 in December, I reached # 130 bird species today with this Collared Sunbird. About 20 meters, full optical zoom plus some digital and picture cropped.

 

[Yilane]

So many species in such a short time... Grats!