Royal tern in flight, La Jolla, CA | Nikon Z9, Nikon 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6S VR + Z 1.4x TC
I spent most of last week in San Diego, leading my annual Southern California birding & wildlife workshop. It was my first real test of the new Nikon Z9 and Nikon 100-400mm S lens. The camera and lens combo performed flawlessly, tracking the fast-moving royal terns along the coast as they circled the rocky shore, looking for a landing spot.
Image Specs
Nikon Z9
100-400mm f/4.5-5.6 VR S Nikkor + Nikon Z teleconverter 1.4x
Charlie Blackmon (19) or the Colorado Rockies singles while breaking his bat against the Miami Marlins at Coors Field, August 8, 2021
I went to a Colorado Rockies game over the weekend, and brought my new Nikon Z fc with 16-50mm kit lens. I set the camera to 1/2000s (shutter priority) and auto ISO, and focused manually. The camera’s fast frame rate (about 9fps in 14-bit RAW) allowed me to capture the moment Charlie Blackmon’s bat broke in half.
Swirling waves, Cannon Beach, OR (Nikon Z 7II with 14-30mm f/4 S Nikkor Z
I took some creative license when I worked on this image from Cannon Beach, OR. The swirling waves resulted from using a 0.5s exposure with my Nikon Z 7II mounted on a tripod. However, I chose to also blur the clouds in Photoshop to create a pseudo long-exposure look. What do you think?
I captured this image of a large shore cannon while visiting Fort Stevens near Astoria, Oregon while leading my recent Oregon photo safari. This image combines several techniques: HDR merge (Lightroom Classic), Silver Efex Pro 3 (Nik Collection via Adobe Photoshop) and finishing touches back in Lightroom Classic. Because I applied Silver Efex Pro 3 in Photoshop, I was able to retain color in the original image.
10-shot hand-held panorama from Badlands National Park, 2020
Panoramic stitching software has gotten so good, that nowadays I’m able to capture many of my pano shots hand-held. This image is a composite of 10 vertical images captured with my Nikon Z7 and 24-70mm f/4S Nikkor Z lens. I merged the images from RAW in Lightroom Classic and then adjusted the resulting raw file in both Lightroom Classic and Photoshop using Color Efex Pro 4 to enhance color and contrast. The resulting file ended up at over 250 megapixels!
