Nikon Coolpix P900. Hand-Held Full Zoom Stuff.

Had time for a decent outing this afternoon, so I headed for the Abbotsbury beach car park. Initially I ventured E to overlook the Swannery, then back again and off towards E Bexington. I wasn't expecting much, but it was just so good to be out again at last. Scoping the Swannery from Chesil Beach was quite enjoyable. If there had been any Scaup I think I might have scored today, because the Aythya ducks were not too distant. However, I did experience gull envy on a grand scale. There were stacks, mostly far, far away. I stopped counting Med Gulls when I got to 100, and mainly concentrated on trying to find a white-winger amongst the big gulls. The thought of picking up a possible Casp at that range was not appealing. A nice surprise was a Chiffchaff foraging by the tank teeth.

Heading back towards the car park and beyond, I had in mind the subject of a comment on the recent Nikon P900 post...

Hi there, I had made the decision not to upgrade to the P900 as I had heard that at full zoom you would need a tripod. Carrying a tripod around with me whilst birding is not my cup of tea so I would be grateful to hear how you managed at full zoom. Thanks, Sam

I decided to just take a few shots at full zoom and post them here with some thoughts...

First off, what is 'full zoom'? I am going to assume we're talking full optical zoom only, ie, 2000mm (35mm format equivalent) and not straying into digital zoom at all. Let's be straight. 2000mm is an absolutely monstrous telephoto lens. It's basically the magnification equivalent of what you see through a 40x scope. That fact puts Sam's query into perspective. Can you imagine using a 40x scope without a tripod? I once made the schoolboy error of going to Scilly with my old 27x scope attached to a shoulder pod, and left my tripod in Penzance. It was dire...

Anyway, enough talk. Here's a shot I took this afternoon, just for demonstration purposes. It is hand-held, at full zoom. Apart from the appended 'properties', the photo is exactly as it came off the camera. No processing at all...

Stonechat. Hand-held @2000mm zoom. Afterwards I paced it out. 35 big strides is approximately 35 metres.

 
The shutter speed was 1/100 second. That is pretty slow. If that was a Siberian Stonechat and I was in need of some record shots I would be perfectly satisfied with that. Here it is again after a bit of cropping and tweaking...

It's not going to win any awards, but it'll do.

When hand-holding the camera I use the eye viewfinder, grip the camera with my right hand - my left cupping the lens - and press it to my face pretty firmly. I then stop breathing and allow my heart-rate to slow to 50. I will have reached the required level of immobility within 30 seconds...or blacked out.

Okay, just the first sentence.

When it comes to camera shake, here's the reality of what we're dealing with, roughly speaking...

At 2000mm of optical zoom, I reckon the camera's objective lens (front) and sensor (back) are very approximately 20cm apart . So if your shaking hand moves the lens 1/10 of a millimetre in relation to the sensor, that translates to a movement of 17.5mm at 35m, or 175mm at 350m. To put it simply, a tiny movement of the lens becomes a big movement of the bird, and the further away the bird is, the worse the effect.

And let's say that 1/10 of a millimeter shake takes 1/100 of a second to complete. When you fire the camera's shutter, what chance has it got of freezing a movement of 17.5mm at 35m range? Or a mahoosive 175mm at 350m? Even if that shake is much slower - say 1/10 of a second - the bird is still moving across your lens at a heck of a rate.

Which is why any kind of support is preferable to 100% hand-held I think. That said, I am sure you will agree that the above photo of our Stonechat is pretty acceptable at a pinch. Rubbish light, 35m range, 1/100 of a second exposure.

Remember how camera shake is amplified by distance? These gulls were at least 80-100m away...

Totally hand-held. Straight off the camera. 2000mm zoom, 1/125 sec, ISO 400

Cropped, unsaturated a little, sharpened. Obviously I was focusing on the Med Gull.

I did take several pics of the gulls, and they're mostly of this kind of quality. A few duffers though, and the moral is: if you are forced to use full zoom, hand-held only, take a lot of shots. I think I'd apply that rule whatever the shutter speed, but especially when slow.

By way of comparison, the following were taken with a decent support. My scope is a Nikon ED82A with soft, stay-on case, mounted on a Manfrotto tripod. What I do is point the scope at the bird and lie the camera lengthwise along the scope. I have the tilt adjuster fairly stiff, pan adjuster fairly slack. Not being a contortionist, I use the fold-out viewing screen to compose the picture. It all works fine. By the way, if you don't carry a scope use a fence post, gate, rock, passer-by. I intend to make myself a bean-bag for such eventualities. I think it will help.

All images cropped and tweaked. The Stonechats were probably a lttle closer than the first Stonechat pic, the Great Black-backs a bit further away. All at full 2000mm zoom, resting on scope.

ISO 400, 1/100 sec

ISO 400, 1/100 sec

ISO 400, 1/250 sec

ISO 400, 1/250 sec

I'm no bird photographer, but as a birder with a camera I am perfectly happy with those. My previous experience with the Lumix Fz38 (with 1.7x converter, by the way) had already taught me that the modern 'Vibration Reduction' (or 'Image Stabilising') technology does a pretty amazing job, but that a firm support helps enormously if you can wangle it somehow. And if you can, it is simply amazing how low a shutter speed you can get away with, and still wind up with a decent photo.

So, Sam, many thanks for your comment, and for prompting me to put this post together. I hope that it helps with your query.

One thing on my photographic to-do list is Birds in Flight. Still, one step at a time...

Having said that, four days ago the NQS household found itself talked into a quick late-afternoon walk at E Bexington, whereupon 3 Black Swans flew past, heading for Abbotsbury Swannery no doubt. I spotted them when they were level with us, whipped out the camera, zoomed it straight to 800mm and got three shots. Here are the first and the third...

800mm zoom, ISO 320, 1/500 sec

3 Black Swans with Portland Bill as a backdrop. Dorset birding at its best.
800mm zoom, ISO 320, 1/500 sec.