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Kathy G

Kathy G

Well-known member
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I took this photo at Cape St. Mary's in Newfoundland. Almost all of the gannets nest very close together and it is difficult to get a photo of just one nest with a 500 mm lens. I took this with D850; Nikon 200-500 at 500 mm F/6.3. Constructive comments are welcome.
CapeStMaJuly2020_1063_Nik.jpg
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You should try using a monopod instead if carrying a tripod around is difficult. I know the 200-500 is quite heavy & thats the reason I invested in the 500 f5.6 PF. But for bigger mammals and habitat shots I still need my 200-500 though its front heavy when full zoomed out.
 
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Yezdi said:
You should try using a monopod instead if carrying a tripod around is difficult. I know the 200-500 is quite heavy & thats the reason I invested in the 500 f5.6 PF. But for bigger mammals and habitat shots I still need my 200-500 though its front heavy when full zoomed out.
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For birds in flight I am hand holding the thing. I do have a monopod but I don't have a gimbal head. So far hand holding is ok as long as I keep the shutter speed up. The only time it was impossible was this summer when I went out in a Zodiac to, hopefully, shoot whales. With the swells, the camera was bobbing all over the place!! Fortunately there were no whales - at least none that were doing much - so I didn't miss anything in terms of photos. My next trip in a Zodiac will be with my trusty 70-200 which has served me well with whales (they often swim close to the boat).
 
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That crop is nice, but I wanted to include that empty space to portray the cliff hanger (pun intended) of this nest. I'm terrible at guessing distance but my guess is that this nest was 30 feet or more from the ocean and it would have been nice to portray that drop.
 
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Kathy G said:
For birds in flight I am hand holding the thing. I do have a monopod but I don't have a gimbal head. So far hand holding is ok as long as I keep the shutter speed up. The only time it was impossible was this summer when I went out in a Zodiac to, hopefully, shoot whales. With the swells, the camera was bobbing all over the place!! Fortunately there were no whales - at least none that were doing much - so I didn't miss anything in terms of photos. My next trip in a Zodiac will be with my trusty 70-200 which has served me well with whales (they often swim close to the boat).
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Currently even I am using the WH-200 gimbal on monopod which again becomes a bit heavy to carry around. But I have the MH-100 Monogimbal head on my Christmas wishlist which should take care of that. 😊
 
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Love the image, the bright birds and the rock, shear drop. When taking this in landscape mode, if you include more rock to the right, it is easy to add black sky to the left, not so easy when it is a definite object like a rock, you could also zoom out a bit. Then you can get a different final crop. As long as you keep your SS at least 2X but preferably more than the focal length, you should be able to nail portrait mode images. I used to do that with the 600 f/4 hand held. Fast shutter speeds and a lot of consecutive images. Even if your lens wonder all over the place, you are bound to get a keeper or more when shooting like this. This allows you to do it sans monopod. One of the reasons I sold my 600 f/4 for the 500 PF was just that - weight and mobility. I can carry it around for hours, and it is never a schlep. (The 600 f/4 is way up there in quality etc, I do not deny it, but for my way of shooting I swaped to the lighter lens. When I got rid of the 200-400 f/4, I also opted for the 80-400 rather than the 200-500 for the same reason and because of the 80 - 200 extra zoom that saves the day, especially with larger critters.
 
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Kathy, I don't wish to offend, that would be the last thing I want to do. It is a lovely photograph but the position that the chick is in made me wonder straightaway if it was still alive? I hope you will tell me I am wrong.
 
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Callie said:
Love the image, the bright birds and the rock, shear drop. When taking this in landscape mode, if you include more rock to the right, it is easy to add black sky to the left, not so easy when it is a definite object like a rock, you could also zoom out a bit. Then you can get a different final crop. As long as you keep your SS at least 2X but preferably more than the focal length, you should be able to nail portrait mode images. I used to do that with the 600 f/4 hand held. Fast shutter speeds and a lot of consecutive images. Even if your lens wonder all over the place, you are bound to get a keeper or more when shooting like this. This allows you to do it sans monopod. One of the reasons I sold my 600 f/4 for the 500 PF was just that - weight and mobility. I can carry it around for hours, and it is never a schlep. (The 600 f/4 is way up there in quality etc, I do not deny it, but for my way of shooting I swaped to the lighter lens. When I got rid of the 200-400 f/4, I also opted for the 80-400 rather than the 200-500 for the same reason and because of the 80 - 200 extra zoom that saves the day, especially with larger critters.
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Thanks Callie. And thanks for the suggestions. I need to try using the 200-500 with vertical. If I used it that way more often, I would probably get more comfortable with it. I tend to lean towards landscape with all my photos. Even the ones I take in portrait tend not to get edited - even portraits!! Just something about me and photography. Those lighter primes look really nice. But, they do cost a bit. The Nikon 200-500 is a really good lens for the price which is one of the reasons I chose it. As for that boat ride ... even the most experienced would have had a difficult. My camera was swinging by a foot!!! The driver of the Zodiac didn’t really know what to do with photographers. The company I usually use for whale touring decided not to operate this year, which is too bad. But there is next year and more whales.
 
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Gongster said:
Kathy, I don't wish to offend, that would be the last thing I want to do. It is a lovely photograph but the position that the chick is in made me wonder straightaway if it was still alive? I hope you will tell me I am wrong.
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Lol, no offence Gongster. Indeed, I’m glad you noted this. Every time I look at this photo I think of Monty Python - ‘this parrot is dead’. All the chicks were laid out like this, I presume they were sleeping. I was at this area for close to 2 hours and the chick never sat up. :)
 
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