[Marcelo_R]

Hi everybody, just returned from my trip to the Mara Conservancies (I visited the Kicheche Mara and Kicheche Valley camps), thrilled with the experience.

I made good use of the Z800 that I was somehow doubting if it'd be overkill... nothing further from the truth. Inspite of the somehow limited f, it performed beautifully and allowed me to shot some good close-ups while driving thru the Mara. It was a heavy load taking all 3 bodies and lenses (another Z9 + 180/400 and a D6 + 24-120 f/4) but worth the effort!

I wish to share with you what I may end up choosing as "the shot" of the trip (cheetah and leopard aside), so here we go:



Z92_6785-T by Marcelo Cinicola, on Flickr

• Nikon Z 9
  NIKKOR Z 800mm f/6.3 VR S
• ƒ/6.3
  800.0 mm
  1/800s
  ISO 280

clicking on the picture should (I hope) open the original in Flickr, uploaded at 5K. Otherwise, I added the direct link to it below the pic just in case.

Editing: Nikon NX-Studio, Nikon Capture NX2 & a sprinkle of Topaz AI for sharpening.

Thanks for reading!

Brgds, Marcelo

 

[Winston Churchill (Sir)]

Excellent shot. I am particularly impressed you took the 800 and made full use of it. I am sure you got a lot of good photos - do share!

 

[Marcelo_R]

Excellent shot. I am particularly impressed you took the 800 and made full use of it. I am sure you got a lot of good photos - do share!

Thank you!

Indeed, the 800 was probably (I should check) the one I used the most when distance wasn't close enough to fill the frame with the 400mm (or with its TC 1.4x engaged).

I'll keep sharing along the now hard work to go thru the almost 28,000 pictures (close to 1Gb!) I took back with me... So far, sorting those out has resulted in ~1500 pictures marked as "to edit" from the NEF files...

Brgds, Marcelo

 

[Winston Churchill (Sir)]

Thank you!

Indeed, the 800 was probably (I should check) the one I used the most when distance wasn't close enough to fill the frame with the 400mm (or with its TC 1.4x engaged).

I'll keep sharing along the now hard work to go thru the almost 28,000 pictures (close to 1Gb!) I took back with me... So far, sorting those out has resulted in ~1500 pictures marked as "to edit" from the NEF files...

Brgds, Marcelo

Interesting - I know I favour close framing to wide - but what percentage (just a guess) do you think was taken overall with the Z800?

 

[Marcelo_R]

Interesting - I know I favour close framing to wide - but what percentage (just a guess) do you think was taken overall with the Z800?

Elsa, I should have a look at my files and sort them by focal, will try to do shortly and revert to you asap.
Brgds, Marcelo

 

[Marcelo_R]

Excellent shot. I am particularly impressed you took the 800 and made full use of it. I am sure you got a lot of good photos - do share!

Hi again Elsa

Out of 1076 shots I've chosen as "keepers" (from the ~28,000 I took home), this is the result:

Shots taken with the Z800mm : 511 pics (47.5%)

Shots taken with the 180/400 TC** : 377 pics (35%)

(**) : either with or without the TC engaged

Shots taken with the 24/120 : 188 pics (17.5%)

So yes, the Z800 was the most used one. Amazing, I never thought it'd be like this, but there it is. Granted, there might be thousands and thousands of pictures taken with the 180/400 that are ditched because of being part of long bursts and I'm only keeping 1 or maybe a few if it was an action sequence, but what it counts is not me being so trigger happy, it's the final result.

Yet, within those 1076 pictures I have initially chosen as keepers for editing, there might be some that doesn't make the cut after all, but % wise, it won't change a lot.

Bottom line: the Z800 (or any 800ish focal lenght) for my trip has been a gem to have. Now, would I have taken my 600FL instead of the Z800? Yes, no doubt, the f/4 and the overall quality (IMHO) of the 600 is miles away from the Z800, different monster, but, the 2lb+ of weight difference when also carrying a "prime zoom" such as the 180/400 is something to think about.

Now, would I take the 600FL if I had a lighter zoom instead of the 180/400? Probably yes, but there's nothing around as good as the 180/400 I believe... and versatile enough to have a 180-560mm f/4...f/5.6.

Having said all that, I'm now longing for the Z600 TC... 600/840mm f/4-f/5.6... the best of both worlds...right?

Brgds, Marcelo

 

[Winston Churchill (Sir)]

I really must say I am quite (pleasantly) surprised to see how high that percentage is. Who would have thought...
thank you for the info - it is very valuable to me.

regards the Z600 Tc 600/840 - ye well no fine The Bank is broken - but I concur - that lens would be the pits

I have a kind of a "thing" about what I own must fit into my bag (so I just ordered a bigger bag) because if it doesn't fit - it's not going along and cant be useful to me.
Obviously I can change my mind like any decent woman will tell you.

 

[Butlerkid]

I really must say I am quite (pleasantly) surprised to see how high that percentage is. Who would have thought...
thank you for the info - it is very valuable to me.

regards the Z600 Tc 600/840 - ye well no fine The Bank is broken - but I concur - that lens would be the pits

I have a kind of a "thing" about what I own must fit into my bag (so I just ordered a bigger bag) because if it doesn't fit - it's not going along and cant be useful to me.
Obviously I can change my mind like any decent woman will tell you.

Not surprising at all. I keep a 1.4 tele on my 600mm a LOT of the time. Staying back a bit from the animals and birds avoids stressing them and allows them to "do what they do"....... I avoid tours where they get on top of the wildlife so the cell phone shooters can get a shot.

 

[BarkingBeans Coffee]

Great image when viewed on Flickr. Really changed my emotion about the shot. This is why I have advocated for linking hi Rez shots here.

 

[NorthernFocus]

Great emotional image. And interesting comments about the 800mm. People either love it or talk it down depending on their style of photography. I was planning on leaving it home when I go on a bear shoot later in the summer. But now you've got me re-thinking that. Like you did above I'm in the process of looking through past shoots at what focal lengths I've used most. But analyzing effective focal length post crop. Smart collections in LR make it possible to do so.

 

[Winston Churchill (Sir)]

Great emotional image. And interesting comments about the 800mm. People either love it or talk it down depending on their style of photography. I was planning on leaving it home when I go on a bear shoot later in the summer. But now you've got me re-thinking that. Like you did above I'm in the process of looking through past shoots at what focal lengths I've used most. But analyzing effective focal length post crop. Smart collections in LR make it possible to do so.

This is exactly what I was referring to - so many folks leave the Z800 behind or are at least tempted to leave it behind due to space, weight etc. And then for it to turn out to be preferred lens - I think this post will make many folks think twice

 

[Viathelens]

Great emotional image. And interesting comments about the 800mm. People either love it or talk it down depending on their style of photography. I was planning on leaving it home when I go on a bear shoot later in the summer. But now you've got me re-thinking that. Like you did above I'm in the process of looking through past shoots at what focal lengths I've used most. But analyzing effective focal length post crop. Smart collections in LR make it possible to do so.

Simply using the filter bar also makes it possible....just a thought and I did not want someone to think they had to use a smart collection to do this.

 

[NorthernFocus]

Simply using the filter bar also makes it possible....just a thought and I did not want someone to think they had to use a smart collection to do this.

Yes with the filter bar you can filter on actual lens FL. But I've never shot bears with longer than 500mm actual FL. However I have used DX bodies, FX bodies shooting in crop mode, and of course crop images in post. So how to decide whether 800mm will be useful or "too much lens"? With smart collections you can filter on cropped dimension. Therefore for a given camera/lens combination you can determine effective FL. Of course what the data can't tell you is how many shots you passed up because you just didn't have enough reach.

Sorry, @Marcelo_R , don't mean to hijack the thread...

 

[Marcelo_R]

I really must say I am quite (pleasantly) surprised to see how high that percentage is. Who would have thought...
thank you for the info - it is very valuable to me.

regards the Z600 Tc 600/840 - ye well no fine The Bank is broken - but I concur - that lens would be the pits

I have a kind of a "thing" about what I own must fit into my bag (so I just ordered a bigger bag) because if it doesn't fit - it's not going along and cant be useful to me.
Obviously I can change my mind like any decent woman will tell you.

I was somehow concerned because of the reported distances, but then again, I think that I could have done well with just the 180/400mm and crop it down, no big deal... however, now we (or at least I am) are spoiled with filling the frame with 45ish mpx...

As for what can fit in the bag, well, I bought just before leaving for Kenya a Vanguard that fits both the 180/400 and the 800, with each Z9 mounted on it, and spare place for the D6 and the 24/120... but, it weighed a ton, so I travelled with 2 bags as cabin luggage so no issues there.

As for the price for the Z600... well... we've seen worse (the 800 f/5.6 was like $19k, wasn't it?)

Brgds, Marcelo
ps: woman changing minds? Not my wife. She's always right. LOL!

 

[Marcelo_R]

Not surprising at all. I keep a 1.4 tele on my 600mm a LOT of the time. Staying back a bit from the animals and birds avoids stressing them and allows them to "do what they do"....... I avoid tours where they get on top of the wildlife so the cell phone shooters can get a shot.

There were moments during this trip that the mammals (cats and elephants) came so close that I had to grab the 24mm to get it framed, but it was them coming not me going. I agree with you about the distances giving plenty of space for them to be themselves.
Brgds, Marcelo

 

[Marcelo_R]

Great image when viewed on Flickr. Really changed my emotion about the shot. This is why I have advocated for linking hi Rez shots here.

Thank you for the thumbs up! Glad to know it helped to include the link to the HR picture on Flickr!
Brgds, Marcelo

 

[Marcelo_R]

Great emotional image. And interesting comments about the 800mm. People either love it or talk it down depending on their style of photography.

I don't fool myself thinking that the Z800 is the greatest lens around.. it's just a different tool than the 600/4 imho. This one is "great" because of the impact when light is good, but it's a lot more sensitive (maybe because of the Fresnel?) to heat waves than the ones with "real" glass. I found out that from 10:30AM it became more and more difficult to get a good shot (due to heat, not the sun), I tried closing up to f/8 and it seemed to help just a tiny bit but it was no match for the 180/400 with the TC engaged (for 560mm f/5.6). Yes, 200mm makes a difference in amplification (or cropping) but at times it was like "forget the 800 and keep going with the zoom or the pics will be horrible"...
Brgds, Marcelo

 

[Marcelo_R]

Yes with the filter bar you can filter on actual lens FL. But I've never shot bears with longer than 500mm actual FL. However I have used DX bodies, FX bodies shooting in crop mode, and of course crop images in post. So how to decide whether 800mm will be useful or "too much lens"? With smart collections you can filter on cropped dimension. Therefore for a given camera/lens combination you can determine effective FL. Of course what the data can't tell you is how many shots you passed up because you just didn't have enough reach.

Sorry, @Marcelo_R , don't mean to hijack the thread...

I missed answering you about the bears: where are you going to? AK? The last time(s) I was there shooting bears I used the 200/400mm with a tc14 and ended up using the D500 instead of the D5...so 800mm would be great to have but giving the light changes... I think the 600/4 and the Z9 on Dx mode would be my choice.
Brgds, Marcelo

ps: by no means I feel you hijacked anything, I'm learning along the posts!

 

[ssheipel]

Hi again Elsa

Out of 1076 shots I've chosen as "keepers" (from the ~28,000 I took home), this is the result:

Shots taken with the Z800mm : 511 pics (47.5%)

Shots taken with the 180/400 TC** : 377 pics (35%)

(**) : either with or without the TC engaged

Shots taken with the 24/120 : 188 pics (17.5%)

So yes, the Z800 was the most used one. Amazing, I never thought it'd be like this, but there it is. Granted, there might be thousands and thousands of pictures taken with the 180/400 that are ditched because of being part of long bursts and I'm only keeping 1 or maybe a few if it was an action sequence, but what it counts is not me being so trigger happy, it's the final result.

Yet, within those 1076 pictures I have initially chosen as keepers for editing, there might be some that doesn't make the cut after all, but % wise, it won't change a lot.

Bottom line: the Z800 (or any 800ish focal lenght) for my trip has been a gem to have. Now, would I have taken my 600FL instead of the Z800? Yes, no doubt, the f/4 and the overall quality (IMHO) of the 600 is miles away from the Z800, different monster, but, the 2lb+ of weight difference when also carrying a "prime zoom" such as the 180/400 is something to think about.

Now, would I take the 600FL if I had a lighter zoom instead of the 180/400? Probably yes, but there's nothing around as good as the 180/400 I believe... and versatile enough to have a 180-560mm f/4...f/5.6.

Having said all that, I'm now longing for the Z600 TC... 600/840mm f/4-f/5.6... the best of both worlds...right?

Brgds, Marcelo

Thanks for this analysis. I love my 180-400 tc and have pondered how it will fit in my shoots when (if?) the 600 arrives. And GREAT shot of the lions (and flies!).

 

[Charles Loy]

Nice snap

 

[Marcelo_R]

Thanks for this analysis. I love my 180-400 tc and have pondered how it will fit in my shoots when (if?) the 600 arrives. And GREAT shot of the lions (and flies!).

Thank you Steven for the thumbs up! I don't think I'll ever get rid of the 180/400 unless a Fresnel comes out with similar aperture. Otherwise, it's here to stay.

Brgds, Marcelo

 

[K9Kirk]

I took a quick look at your Flickr site (1st page) and although they are all nice, cheetah 6361 was my favorite. I will look at the rest when I have more time.

 

[Marcelo_R]

Nice snap

Thank you Charles!
Brgds, Marcelo

I took a quick look at your Flickr site (1st page) and although they are all nice, cheetah 6361 was my favorite. I will look at the rest when I have more time.

Thank you for the thumbs up Kirk, that cheetah's look was like "you game for a hunt?" I appreciate you taking the time exploring my Flickr, I'm still processing pics so it'll be loaded with more pics as I finish editing!

Brgds, Marcelo