D7200 in the post... Where to start?

[Dyslexicbloke]

Well, I bought one... Now I want to learn how too get the best out off it.

OK. I appreciate that is a HUGE topic and has no simple or short answers but I would appreciate some pointers with respect to catching wildlife with my 600mm Tammy.

How much ISO is too much.

Best focus options... I have no clue, to be honest I usually go with single point, because I understand what it does, but I am sure there are better options.

Should I stop down and lift ISO or shoot as open as possible to minimise ISO?
I anticipate that something between the two is going to be better but wouldn't know how to evaluate that without taking loads of shots. And from be honest I think test shots probably need to be chosen, as opposed to random stuff, and I don't know what to choose or why.

I realise I will be doing a lot of testing and that no amount of comment will replace that but I suspect comments will make testing far more effective.
Because I will have a better Ideas what to try and how to twerk the methods.

As always... Go for it, I have thick skin.
Keen to learn, even if it stings.

Thanks,
Al

 

[Dyslexicbloke]

BTW
How do I calculate DOF, is that something the body will tell me?
In the past I have always tried to get as much as possible but suspect that is not a great plan.

(Obviously that only applies to matching action, I realise intentionally having an out of focus background can be a huge benefit in many circumstances)

Al

 

[Designer]

Choosing what mode or aperture or shutter speed should be decided by envisioning how you want your photograph to turn out. Some artistic intent will lead your decision process. Same for the focus areas you choose.

All the mechanicals will be in the user's manual.

As to calculating the DOF, you can use the online DOF calculator, and also have one on your smart phone.

 

[zulu42]

Online Depth of Field Calculator

Play with this DOF calculator. It's fun and educational.

The first paragraph from @Designer above is very powerful. Start with your intent for a photo, then research and learn the mechanics and settings to get there.

Remember, minimal ISO is not the goal, a properly exposed image is the goal.

Often in wildlife we end up shooting with a wide open aperture to gain the shutter speeds we need. BUT... I have that Tamron 150-600 G2, and it has a very noticeable increase in sharpness when stopped down to f/8. When the photo calls for the most sharpness possible, I use f/8 and increase ISO as needed.

Also, welcome to the forum !

 

[Derrel]

Regarding ISO to use with your new camera: the D7200 is what is called "ISO invariant", which is a great thing! The D90 most decidedly was not ISO invariant. See this article for explanation and some good photos that show what ISO invariant means.https://improvephotography.com/34818/iso-invariance/

A camera that is ISO invariant makes the post-processing exposure adjusting process almost painless. THIS will be the number on difference you see between the older D90 and the newer D7200 Nikons.
***** *****

Outdoors in daylight, the light levels are usually good to excellent, compared to indoors, or at night indoors or night outdoors, where the light levels are low and poor. Because outdoor lighting is good to excellent, your MAIN objective is to get the right shutter speed to stop motion blur or camera shake; with a long lens in the 400mm to 600mm range, you MUST have a fast shutter speed! 1/1000 second is a good starting place; faster speeds, like 1/1250 or 1/1600 or 1/2000 or even 1/4000 second for say, hummingbirds, is the basic idea.

With the D7200 set to M for Manual exposure mode, and with AUTO ISO set to ON, in the AUTO ISO Setup menu, you can set the minimum allowable shutter speed to 1/800 second, but on the top deck of the camera, set the desired shutter speed at 1/1250 or 1/1600 or so, and set the lens wide-open. With the Base ISO value set to 200 ISO, in daylight, the camera will be free to run the ISO value upward, as is necessary, to achieve the wide-open lens aperture and the fast shutter speed of 1/1600.

If the pictures look too dark or too bright, use the Exposure Compensation ( Use the + and - symbol control button, in concert with the rear command dial) system to add or subtract a bit of exposure. Against bright sky or back-lighting, often a + 1.3 exposure addition is necessary; when shooting black cats, a Minus 1.7 exposure minus might be a good idea.

This is how I would start shooting birds in flight: using the new, modern Nikon's amazing sensor, with its huge range of usable ISO values, in AUTO ISO and Manual exposure setting method. YOU are then free to work on composing, and tracking the subject, and getting focus, and shooting. The camera is already set up by you, at the right speed, and the desired f/stop, and all it does is adjusts the ISO level to achieve the desired exposure, and it does this fast, and it really,really frees you up to concentrate on the subject and getting the right compositions!

 

[BrentC]

Some great points above. When shooting wildlife you usually want to isolate the subject and this means shooting as wide open as you can get so you get that oof background. Unless there is a need to get something in the background or foreground of course. With you lens I would be almost always shooting wide open. Set your metering to spot metering. This way when you target your subject it will expose on the subject and not the whole frame. Always try to get the sun behind you. Mornings and evenings are the best time light wise. In the morning animals are more active as well.

Play around with the different modes, M, A and S to see what fits you. I tend to use A more often then not and set a minimum shutter speed in Auto-ISO, this way all I am adjusting is aperture and exposure compensation and don't have to worry about shutter speed. When I need to be more selective in my settings I'll use Manual. S can also be used with bif's where you adjust the shutter speed you want and let the camera decide aperture. Play around and figure out what suits you best.

And lastly, practice, practice, practice. Its going to take a while to get familiar with the camera and also there is a lot of skill in shooting wildlife. Post your shots and ask for help when you need to.

Good luck and looking forward to seeing your photos.

 

[Peeb]

Start with 1/1000 shutter speed and f/8 aperture with "auto ISO" and go from there.

 

[Dyslexicbloke]

Thanks folks... I am somewhat encouraged by all that.
I haven't read the article yet, wanted too reply first, but I am about to.

Encourage because I and ISO auto is what I have been trying to do but my numbers were way off, shutter speed way too low based on your comments.

Simone ones described the learning process to me this...

Uncontious incompeten. You don't know enough to apriciate what you don't know.
Contious incompetent. You realise how little you know after apriciating some basics.
Contious Competent. You are amassing knowledge and understanding it but it's all still difficult.
Uncontious Competent. Now you have it, and intuitively handle there detail.

I guess I am probably somewhere between 2 and 3, but mostly 2.
I do get the very basics, theoretically, but how those basics actually play out with a modern DSLR and where the pitfalls are... Much to learn on that front.

For example If haven't occured too me that lense sharpness was affected by apature. The only reason I wasn't working wide open was In attempt to get more DOF
Worse still I didn't know about defraction affects at higher F numbers.
(Someone mentioned this earlier)

Right now I feel that I am actually moving backward on the competency scale but that is a good thing as it only serves to show that I wasn't as competent as I thought in there first place.

Having said all that... I also used to be very focused on detail in a shot, generally leading to me being disappointed with most of what I shot, but I am mellowing a little.
I am trying to concentrate on asthetics now.
I think the realisation that a good shot is subjective roommate a long time to sink in.
I get a bad shot will always be a had shot and that there are a mirriad reasons for that, but I am increesingly of the opinion that good, even very good, didn't have to be perfect and that trying to achieve perfection unattainable, given my real world limitations with respect to both skill and available kit.

I am knot saying I do not need to improve, far from it, but I plan to focus on learning to get pleasing shots, issue by issue, rather than worrying about every last whisker and feather.

However I also realize that there is some stuff that simply isn't going to be negotiable, hence the question, the problem is I don't know which stuff that is. YET

Thanks so much for your replies,
it is a huge help.

Al

 

[Dyslexicbloke]

What is Exposure Compensation actually doing?

OK I realise it lightens or darkens an image, I am not that clueless, what I mean is how?
It has to tweak something and I always assumed that it was making incremental changes to sensitivity, ISO, but based on comments, reading, and a bit of raw editing I am wondering how it Is am simply missing something.

I always assumed that ISO in a digital DSLR, in fact any CCD based imaging device, was a physical thing. IE the gain being adjusted.
However as I am beginning to get a glimpse of some of the complexities I suspect that this view is just wrong.

I am asking because I do know that though can't get something from nothing.
I am fine with post to get a good exposure, purists I am sorry, but the camera is doing it so why shouldn't I, but from a practical standpoint there are hard limits.

Quite apart from wanting to understand, I think it is likely that the mechanisms by which the camera is working will affect how the best results are attained from it.
Based on that, if it is a reasonable assumption, I probably need to know that is going on to avoid the limits in the first place.

Al

 

[ac12]

Something my old boss once told me.
The more you know, the more you know you don't know.
IOW the universe of knowledge (at 1000) is greater than you thought (at 100). So your slice of what you know (at 10) becomes a smaller % of the now greater knowledge (goes down from 10% to 1%)

Exposure Compensation is taking the meters reading, then offsetting the exposure by the EC you dial in, for either less or more exposure.
The actual implementation depends on the camera; Canon may do it different than Nikon.

A properly exposed sharp image is the goal.
Raise the ISO to both properly expose the image, AND have the subject sharp.
A properly exposed blurry image is not what you want.
You need your shutter speed high enough to get a sharp image that is properly exposed.

I would experiment with the different AF modes.
The proper mode to use will depend on various factors.

• Background clutter may cause some options to loose track or focus lock.
  • clear sky vs. trees
• Foreground clutter/objects may cause zone focusing to loose lock of the bird and lock onto the clutter/objects.

You will have to experiment and take notes.

For DoF, today you need either the online DoF calculator, or the app you can download to your phone.
The problem is, if the lens does not have a distance scale, which some/many AF lenses today do not have, you are guessing at the distances that you enter and read from the DoF calculator. Or you get a laser rangefinder. This makes DoF calculation and implementation rather clumsy, because of the distance undertainty.
Today DoF calculation is not as easy as the old days, with prime lenses which had a DoF scale on the lens. I know of only ONE modern Canon zoom lens that has an electronic DoF scale, which duplicates the function of the DoF scale on the old primes.

 

[johngpt]

Great advice from the folks above.
I've often found that reading the manual and going through the menus is a good start to learning about a new camera.
I did it in 2011 when I got my Fuji X100.
Did that when in 2014 when I got my Fuji X-T1.
Did it again when my beloved X100 fell and broke and I got the X100F.
Hold the camera lots.
Take a variety of exposures whenever you photograph a scene or subject.
Go manual mode with fixed ISO to see how the settings alter the result.
Go aperture priority and see what happens when the camera decides on your shutter speed or ISO and what happens to the background sharpness or blur.
Use an app that can tell you what your exposure settings had been.
For example, I use Lightroom to import my images and in its Library module it tells me what my aperture, shutter speed and ISO had been.
Shoot lots and then take your time examining the results.
There is no quick way to gaining experience.

 

[Gary A.]

Start with RTFM.

 

[zombiesniper]

Wildlife photography?

Start here!

 

[astroNikon]

I recommend you purchase this book from Derrell Young, mastering the Nikon D7200.
It will go through the features and give examples of everything. It's not just a "reference" like the instruction manual. It will teach you a lot about the camera and how to improve your use of it.

https://www.amazon.com/Mastering-Ni...ords=darrell+young+mastering+book+nikon+d7200

I bought it for the Nikon D7000 way back when. I learned so much from that book (and this forum). The manual actually made sense afterwards.

 

[Dyslexicbloke]

Gary,
I take yiur point and believe me I have been reading but withot knowing the real word context, from a technique perspective, there are plenty of occasions where reading isnt much help.

There are so many ways to accomplish thinghs that simply looking at the raw fcunction of a single menue item is not much use...

I write programs for a living... The proigrams control hydroelectric installations, many of which have control panels that I designed before writing the code...
I am pretty sure all the PLC and isntrumentation manuals are quite good but I am positive that somoine with anything less than aadetailed understanding of how a hydroelectric installation works woulkd have great dificulty even picking the correct setpoints, let alone writing the code from the ground up and trhat is asssuming they were fully up to speed with the PLC and allk ther instrunments, 'O' and trhe networking and the electrics and the.....

I am not asking because I cant be bothered, I am asking because a few words of guidence fcrfom a kind sole will give me the basis to explore without making asumptions that are flawed in the first place.

Case in pooint... Back buttomn focus.
It seemed like a good plan, and ikts hardly a challange to set up, evev without the manual.
However it was pointed out to me that I. ay want my thumb to shift focus points around, which. hadnt considdered, and also that always using back button focus, as opposed to only when realy needed was likely to cause me to miss shots.

None oe that is in te manual...
It also dosnt mention focus/shutter priority in the context oif getting the shot, just what it dose.

My plan is actually to use a hybred aproac h that is easy tro customise for a given situation.
Add both AF and AE shutter coupling to a short custom menu.
Add Fn and AF/AE button assignment to the same menu.

I think I can now coinfigure for a multitude of situations and my comfort, when I find some, quickly and easily... be that back button focus or even front button, under my pinky, focus for that matter.

one simple change will put either AF or AE back on trhe shutter buttom without affecting the custom button assignment.

I havwe also set AF-C priority to shutter and AF-S priority to fcocus.

All that sounds sensible to me and addresses many of the concirns raised buy folk earlier.
However, now I actually have a plan, good or bad we will see, I would apriciate some comments on it, bnecaus the manual simply dosnt cover that scope or context and although I know it works technically I have no idea if I will be shooting muself in the foot practically.
Perhaps .am just going tro learn bad habits and suffer becaus of it fore a long trime to come...

The point is I dont know, which is exactly why I am asking.

I will be asking about flash setting too I expect, because trhe manual for that it hard going neither the canera or flash documentation is presenting a cogent explanation.
At least not to me... Perhaps I understrood the basics it would be clearer, but I doint so I will likely beasking silly questions.

It took me ages to find the setting that made the beam angle, zoom, folow the lense and although it is working now I honestly dont know why some of the menu items are yet, let alone what to do with them or even which I need and which are more creative options.

I am hoping to work most of the time with fill flash, reteat fill flash at that, so I expect I will havew to reduce the output oir run out of charge, what I dont know is how toi tell the camera I am doing that... and I cant find that in the manual either.

Right now I have the flash in TTL / BL / FP set to -1EV
The camera has flash comp of + 1EV
This seams to work and will give me 3 shots in burst.

However I also have trhe camera in auto ISO and with the flash on it seems to be locked at 400...
Still readsing but not getting far.

Al