First shots from the D7000

[Jim Walczak]

Alrighty, as the title suggests, these are the first few shots off the recently acquired used D7000 that I snagged last week to replace my broken D90.

Admittedly, it's not my best work...the first two shots were taken out at French Creek Reservation of the Lorain Country MetroParks while taking our dogs for a walk yesterday evening (in other words, the 6 month old pup was dragging me along behind her, LOL). I had wanted to get out to a local nature preserve, however recent family situations dictated otherwise (the tranny on my minivan let go, so we're searching for a new ride at the moment). The third shot is our family's newest member, Louie...a couple of months ago we took him in as a stray at 10 weeks old, only to find out he had feline leukemia, however has has been retested and is now (thankfully) healthy and doing well.

For those interested, the shots of the deer and of the kitten were captured using my Tamron 70-300mm and the wide angle of the path was shot with my Nikon 18-55mm. All were captured using AP mode on the camera and all have been processed thru Camera Raw and Photoshop.









It's probably gonna take me a few weeks to get used to the D7000...it's just different enough from the D90 to throw me a bit (both in handling and processing), however once I get used to the nuances and such, I think it's gonna be a GREAT camera to shoot with.

As always, comments and critiques are welcomed and encouraged, however I do ask that you be detailed...whether you love it or hate it, please tell me why. Don't feel you need to be a pro or anything to review my work, however simply telling me "it's wonderful" (or "it sucks") really doesn't tell me much at all.

Thanks and enjoy!

 

[Ron Evers]

Methinks you need to adjust your WB as all these shots look cool on my calibrated monitor.

 

[astroNikon]

They're wonderful .. lol

the cat picture is nice but fuzzy - not sharp
probably due to the 1/20 shutter speed due to movement blur
try to get "portrait" type shots to at least 1/125 if you can. I'm going to guess it was a dark-ish room due to the ISO.

EXIF = Auto exposure, Aperture-priority AE, 1/20 sec, f/5.6, ISO 3200, Compensation: -1/3

When I had my d7000 I normally used 1600 as the MAX ISO but you gotta do what you gotta do to get the shot.

same problem with the 2nd photo 1/40 shutter. Head must have been moving when you took it. Head is soft but body sharper. The tree behind isn't very sharp either so I assume camera movement blur.

first photo
Camera: Nikon D7000
Lens: 18-55 mm f/3.5-5.6
Shot at 19 mm (35mm film equiv: 28mm)
Exposure: Auto exposure, Aperture-priority AE, 1/100 sec, f/5.6, ISO 400, Compensation: -1/3


second photo
Camera: Nikon D7000
Lens: 70-300 mm f/4-5.6
Shot at 185 mm (35mm film equiv: 278mm)
Exposure: Auto exposure, Aperture-priority AE, 1/40 sec, f/5.6, ISO 800, Compensation: -1/3
Flash: Off, Did not fire
Focus: At 32m, with a depth of field of about 6.6m, (from about 2.9m before the focus point to about 3.6m after)

 

[Jim Walczak]

Methinks you need to adjust your WB as all these shots look cool on my calibrated monitor.

Actually it's probably just my monitor...it's been a while since I've re-calibrated and I suspect the colors are a bit off. That said, I'm also still playing around with the menus and such on the D7000...I was messing with the D-Lighting and such, so it's probably gonna take me a bit to get the bugs all worked out.

Thank you for the comment!

 

[Jim Walczak]

They're wonderful .. lol

the cat picture is nice but fuzzy - not sharp
probably due to the 1/20 shutter speed due to movement blur
try to get "portrait" type shots to at least 1/125 if you can. I'm going to guess it was a dark-ish room due to the ISO.

EXIF = Auto exposure, Aperture-priority AE, 1/20 sec, f/5.6, ISO 3200, Compensation: -1/3

When I had my d7000 I normally used 1600 as the MAX ISO but you gotta do what you gotta do to get the shot.

same problem with the 2nd photo 1/40 shutter. Head must have been moving when you took it. Head is soft but body sharper. The tree behind isn't very sharp either so I assume camera movement blur.

first photo
Camera: Nikon D7000
Lens: 18-55 mm f/3.5-5.6
Shot at 19 mm (35mm film equiv: 28mm)
Exposure: Auto exposure, Aperture-priority AE, 1/100 sec, f/5.6, ISO 400, Compensation: -1/3


second photo
Camera: Nikon D7000
Lens: 70-300 mm f/4-5.6
Shot at 185 mm (35mm film equiv: 278mm)
Exposure: Auto exposure, Aperture-priority AE, 1/40 sec, f/5.6, ISO 800, Compensation: -1/3
Flash: Off, Did not fire
Focus: At 32m, with a depth of field of about 6.6m, (from about 2.9m before the focus point to about 3.6m after)

Usually I can shoot handheld down to around 1/60 (give or take my coffee intake that day), however in the case of the kitten pic, we had just walked in the door and I was just trying to get a quick snap of the little stinker before the pup got in the house and they started playing, LOL! That said, yea...dark stairway (we have lights at the top and bottom, but no light on the landing). Either way, wasn't really watching the settings at all... I walked in the door, saw him layin' there, had the camera in my hand and "click".

On the shot of the deer, I think the problem was the really shallow DOF combined with missing the face...it was pretty late in the evening, so I had the lens wide open and I don't have the focus points quite tweaked out yet. Normally I only use 1 focus point (at least with critter photography) so I can get the face sharp, however I had everything turned on to see how that 51 point auto focus would effect things...looks like the camera went for the body instead of the face. I could probably tweak it a bit more in Photoshop, but the truth is that I have MUCH better deer shots...mainly just wanted to get something posted right away off the new camera

Again, not my best work by any means, but yes, thank you for the comments!

 

[astroNikon]

You can check the focus point selection in-camera.
There an option you have to turn on first I think, then when you scroll up/down on the pad you get to the focus point in the LCD. It comes in handy when you let the camera pick the focus point.

Most of my animal, sport, etc shots are AFS-S or AFC-Single focus point.
Every time I let the camera decide something it usually ends up not in my best interest. lol

Any time I need to "get a shot the first time" while grabbing my camera I put it in Aperture priority and take the shot to get it. So wtih your cat shot I figured it was an instantaneous shot with the shutter/ISO/f combo.

 

[Jim Walczak]

You can check the focus point selection in-camera.
There an option you have to turn on first I think, then when you scroll up/down on the pad you get to the focus point in the LCD. It comes in handy when you let the camera pick the focus point.

Most of my animal, sport, etc shots are AFS-S or AFC-Single focus point.
Every time I let the camera decide something it usually ends up not in my best interest. lol

Any time I need to "get a shot the first time" while grabbing my camera I put it in Aperture priority and take the shot to get it. So wtih your cat shot I figured it was an instantaneous shot with the shutter/ISO/f combo.

Thanks for the tip...I'll look for that regarding the AF points. It's kind of funny in a way because working with this D7000 has made me realize just how little I really tend to doodle and doink with the camera settings. I remember "exploring" the menus and such when I first got my D90 and changing a few things here and there, particularly since I had just switched from Canon...tweaking the camera out and such, but the truth is, I don't think I've really touched anything in the menus since I first got it. Once I really get the camera setup, I pretty much just go out and shoot...I really just don't like to twiddle knobs and such while I'm shooting. This D7000 on the other hand, whoever the previous owner was, let's just say I've had to go thru everything right from the get go. I've pretty much had to reset everything and just start fresh.