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I've been taking a lot of hummingbird pictures in the backyard recently. Maintaining focus tracking has been something of an issue. These little guys are fast. Only occasionally, the camera will lock onto something in the background, and I have to use the manual focus ring to get back to the...

At a recent CNPA meeting we had a presentation on artistic rendering of images. One of the techniques made them look like pen and ink, or charcoal drawings. I found that some hummingbird pictures work quite well for this. I found that these print rather well, and make nice greeting cards when...

Some of you may have already run across this, it was new to me. I've been playing around with pre-release capture on my Z8. This morning, about halfway through a backyard shoot, I thought I would see what difference it makes to go from 30 to 60 fps. Later on, I happened to notice that my display...

I currently have a copy of Topaz AI that I use for reducing noise and sharpening. I have been happy with Topaz with a caveat. I purchased the 3 individual programs several years ago, and was upgraded to Photo AI during the first year of purchase. I've had trouble with tiling artifacts on many...

Well, there's something badly wrong with my back up camera. No, not the one in the car, the one in my camera bag. I needed a shot of me for the CNPA newsletter, so I set up my primary camera as a prop, and used my back camera with the timer to get a shot. The problem? All the shots ended with...

I decided to try something a little outside my normal comfort zone. I shot this image of (I believe) a female redwing blackbird. I decided to do something a little creative with the background. Basically it's just an inverted radial gradient that I flattened, feathered out and adjusted the...

I got curious when I saw an article about them getting some never before taken shots of the earth. I looked it up and they have 3 cameras on board. 2 Z5s and 1 Z9. I'm not surprised they have Nikons but I would have chosen a handful of Z8s. Or at least Z7iis. I'm sure they could afford...

The Pup and I attended the Sportsman Expo yesterday in Conway SC. The goal was take more Dock Dogs pictures. While there I was approached by several of the participants (the owners, not the dogs), interested in getting some images of the dogs in action. At this point I'm not interested in...

There's a local photo contest coming up, and I need to get some images together to print and mount for it. I'm having a little trouble making the final decisions. I can enter up to 4 images. I may or may not enter all 4. I've narrowed it down to these. I actually have some better images from the...

I'm looking at trading in my Z5 and have thought about using the proceeds to get something useful. While I have two holes in my lenses, 70-200 and ultra wide, I really am not sure I would use either of them enough to justify spending the money. I have thought about a teleconverter. I've looked...

This has come up, mostly as a tangential issue, often enough that I thought a separate discussion on it might be a good thing. Everyone has an opinion on where to draw the line, although some may not have given it that much thought. With the rise of AI generated images, and software tools that...

One of the highlights is the "Members Choice" contest. It's an annual contest among the Carolina Nature Photographers Association members where the members vote on the images. We have around 1,000 members in 13 chapters throughout North and South Carolina. The amount of talent is awe inspiring...

We don't get much snow in the Charleston SC area, so when we do, it's a big deal. They are calling for around 3" in my area, just a little north of Charleston. I went outside a few minutes ago and it's coming down fairly heavily. It's those really small flakes, but it is starting to stick. Air...

What do you think? No peeking at the EXIF.

I'm getting a little tired of carrying my Z8/180-600 combo around all day. I've considered something like the cotton carrier system. I just hate to spend the money not knowing if it will suit my needs. I was a little put off by it not coming with an arca swiss compatible plate, although they...

Went back over to Cypress this afternoon to see if the wood ducks would gather late in the afternoon as promised. New Flash: They didn't. I arrived early and made the rounds to see what things were like in the afternoon. As I was walking the trail, I ran across a group of dressed up folks on...

I guess it's time to switch to a new year's thread. Unfortunately, things were a little slow at Magnolia yesterday. Early morning was very low light, and the critters were not as cooperative as I'd have liked. "Mama said there'll be says like this. There'll be days like this, Mama said." This...

I know, I was going to wait for Christmas to unwrap and use the 180-600. I was doing really well, then our nature photography club had to move the monthly outing this Saturday to Magnolia Plantation. This time of year birds are the main draw, unless they have the Model A cars this weekend. I...

It's been 9 months since I, rather unexpectedly, ended up with a Z8. I thought it might be time to give an update on my experience with it. Despite having to carefully budget my hobby money for most of my life, I have been fortunate enough to have used a few exceptional cameras. My dad's Rollei...

The Pup and I have put together a calendar featuring some of this year's work from both of us. We were thinking about printing about 10 of them for friends and family. We aren't necessarily doing this for Christmas, but more as a fun project, but would probably be looking to get them out either...