Rodney Campbell's Blog

Back at Lake Windamere before dawn for an early morning shoot. It was incredibly foggy in town where we were staying, on most of the drive here and on the hills surrounding the lake. However down here on the lake… nothing… it figures 🙂

Blue and Gold

NIKON Z 7 + NIKKOR Z 24-200mm f/4-6.3 VR @ 36 mm, 104 sec at f/7.1, ISO 100

Anyway a long exposure for some early twilight colour (to the naked eye it was basically dark) and some light painting of the trees to reveal and warm them

Note: These photographs (especially the wider shots) look much better when larger. To see larger versions in an inline overlay slideshow gallery viewer click any of the images.

Wretched

NIKON Z 7 + NIKKOR Z 24-200mm f/4-6.3 VR @ 55 mm, 47 sec at f/8, ISO 100

A little monochrome conversion of a shot taken at the afternoon session of daytime Long Exposures with the Focus Photographers group and NiSi Filters at Turimetta on Sydney’s Northern Beaches

Plumbing the Depths

NIKON Z 7 + NIKKOR Z 24-200mm f/4-6.3 VR @ 63 mm, 92 sec at f/9, ISO 64

This one taken at a longer focal length (63mm) with the Nikon Z 24-200mm lens along with a NiSi 10-Stop IR ND 100mm square filter

For these images I’ve dropped in a Lee LittleStopper 6-Stop ND filter to drag out the exposure

The 6-Stop ND is a very handy filter which turns seconds into minutes – literally…  The exposure calculations are that easy. If the before (adding the filter) exposure is 2 seconds, the after is 2 minutes

Pier One

NIKON Z 7 + NIKKOR Z 24-200mm f/4-6.3 VR @ 40 mm, 155 sec at f/8, ISO 64

In this first image it was still reasonably dark (facing away from the coming dawn). We have a 155 second exposure which has nicely smoothed the harbour waters. This city was also starting to be heavily shrouded in fog by this stage so it’s given the whole image this sort of mystical blur

Note: These photographs (especially the wider shots) look much better when larger. To see larger versions in an inline overlay slideshow gallery viewer click any of the images.

In this second we’re pointing towards where the sun would rise and the clouds were putting on quite a show (unfortunately behind the buildings :))

Fire and Chrome

NIKON Z 7 + NIKKOR Z 24-200mm f/4-6.3 VR @ 59 mm, 6 sec at f/8, ISO 64

My first real “landscape” session with the new Nikon Z 24-200mm f/4-6.3 VR lens

I was already planning for this to be my go to travel and walkaround all-in-one lens

However I’m also planning to replace my Nikon Z 24-70 f/4 lens with this lens in my typical landscape loadout in my camera bag. Primarily to give myself more reach, flexibility and options in the field. Whilst also removing the need to own/pack an additional (F-Mount at this stage) lens for a longer focal length (> 70mm) option

So I’m quite keen to see how the lens performs in a more typical landscape setting. So this is my first twilight & sunrise shoot in many months. It’s out with the tripod and my 100mm filter kit

I’ve taken the quick and easy option and headed down to Sydney harbour (Blues Point Reserve). It’s a lovely spot and there’s this little sandy beach with some nice rocks which becomes accessible next to the rock wall at low tide. What I hadn’t counted on was the whole area being blocked off due to construction for the new Metro line tunnelling under the harbour 🙁

I’d have to settle for shooting from on the reserve – alas no foreground options here. Thus I’d only be using the longer focal length options shooting over the water… so be it

Mystic Hanging

NIKON Z 7 + NIKKOR Z 24-200mm f/4-6.3 VR @ 75 mm, 62 sec at f/8, ISO 64

Note: These photographs (especially the wider shots) look much better when larger. To see larger versions in an inline overlay slideshow gallery viewer click any of the images.

No clouds (at least not in the direction of the city or Opera House) but quite a bit of fog around this morning again. Sydney’s been draped in fog each morning for quite a few days. Interestingly it’s mostly a light mist during twilight but got heavier after the sun started to rise

The pre dawn pastel colours were pretty nice though – with some nice red glow developing on the horizon

SOH Dreaming

NIKON Z 7 + NIKKOR Z 24-200mm f/4-6.3 VR @ 120 mm, 5 sec at f/8, ISO 64

I also took frames for a very wide stitched panorama which I’ll post next, along with some 100% crops to see how this lens is performing

I’d previously tested the new Nikon Z 24-200 lens with the type of long distance landscape and outdoor subject material one might encounter when travelling. In short it appeared excellent across nearly all focal lengths with a slight weakness at the extreme edges at the shorter (24mm) end

Another typical use case for a lens like this when travelling, day tripping out and about or doing street photography is nice tight crop portraits

It was a nice fully overcast day so I figured I’d see how the lens operates for this portrait use case

This is one aspect of where the near zero focus breathing and very close minimum focus distance (~0.5m) of this lens is fantastic

I suspect I may not have done this well with either my 28-300 (the focus breathing at close distance is rediculous – it ends up being way lass than a 200mm effective focal length at this distance). Perhaps not even with my 70-200 (can’t shoot anywhere near this close as the MFD is around 1.5m)

In this case I have the additional challenge of trying to take portraits of our new puppy. He’s not particularly amenable to staying still to have his photo taken :). So here’s me chasing him around my back yard trying to stay in close :). I shot at 1/400th sec @ 200mm to try and help deal with most of the motion and using Animal Detection autofocus is an absolute godsend 🙂

NIKON Z 7 + NIKKOR Z 24-200mm f/4-6.3 VR @ 200 mm, 1/400 sec at f/6.3, ISO 450

and here is a 100% crop from the image

NIKON Z 7 + NIKKOR Z 24-200mm f/4-6.3 VR @ 200 mm, 1/400 sec at f/6.3, ISO 450

One concern I had was the relatively limited f/6.3 aperture and the limits that would have on both available light and the ability to control depth of field. I’m a fan of being able to throw out the background and have a nice soft bokeh blur. This is something that is glorious with say the 70-200/2.8 or faster longer primes like the 85/1.4 or 1.8

I was pleasantly surprised with what the 200mm end of the 24-200 @ f/6.3 can do

Note: These photographs (especially the wider shots) look much better when larger. To see larger versions in an inline overlay slideshow gallery viewer click any of the images.

NIKON Z 7 + NIKKOR Z 24-200mm f/4-6.3 VR @ 200 mm, 1/400 sec at f/6.3, ISO 900