For them not interested in reading, you can see the photos in THIS SmugMug Gallery.  

For a SmugMug slideshow click HERE. When you click the link, it will open in a new window and you have two options:
1) Manually scroll through the photos by clicking the “<” and “>” symbols to the left or right of the photos.
2) There’s a PLAY/PAUSE button at the top-left of the screen with the transition set at about 5 seconds. Note: clicking the PLAY arrow will run a full-screen slideshow. You can then still use the”<” and “>” symbols to the left or right of the photos as this will pause the slideshow.

If you want the full experience, keep reading.

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By the way, as usual, WP seems to degrade the photos; sometimes a bit more than other times. If you click on any of the photos, a larger copy will open up in a new tab or window and — hopefully — will be of slightly better quality and larger.

Another thing . . . I’m using the Classic Block for the first time in a long time. It looks as if WP fixed the problem with the disappearing menu (although working with photos still has some glitches). We’ll see how it goes.

So, the above photo was taken in September with my Nikon P900. One of the complaints with the P900 is that it doesn’t match the quality of a DSLR with a larger sensor. Truthfully, often, it doesn’t even come close … except, we (me) sometimes compare apple and oranges and expect them to both be pears. OK, I don’t know what that means either, but here’s me attempting to explain …

Basically, because I can, I often shoot the P900 at close to the full zoom, or 357mm (2000 mm equivalent). If the subject is close and in good light, like in the above, the results rival what I can do with a DSLR because with the DSLR I usually have to crop to get an equivalent-sized photo.

Confusing, I know . . . here, let me show you a gallery of hummingbirds shots taken with the P900 around the same time as the above.

I’d say those are excellent shots, especially the last shot . . .

Now, look at these two shots of a hummingbird roughly twice as far away and in not-so-good light and taken on the same day.

Those are not as sharp, not as detailed, and the white balance is problematic, and this is after I’ve processed them with some of my favorite programs. The thing is, those are not crops. Those are original size files (well, reduced to fit here — the originals are in SmugMug), but if I had taken that same photo with my DSLR that equivalent view would be a much smaller photo of probably not much better quality (other than the colors). In fact, I wouldn’t have even bothered cropping the DSLR photo or sharing it if I did.

And, I can still play with the above photo and do this . . .

Part of the issue is the metering, and, in part, it’s the focus (the P900 uses a contrast-based focusing system that is especially weak at the maximum zoom because it’s using so little of the sensor).

For instance, this backlit flower, no matter how much I tried, never got into sharp focus . . .

I mean, it’s not bad, but the only thing I’d use this for is this . . .

Let me show you an example of image quality between the P900 at maximum zoom and my D7500 with the 70-200mm f/2.8 lens . . . here’s the scene shot with the P900:

Here’s the gargoyle at the P900’s maximum zoom . . .

Here’s the DSLR at 200mm zoom . . .

I would say — especially at the pixel level — that’s a much better photo . . . unless I want the same approximate view as the P900, in which case I need to crop the above and get . . .

I still say that’s better than the P900 . . . but the crop is dimensionally smaller than the P900 photo (1033×733 versus 4608×3456) which makes a difference as to how large a print you can make or how large you can see it — if I display the full-size P900 shot of the head on my 30-inch screen at full resolution, all that I see is the eye; the DSLR crop barely fills a fourth of the screen.

And that’s the crux of the matter . . . meaning, it matters what you’re going to do with the photos you take. If i’m just displaying them here (about the only thing I do these days) then the smallness of the DSLR crop and the large size of the P900’s original are irrelevant because they are all shown at the same size in this post.

Another area where the P900 suffers is performance in poor lighting (as mentioned). And, it’s not just the quality of the photo, but also the color rendering. For instance, I can get very different results shooting the same subject just based on what (and how) the camera chooses to meter the scene, like in these two photos post-processed the same but loking very different . . . 

Here’s a different part of the above shrub, and it’s different yet . . .

In this case, the photo is once again fairly ‘soft’ . . . ok for me to ‘paint’ it, though.

Here’s a photo of one of the holly plants . . . it’s sharp enough to make out the milkweed seed in the leaves, but not sharp enough to get fiine details from the shot . . .

Not a bad shot, really, but, again, I’m likely to just ‘paint’ it . . .

Because I was painting the pergola, I moved the two lounge chairs out from under it . . . and when it rained, I snapped these two photos with the P900 (from about 20 feet away at maximum zoom).

Like all cameras, at the maximum zoom of the lens the depth-of-field is shallower, so the first is focused on the back chair and the second is focused on the front chair. I liked the reflections.

I quite like those photos . . . so much so that I might still ‘paint’ one of them . . .

Why, I might even do a monochrome version of it . . .

Here’s a gallery of three equivalent photos taken with the D7500 (and their respective crops). Again, I think these are ‘better” but it might come down to preferences . . .

Side trip: I mentioned I painted the pergola. Actually, I primed it, then I had to wait because the rain was moving in the next day (the forecast changed on me). Here’s the thing . . . the primer was supposed to be ‘quick-drying’ but the next morning, I saw a neatly-represented version of the pergola’s lattice on the concrete under it. The primer had run and it hadn’t even rained yet; it ran just from the condensation of dew on the wood. I had to bring out the powerwasher and clean out the dripped primer mixture before it set on the concrete (luckily, it came out) and I then put down some plastic before the rain proper moved in. I was not a happy camper, I tell you what! Why am I telling you this? Because of these next photos.

These were shot with the P900 from about fifteen feet away at maximum zoom . . .

The photos are not cropped, but I did post-process them. I think they look pretty good . . .

. . . but, OK, the ones from the DSLR (cropped) look better, especially some of the ones showing the bubbles breaking and the drops of water dancing on the surface. Here’s a gallery of the full shots followed by the respective crops.

Anyway, just passing time, don’t you know.

And now, not a comparison, but rather one picture multiple ways . . . I shot this at Crab Orchard National Wildlife Refuge because I liked how the branches looked against the sky . . .

This next version is what I had in mind when I snapped that photo . . .

Those are interesting but I wanted a version expressing the concept of Fall . . .

. . . and, using the same photo, an expression of Spring . . .

That’s it. This post has ended . . . except for the stuff below.

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