One of the past challenges in shooting stars is setting the lens to infinity. Well, that problem was solved with a setting in our mirrorless Nikons and I didn’t even know it! In prepping for last night’s starry light shooting, the topic came up. Roger had just watched the latest NPS tech talk where he learned that if you go to the Setup > Save Focus Positon and set it to OFF, when you power up the camera, it will focus the lens to Infinity (must be a Z lens, no mechanical issues and not affected by extreme heat or cod) automatically. I instantly tested it and it worked. Went and shot tonight and darn if it didn’t work perfectly! Goes to show the importance of keeping up one changes is important, I was lagging behind. Infinity couldn’t be any simpler!

Color management just as the name suggests is all about bringing home the color to tell YOUR story. Most have a decent handle on color management for stills, but video, that’s a totally different animal! Speaking for myself, that’s the first thing I tackle when editing video cause it takes me the longest to nail it. That’s where the Calibrite ColorChecker Passport comes in. Just like when shooting stills, slipping it into the frame for a couple of seconds has saved me hours in post. It not only makes it simpler, I’ve been learning how to shoot it better in camera from mistakes the Passport corrects in post. It’s a small thing, slips into your shirt pocket and has video and still colorchecker in one compact case. If you are having issues / challenges with color balance, color management, you can nail it with the Calibrite ColorCheck Passport!

This is a continuation of a series of videos, some simple advice that might help move your photography forward. It’s like any advice you might receive, you gotta take it in and decide if it works for you. If it does, perfect. If it doesn’t just forget it and continue on :-)

My typical workflow is to ingest all the files, stills and video, at one time at the end of the shoot / day. I prefer to view all my files in chronological order, from the first shot of the shoot / day in the beginning and the last shot of the shoot / day, at the end. Then in Photo Mechanic, the light table is set to Capture Time so I see all the files just as I shot them. This is true if I’m shooting with just one camera or three, they all appear in chronological order. That’s because I use Synchronize date and time to sync up all my cameras. Found in the Network Menu, this very simple process syncs all cameras that are synced down to the second (time zone, date, hours, minutes as well). It takes seconds to do, first requiring you setting up Snychornized Release and then Synchronizing Camera Clocks in all the bodies you want to sync. Once set up, takes only moments every so often (I do it the night before I go out to shoot) to make sure all bodies are synced. This simple feature makes going through all the files a bit faster and simpler and in photography, that’s a good thing.

Maintaince of our gear is really important, before, during, and AFTER our adventures! Most do the first two but it’s that last one, after, that seems to get pushed aside in the excitement of being home with our new images. My normal process is to clean all my gear before I board the plane to come home. Then once home all the gear is pulled out of the bags (inside to the bag gets vacuumed out) and laid out to come to room temp for 24hrs. Once that is done, I go through a deep and thorough cleaning which includes pulling off filters and getting all glass surfaces. Qtips in all the nooks and crevices around the camera prism and lens switches. I even go through the battery compartment. I’m talking thoroughly here right down to charging all batteries and cleaning lens/body caps. I even make sure the clock in the camera is set back to my time zone. This ensures my gear is ready to go on the next adventure, any booboos and repairs are dealt with, and nothing is missed. Knock on wood but doing this, I have never had an issue in the field where my gear left me unable to shoot. It’s a simple thing but important, that after adventure clean.

There are two aspects of wildlife photography we constantly strive to accomplish, image size and controlling the background. Shorebirds are small little dudes and when we walk up to them, we must seem like monsters. One reason they tend to head in the other direction. At the same time, these little brown jobs blend in pretty darn well with the background. Go figure. There is a simple yet for some, scary way to get past these two barriers and that’s just getting down on their level. It’s not that we are hidden when we lay on the sand, I honestly feel the birds just think we can’t be dangerous if we’re willing to lay on the sand. Often, they get so close you can’t focus on them. At the same time getting down at their level makes the sand detail disappear so the birds pop! The Panning Plate keeps the Z 9 / Z600f4 TC perfectly stable on the sand. The Frisbee makes it simpler to slide the rig around on the sand. With shorebirds putting on their spring plumage, nows is the time to give this great technique a workout. Spring time is hitting the sand time!