Nikonians Articles

My finger was bouncing around on the keyboard, on an online photography forum the other evening and someone asked this question, “Can mental quickness in responding to a changing photographic scenario be learned or improved?” Read more...

Remember our scale at the beginning? 0-64 points for concept, 0-32 for working with people, 0-16 for planning, 0-8 for composition, 0-4 for lighting, 0-2 for shooting, 0-1 for post-processing? Multiply them all together, and the result ranges from 0 to 2 million. The way you shoot the shot can make an otherwise perfect image $2 million, $1million or $0. Read more...

Darrell Young is busy writing Mastering the Nikon Z7 & Z6 books for the NikoniansPress/RockyNook series. Here he shares with us a good tip on how to use the depth of field (DOF) preview. Read more...

Why did I find myself in Cuba on a Street Photography Workshop? -- A non-streetphotographer tells her story while working her Nikon Z7 and D500 in this target-rich area. Read more...

Let’s recap where we started. To achieve the maximum effect, give yourself from 0-1 points for post-processing, 0-2 for shooting, 0-4 for lighting, 0-8 for composition, 0-16 for planning, 0-32 for working with people, and 0-64 for concept. Multiply these together. You will get a result between 0 and about 2 million. Read more...

People often ask about teleconverters. They sound like a great idea. For a 200mm lens, you can use a 1.4x TC to make it 280mm. Or you can use a 1.7x TC and make it 340mm. Or a 2.0x TC and turn it into 400mm! Read more...

I have several photographer friends who have switched from a standard dSLR to a mirrorless camera at some point during the last years. Each time I would see their printed images I would think that the images were so much sharper than my dSLR cameras, even though I always carefully sharpen my images at the end of processing. Read more...

Jonathan Kandel (JonK) has been a Nikonians member for almost a decade and a half, and a long-time moderator. He is a semi-professional photographer who just got his Nikon Z7 mirrorless camera. Here he offers his thorough first impressions. Read more...

It goes without saying that Composition is fundamental to any photography project and every professional assignment. Read more...

Nikonians co-founder J. Ramon Palacios presents us a tip for better hand holding when with a long lens, reducing fatigue. Read more...

Shooting property in a thriving real estate market. There’s plenty of property to shoot - custom homes, historic homes, commercial buildings, interiors, custom landscapes, vineyards, and ranches with ample wildlife. Read more...

Nikonians co-founder J. Ramon Palacios (jrp) comes back to us to share what he has learned about the fourth of the seven deadly sins in photography: Missing Distractions. Read more...

When I read the rules a certain line in the wording gave me pause for thought as did other wording about the specific category rules. It seems to me that people are still struggling with what digital photography is versus what film photography was. Read more...

I follow photography conversations on a couple of different web sites, as do many of us. I also take photography trips to various areas with tour guides, again, as many of us do. Recently I took a guided photography trip to Costa Rica. One of the things I like about taking these trips is meeting new people, mostly other photographers, and talking about our shared love of the craft. This trip I was reminded about the seemingly apparent divide over shooting JPEG format versus shooting RAW format. Read more...

The human eye interprets images in the following order: movement, colour, shape, content. If you wish to create images that sell products, change social behaviour, win election campaigns or merely persuade people to invest their evenings in watching a particular TV show, then you need to construct the image with these in mind. Read more...

I often hear Ansel Adams invoked during discussions on photography. Many times, it is apparent that the person invoking Adams knows little about him or his life, but read a few lines somewhere written by some obscure person who said whatever it was about Adams that they then repeated as true. Read more...

Nikonians co-founder J. Ramon Palacios (jrp) compares different Nikkor lenses for birding, including the latest ones available, with and without teleconverters, based upon budget and image results. Read more...

Sometimes I cannot get outside in a location that will allow me to take interesting photographs or the weather just won’t allow it. But, I still want to use my camera to take photographs so I’ll try setting up a still life of some sort. At one point, I read about light box photography and saw some beautiful flower images that a photographer, who teaches the technique, had taken. Read more...

My goal, with every photograph I take, is to make each image be the very best that it can be by my standards and by general artistic standards. Read more...

In the process of learning photography we often get stuck at a stage. Jim Donelson reminds us of the wisdom of Zen Budhism to overcome the possible obstacles, suggesting that most of them are self-made but can be demolished by expanding on our habits and attitude. Read more...

Learning to photograph animals in action takes effort, time and patience and, at some point, will result in successful action shots. Read more...

Most photographers are not natural planners. If you come from a landscape background, you expect to be inspired by what you find. Photojournalists look for the decisive moment. Press photographers were always told ‘f8 and be there’. But even the most spontaneous photographer needs at least the basic planning of having their equipment ready when the moment happens. Read more...

Fifty-millimeter lenses have always been a staple of SLR and DSLR photography. They are very popular as they are small, inexpensive, and generally of very high quality. All camera makers make some version of this type of lens, and it originally was the lens you would get when you purchased a kit of camera and lens together Read more...

More on the "controlled spectrum" in photography with some thoughts on decision-making and consequences of our actions, or inactions. We will look into taking risks, and freedom as a foundation for creativity. We are also coming back to physical exercise for helping your creativity to flourish. Read more...

Photography on the slopes comes with its own skillset and it is more than just people or landscape photography. This article is for all of you who want to achieve more than just some landscape shots or shooting your resort. Read more...

Many people advocate that we “throw away the rules,” or use them “with a grain of salt.” But it is imperative to learn all of these compositional rules and to know them so well that they can be used without conscious thought. Then, and only then, can you forget about the rules and toss them to the wind. Read more...

The factor which can disrupt whole shoots or, equally, turn dross into gold, is what we call in the trade ‘the human factor’. Read more...

In this fourth part of "mastering the art of photography", I continue to explore what mastering this art form entails. We'll discuss what items you can control for, how to get the most out of it, time scheduling and the areas you have to be aware of as not being well controllable. Read more...