I've gotten into photography rather recently, and I've seen a lot of people blur their backgrounds, so I wanted to do the same thing.

 

However, no matter what I do, it seems it won't work (manual mode, AF area mode). I was wondering if anyone could give me direct instructions, or the reason why it isn't working.

 

Thanks!

I have the Nikon P950, since around June, and I'm also new to photography.

It depends what you mean by background. The camera will blur the background at any AF stop, not to the same extent of course, but it won't blur something the bird is sat on, e.g. rock, tree, because that is not the background. 

As an example, here is a picture of a meadow pipit I took a few days back. You can see what part of the picture is blurred. Aperture is around 6.5.

It will help if you post a picture and point out what you think should be blurred.

Hi all,

'Wonder if there's anyone out there who can help me.

I've started running my raw files through NX Studio and saving in TIFF format before processing in Affinity. My understanding is that a raw file ran through NX studio and saved to TIFF will be of better image quality than a RAW or JPEG file imported directly to Affinity (please correct me if this is a flawed assumption).

'Problem being that I'm not seeing any difference between a RAW and a JPEG file in NX Studio in terms of image quality. I appreciate that NX Studio applies camera settings/controls to RAW images and so they should look pretty much identical, but my understanding is that there should be a difference in image quality because JPEG compression is not applied to the RAW file unless I specifically instruct NX Studio to do that.

Given that many people, more experienced than I am, are confident that NX Studio RAW images are of better quality then I reckon there's a very good chance I have something not helping in the settings. I've looked at various YT videos but none answer my questions. So, given that I simply want to have the best RAW image file possible before processing in Affinity, what should my settings be?

Colour Space for Colour Reproduction: it is set to "recorded setting".

DX1 Raw Default: it is set to 10MP.

Colour Reproduction Process: it is set to "camera compatible". 

I noticed that the software is applying a level of noise reduction, but I'm guessing that it is simply reflecting the camera settings which I have set on low?

I take pictures using the following: neutral picture control, sharpening/contrast/saturation all set to 0, and I only ever use ADL when it's a particularly bright day.

Also, where is the option to apply JPEG compression to RAW files so that I can ensure it does not happen, or is this simply done at the point of saving to a JPEG file?

Is there anything else I'm missing, should be aware of, given what I'm trying to do?

Thanks in advance for any help!

Super zooms are notoriously not the sharpest tools in the shed.  That’s a lot of glass to move around. They not only magnify images but imperfections and vibrations.  Then there’s that annoying thing called heat distortion, especially at long distances.  This is when heat from the ground softens your images at long distances.  I think the sharpness you seek (and the images you posted are pretty sharp), will come with experimentation and practice.  Good luck.

Cheers for the reply.

Aye, I'm under no illusions in that there's a reason why the camera is 800 quid and not a few grand. That said, I've seen sharper images with this camera posted on-line. I tried the vivid picture control and I think there is an improvement, although difficult to say because the weather isn't great here at the moment and so I haven't had a chance to compare in a like for like situation.

'Seems to me, from this forum, another one I post on and general reading around the internet; that nobody is going to hand me a magic solution on a plate and so, as you say, it's a case of doing my own experimenting and seeing what happens.

It might be worth exploring shooting in NRW and converting to .tiff in NX Studio before you edit in Affinity as Nikon's own software usually gets more bite out of the raw files than third-party converters.

 

The Vivid picture control doesn't only boost saturation, it renders a higher contrast photo as well. Its origin is the need for a setting that emulated Velvia for the nature photographers back in the day and not lose them all to Canon.

 

These are general observations as I don't own a Nikon compact.

Cheers Merco. I hadn't considered other photo processing software. I do feel that at least a part of the answer lies in-camera, but I was after ideas and your post is very helpful. I will certainly give vivid picture control a go.

What are your shooting parameters? Shutter speed, aperture and ISO will all play a part in getting a sharp result. 

What picture control do you use? 

Do you do any post-processing? What software do you use?

Have you thought about getting a monopod? Holding still at the magnification available with the P950 is not trivial.

These are all in the range of 1000 to 2000 shutter speed, 200 ISO, aperture around 6.

Standard picture. Yes, I use Affinity photo editing but not extensively, say a minute a picture.

Aye, I've thought about a monopod but there's something in me that wants to do it handheld.

I was hoping someone has this camera and found a huge difference in sharpening and noise reduction levels or something.

Hi all,

I'm hoping someone can provide a bit of insight.

I've attached some pictures to give an indication of the level I'm at. I'm pretty new to cameras: owning an FZ330/FZ300 for a few months and now the P950 for around say 6 weeks, and I'm interested in bird photography.

I take most of my pictures either lying down with my elbows on the ground or sat down with my elbows resting against my knees, and I've made a point of striking a balance between learning the technical basics, keeping the camera steady and learning how to get close to birds.  As is stands, I've nowhere to go except back to the technical aspects of the camera in the event I want to achieve sharper images: I'm as close to birds as possible and the camera is kept steady. 

I've seen pictures taken with this camera and they're sharper than mine, and so my question is: what are the top two or three technical things/camera settings that generated such sharp images? 

There is minimal cropping with these pictures, by the way.

Thanks in advance for any help,

Paul.