grandpaw

I am going to share the settings I use for most of my wildlife photos. I have three cameras, a Nikon D7000, Nikon D600, and my Nikon D500. The D500 is what I use about 95% of the time and the lenses I use are a Nikon 70-200VR F2.8 and add a 2x extender sometimes for more reach. I also use my Tamron 150-600mm a lot and both of these lenses are the original versions. I normally shoot in “Aperture Priority Mode” because controlling the depth of field is very important to the look I like and my style of photography. Most of my images are shot at f8 or F9 depending on the distance to the subject being photographed. The longer the distance the more depth of field you will get and the closer the distance the less depth of field you will see.

I am sharing this information and I will add that it works for me and my style of shooting and may or may not work for you. The first thing I do is set my ISO to 500 and make sure my camera is on aperture priority. If the subject is close by I use F9 and for further away subjects I use F8 to get me the depth of field I am looking for. This combination gives me the needed shutter speed for just about anything I wish to photograph. Often I will have a minus 1/3 to one full stop of exposure compensation. I try to get a background that is not busy and with the shallow depth of field I get, this combination makes my subjects stand out from the background and look more like a portrait. These settings are NOT a one size fits all group of settings but do work well for me. I will add that I have extremely steady hands and that plays in to the settings I choose to use. I might add that I shoot almost everything hand held and seldom use a tripod.

Your camera, shooting technique, shooting situation, lens and experience all play into what settings will work for you. Remember that these settings work for me using my experience, my equipment and knowledge of my equipment and is not meant to say that this will also work for you. This is just meant as another option you can try and see if it works for you.

If you check the EXIF data on some of my pictures and it does not match this, please don’t waste your time pointing it out to me. These are general settings that I use and work for most of my photography.

If you find this helpful, thats great and if not just disregard this post and do it your way. Grandpaw

DaveO Loc: Northeast CT

George Rains Loc: Austin, TX.

Good information and thanks. My hands are not so steady anymore, but try to hand hold or find something to brace against. Darn this creeping middle age. Do keep a tripod handy, old metal one and heavy, carbon not in budget just yet. Nikon D60, 24-55 and 55-300, both VR. Limited transportation so don't get out much. Like what you do and learn a lot from you and this group. Have LR 5, but not capable with it yet, so all captures are store original, crop in camera. Again, thanks. George

smilenangler Loc: The Flood City, Pa.

Thanks grandpaw, I like your shots, and narrowing down the settings is good for me. I shoot a
D7100 in aperture and have been trying to figure out how to get more speed to stop motion.
recently got nikons 200-500. It's all for fun, have a great day.

DaveO Loc: Northeast CT

Have you tried shutter priority...that's what it's used for. Many use manual to stop motion and at the same time have a little latitude on DOF typically at the expense of ISO.

grandpaw

I will be 66 years old in about two weeks and have been very blessed with extremely steady hands. A group of us meet every Thursday night and we were talking about our ability to hold a camera steady. I had my D500 with my Tamron 150-600mm on it and took a photo on this crop sensor camera at the full 600mm at a shutter speed of one full second and it was tack sharp. Not something I would normally do but just wanted to see if I could do it, and I did.

grandpaw

I have tried them all and can use all of the modes well but just prefer "Aperture Priority' for my shooting style. There are many ways of capturing the same photo and finding the one that works the best for you and your style is the main goal. Don't ever listen to the people that say you need to do it the same way they shoot or your wrong because they are simply just incorrect. There are tons of combinations you can use for any photo and the goal is to find the one that works the best for you and your style of photography and the situation your in. If there was only one right way to take a photo there would not be so many buttons and menus on all of our cameras. Occasionally I will shoot in 'Shutter Priority" or "Manual" but find the 'Aperture" works best for most of my shooting.

DaveO Loc: Northeast CT

Please let us know how you make out eliminating motion blur for things like sporting events or BIF by using aperture mode. I heard that there were many combos and I am always willing to learn.

You do realize that I was responding to this post, right?

smilenangler wrote:
Thanks grandpaw, I like your shots, and narrowing down the settings is good for me. I shoot a
D7100 in aperture and have been trying to figure out how to get more speed to stop motion.
recently got nikons 200-500. It's all for fun, have a great day.

grandpaw

Most of my shooting is done during the day and by setting the ISO at 500 with the F-stop of 8 or 9 this gives me the shutter speed I need to stop any motion that my subjects have. I have taken horse shows with riding and jumping. birds in flight a lot, and baseball games and many other things during the day without any problems and it worked well. If I take football or lacrosse pictures at night then obviously these settings will have to change but as I said these work for the vast majority of what I shoot which is wildlife during the day. I plainly said these work for what I shoot and may or may not work for you.

My very first sentence said "I am going to share the settings I use for most of my wildlife photos." Another sentence said These settings are NOT a one size fits all group of settings but do work well for me." Wildlife is my main interest and is why I posted what I did.

Depending on the event I would up the ISO and use a larger F-stop to gain a faster shutter speed to stop the action. Also panning would be very helpful.

DaveO Loc: Northeast CT

My D7100, D500 and D850, 70-200 2.8 ,200-500 and 150-600 G2 are obviously not on par with yours. Maybe my birds and sporting events are faster and the light isn't as good. I'd love to know what ISO values average.

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

wilsondl2 Loc: Lincoln, Nebraska

Just a thought - If you want the highest shutter speed possible at a set ISO use aperture priority with lens wide open. This will give the highest possible shutter speed possible. - Dave

DaveO Loc: Northeast CT

I do several thousand BIF shots a year along with kids sporting events, so I would agree. Increasing the ISO , EC, etc...that's why I was curious about ISO, particularly with so much shooting at F8 plus.

DaveO Loc: Northeast CT

By the way, my post regarding S mode, etc, was directed to someone other than the OP and the OP seemed to take offense that I was directing it at him. That's why I included the quote I was responding to..

smilenangler wrote:
Thanks grandpaw, I like your shots, and narrowing down the settings is good for me. I shoot a
D7100 in aperture and have been trying to figure out how to get more speed to stop motion.
recently got nikons 200-500. It's all for fun, have a great day.

grandpaw

I apologize, I miss read it. Grandpaw