Dave Benham

Nikon D700, 24-70 AF-S @ 70mm, 1/640th at f/7.1, ISO 200

The New Forest confuses some people in that it’s not just trees. There are lots of wide open spaces to enjoy, often shared with the odd New Forest pony or twelve. A walk on Sunday took us into the forest near our home and presented an ideal opportunity for practising panning.

By panning I don’t mean criticising; there’s enough of that going on at the moment elsewhere. I was having fun with my parent’s dog, chocolate labrador Molly, and a bundle of hair apparently concealing another canine. As they approached I switched the D700 into continuous focus mode, and multiple frame advance in shutter priority mode, selecting 1/640th second. By continuing to track the dogs as they ran past I was able to get four or five sharp shots. This was my favourite, mostly because the mop is in full flight and there are little catchlights in both dogs’ eyes.

A little different from the Red Kites and cricket recently, but another technique that’s good to practice on. Watching a little of the Formula 1 racing this weekend has tweaked my interest in a little motorsport, where panning is really critical. Watch this space!

Nikon D700, 70-200 VR with 1.7 Teleconverter at 340mm, 1600th @ f/4.8, ISO 450

Nikon D700, 70-200 VR with 1.7 Teleconverter at 340mm, 1600th @ f/4.8, ISO 800

Summer’s arriving – which in the sleepy village of Sway in the New Forest means that the sound of willow on leather can again be heard on the village green. Well, the sound of willow wafting at leather anyway.

The second XI were at home to Beaulieu on Sunday, so off I went complete with D700, 70-200mm f/2.8 and teleconvertor, and a monopod to keep me stable. For the second time in as many weeks I was left feeling a little inadequate – filling the frame from the edge of the boundary was proving difficult. This time I was shooting in shutter priority mode, and varied between 1/500th and 1/1600th of a second.  I wanted to make sure the ball was a little blurred to give the impression of motion while the batsmen were frozen in their pose.

Sadly I had to go before Sway’s bowlers began their onslaught, but I’m pleased to say the end result was a well earned 154 run victory. The shots above show top scorers Rick How and Nilantha Atapattu on their way to 74 not out and 52 respectively.

Nikon D700, 17-35 AF-S at 24mm, 6 seconds @ f/22

A quick postscript on the Red Kite trip – arriving at Welshpool late Friday and keen to make the most of the weekend Andy Keen took me to Lake Vyrnwy, about half an hours’ drive from the station. The sun and the heat of a five-hour train journey rapidly turned into drizzle, but as the last elements of light started to disappear we weren’t to be dissuaded. Even a close encounter with the slope didn’t put us off as we clambered with our tripods.

I didn’t get many shots that were usable and spent more time wiping the rain off the lens than anything else. This final shot had potential, and with a little tweak in Lightroom on the saturation and a vignette effect I’m pretty pleased with the result.

Nikon D700, 70-200 VR with 1.7 Teleconverter at 290mm, 3200th @ f/5.6, ISO 500

Thanks to everyone for their kind comments about the Red Kite shots from a couple of weeks ago, as promised I thought I’d better post a bit more on the technique and equipment behind the scenes.

You might think that we used shutter priority to select a fast shutter speed, but I was worried that with contrasting low light in the background the camera would select too large an aperture, and the bulk of the bird may be thrown out of focus. So I used aperture priority, adjusting the aperture between f/5.6 and f/8, and using the ISO speed to get a quick enough shutter speed to make the Red Kites sharp. For much of the day I was able to use ISO 320 to get a shutter speed over 100oth of a second, but at times I went as high as ISO 800. Fortunately the D700 makes such choices academic.

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Nikon D700, AF-S 24-70 @70mm, 1/125 @ f/5.6

It’s been a busy week in the Forest after the relaxing Bank Holiday weekend. The long weekend turned into lots of preparation at work and expectant kids at home. Poor old Harry does get a camera pointed at him more than most kids, and I loved his expression above. Has he turned into a teenager over 10 years early?

Nikon D700, AF-S 70-200 VR with 1.7 teleconvertor @340mm, 1/160 @ f/6.3

Our garden is attacting all sorts of visitors at the moment (and I’m not just talking about the in-laws). I was really impressed with this shot, not only because of the detail, the pleasing bokeh in the background and colours – and also as it was shot handheld at 340mm using a slow shutter speed. Yes I was supporting the lens properly, but I have Nikon’s amazing VR technology to thank for this one.

I’m writing a more detailed account of the Red Kite shoot from last week, and I’ll include some of my landscape and waterfall shots from the weekend as well. The Kites were featured on Springwatch on Monday, if you missed it check out the episode on BBC’s Iplayer.