What is a Great Bird Photography Rig?

Perfect timing Moose and a super video 👍 just had my 500PF delivered from our friends at Gray’s of Westminster and couldn’t be happier 😀😀

Thanks for the video, Moose. I've been using the Z6ii with this 500 pf lens for birding for a few months now. It's such a light combination when you're out hiking around. At first, it was frustrating to get used to the autofocus, but once I dialed it in, my keeper rate has been good enough to put the D500 back into its case. I haven't used it with the 1.4 as yet, thinking it might be too slow to autofocus, but I'll take your word for it and try it out today! Keep the videos coming!

Thank you so much Moose. I ordered my 500PF for use with my D850 for birding. I can’t wait for it to get here. We met years ago during a talk you gave at the Poppy preserve in so cal.. ever since I’ve always gone to your channels when researching since your work is the proof of your mastery of photography". So many arm chair you tube content creators out there. But you are the real “Boss”

Using the Z6ll with the 200-400 f/4 + 1.4tc + FTZ. Also use the same on the D500 for up to 840mm reach.

Thanks Moose. This is terrific information. I love the suggestion of the F mount 1.4 teleconverter model III attached to the 500 PF lens. That's quite a set-up for bird and wildlife photography. I did not know there are extension tubes for the Z mount. That's very interesting information I'll have to look into. Once more, thanks for all your reviews and advice. 👍📷👀😎

Fabulous with the D500 too!

I’m not sure I can afford to watch you anymore Moose… I have the Z 6ii but haven’t gone birding yet. Next season here in south Florida I’ll give it a go. Hoping for the 100-400 by then but if not this is certainly an option!

Thank you Moose for this video I have the Z6ii and 500pf, love the rendition of this lens! Tried extension tubes on some sparrows, I found it hard to gain initial focus with the tubes on. Any tips would be much appreciated!

I use the 500 PF on the Nikon D6 body. 3D-autofocus works well for birds-in-flight. Have not tried to add the 1.4 or 1.7 teleconverter. Am happy with the outcome as is. Also fine on the Z7... waiting for the Z9. Cheers from Aus.

Just ordered mine! My Z6ii is ready to meet its new friend (:

I so wish canon would offer this lens!! I have a shooting buddy who uses this lens and I’m always telling him how I wish canon would produce a 500mm f/5.6. Love your work Moose, thank you for sharing your knowledge!!!!!

I fricken love the 500mm pf!!!

Love my Olympus EM1X with the 300mm F4 and 40-150 F2.8. The bird tracking feature is pretty sweet when shooting the Eagles around here. Plus it is a small light kit.

Moose, that's a really great kit scenario for birders. I offer an alternative one, for the incidental birders. Z 7ii + Z 70-200mm f/2.8 VR S + Z Teleconverter TC-2x. The "7" does away with the fuzzy filter (AKA AA or low-pass) over the sensor and the Z/S zooms are at prime quality level. The 2x TC fives you 400/5.6 and cropping to DX cuts that to the effect of 600. And it avoids all the adapters with its very close closest focusing distance. If you never tried this, then Nikon USA should let you play with this configuration for a month or so. Use Nikon NX Studio (free) to raw process, or in Lightroom (LR) make sure to adapt the "detail" sliders (or the selected raw processing profile), or else the "7" files could get you 'color noise' (pixel-level seemingly chaotic Moiré) from its raw processing (*). If it's about the burden of weight, then note that the "6" and "7" are the same weight and the zoom is lighter than the relatively very light 500PF. If you never shot raw files at "7" resolution, note that their file size is much bigger than the 6's and LR's preview processing relates to your horizontal display resolution. With 2 displays of 4K resolution (7,680 pixels) I needed a computer with loads of RAM, video RAM and processing power to be able to run (a) LR and (b) something else next to that (on W10, a 9th gen i7 with 16GB RAM and 4GB video RAM crashed all the time - on my 10th gen i7 workstation with 64GB RAM and 11GB video RAM and a couple full SSD RAID arrays, "the sky is the limit"). If we expect 2x the resolution from 2x the megapixels, then we are fooled, but we do get 2x the load on our processing and file storage. Resolution follows "linear" lines and we need to compare "6" and "7" edge resolution numbers to find out that the "7" has 40% more resolving power potentially at the sensor level. The removal of the fuzzy filter adds a bit of contour sharpness and it makes depth of field a bit shallower, provided our lenses can reveal that. Note that "7" color space and dynamic range are a bit better than the 6's, except high ISO is a bit less. That said, my experience with Nikon 24 mega photosite cameras is that they are very good - with Nikon glass. When we blow images up, missing bits are invented in the software we use between the raw file and the display or the raw file and the printer. How good the blown-up image looks is to large extent a function of the software we use. Some 3rd party app may do that "upsampling" better than what we normally use. DxO have PureRAW now that integrates nicely with LR and Topaz have a couple apps that work very well. These may give better - in your perception - blown-up results than Lr/Ps. Or, in this scenario, my offering the 7 primarily is for the DX resolution it gives you. (*) AA or low pass filters disperse a bit of light traveling to the sensor's photosite [x,y] across its neighbors. This is a simple way to make raw processing (RGB color guessing) easier. Remove that fuzzy filter from the camera and color guessing needs to be done differently in software. The guessing is always mathematically precise and repeatable, but very crude. It can create Moiré - that's what we call it when we recognize it - but it also creates low level "noise" that is not "the fault of the camera". So, from the D800E, Nikon has had cameras without that fuzzy filter and these need a slightly different raw processing algorithm than the others. The idea is that the increased resolution reduces uncertainty about the assignment of hypothesized RGB to [x,y] where the data in the raw file for [x,y] only has one of R, G or B. The raw file only has monochrome data and that's where the 14 bits are - after raw processing the 14 have become 9 (in the best cameras with 9+9+9=27 bits color space). That's marginally better than the 8+8+8=24 of JPEG, but we have decided how to take the 9+9+9 out of the 14+14+14 instead of the in-camera raw processing that generates JPEGs.

Looks an epic lens for birding, given the PF design, weight and length. Still waiting for Nikon to produce the promised Z 200-600mm lens; although I guess that will be bigger & heavier if it's the traditional design. I predict it will be similar to the Sony 200-600mm with an F6.3 max aperture at the tele end and will cost around $2,000.

Great video

I love my 500mm PF I can’t recommend this lens highly enough.

Love the 500pf, but I don't like where the have the focus limiter set. I wish it could be customized.

Im still using my ole D500 and the Nikon 200-500mm

I'm wondering why the Z6 II, over the Z7 II? Isn't there more pixel density in the Z7 II so you could crop more, or is there an advantage on the Z6 II that outweighs it?