The Search for the Perfect Tripod Head - Tripods are very personal things and what suits one person may not suit another. With that in mind though there are some general considerations that apply to all photographers, whether beginner or advanced. In this article I talk through how I believe I have finally created the perfect combination of tripod legs and head that allows me to get the majority of images I take.

Firmware 4.0 for the Nikon Z9 was released on 13th June 2023 and brought a new Auto Capture menu that effectively allows the camera to start taking photographs once a preset series of conditions have been met - it effectively turns the camera into one of the most expensive and most advanced trail cameras available.

For this post I thought I’d combine old and new to see how well old technology works when combined with a modern high megapixel camera like the Nikon Z7ii. The Nikon PB-6 bellows unit was released in 1983, 37 years before the introduction of the Z7ii, so I thought it would be interesting to see how the two can be used together.

Adobe has released an update to Lightroom Classic and Adobe Camera Raw that introduces a new AI based noise reduction system. In this article I have performed a quick test of the new Lightroom Denoise and compared it with the previous manual noise reduction, alongside Topaz Photo AI and DXO PureRaw 3/ PhotoLab 6.

The Nikon Z9 DK-33 eyepiece is a flat rubber disc that doesn’t extend back from the camera to enable a comfortable shooting position. This hack shows how to replace the eyepiece with the DK-19 eyecup from previous DSLRs.

With the Z9, Nikon released a camera that combined the best of the Z7ii and D850, with the best of the D5/D6, creating a state of the art flagship mirrorless camera.

I made the decision to trade in the D850 and D5 for the Z7 II and trade in most of my F-mount lenses to switch to the new Z-mount system. Did I make the right choice?