N-Photo: the Nikon magazine April 2022

James Paterson PAGE 6, 54 & 56 Our resident photo-editing whiz James shows our apprentice how to take stunning creative portrait images in the studio. Ross Hoddinott PAGE 26 Ross has come up with no less than 50 brilliant tips to help you take your best-ever lanscape and wildlife shots this spring. Jon Adams PAGE 52 Creating monochrome masterpieces is easy with Jon’s custom-built presets, free to download with this issue. George Karbus PAGE 64 Freediving marine photographer George speaks about his amazing career capturing the denizens of the deep. Richard Barrett PAGE 72 Well-travelled wildlife pro Richard tells of his adventures photographing iconic species from all around the globe. James Artaius PAGE 100 Our verdict on the Nikon Z 9 mirrorless is in! Pro camera expert James puts the flagship mirrorless through its paces……

After the long grey winter months, blossoms are beginning to bloom, insects are buzzing once more and newborn animals are making their first tentative steps. Spring is most definitely springing! And to celebrate the season of rebirth, nature pro Ross Hoddinott brings you 50 hand-picked tips to reinvigorate your photography and encourage you into the great outdoors with your Nikon. But if you’d prefer to hibernate just a little longer, famliar N-Photo face James Paterson dons his instructor hat and shows our apprentice how to take cool creative portraits from the comfort of the studio. In our interview, we dive deep into the imagery of marine photographer George Karbus, who tells us that being raised in the landlocked Czech Republic was no barrier to his underwater ambition. In our Gear section, we review…

James asked Nigel to arrive at the studio an hour before the models so they’d have plenty of time to prepare. “The relatively short amount of time we have with the models is going to be the biggest challenge today,” said the pro as they finished assembling two flash heads and a Speedlight. “But time management is an important lesson when it comes to studio work, and I’m guessing it’s something you’re already quite used to Nigel?” The apprentice nodded: “Aviation photography requires you to maximize small windows of opportunity – it’s setting up the lighting that’s the daunting bit…” James smiled: “We’ll start with a more conventional setup and once you’re comfortable we’ll progress onto using some of the more creative light sources that I have here.” When Jabez and Diana arrived…

TWEAK THE SETTINGS James says… Nigel didn’t have to change his camera settings much at all, once he was happy with each lighting setup. He used Manual mode and Matrix metering throughout, and generally started with the same basic settings – 1/125 sec, f/8, ISO100 – before tweaking them accordingly. CLEAR VIEWS James says… Viewing images on the back of the camera is hugely important when creating a new lighting setup. I find it helpful to have an unobstructed view of my pictures, so I recommend turning off the info overlay by checking the ‘None (image only)’ box in the Playback Display Options. FOCUS ON THE EYES James says… I’m very happy with my Nikon D850, but I do find the advanced AF abilities of Z mirrorless cameras rather tempting. I would normally suggest shooting…

James says… When using gels, it’s easy to focus on illuminating your subject and ignoring the saturation of the colours. While you can boost saturation in post, you still want to get it as close as possible in-camera. If you’re not careful, lights can cancel each other out and reduce saturation. An easy fix is to reduce the power of one of the lights. We reduced the power of the red kicker – used to illuminate the side of the face. This ensured the blue key light remained strong and saturated, directing the viewer’s eye towards the subject’s face.…

COMBINE IMAGES James says… Open the portraits in Photoshop. Copy one (Cmd/Ctrl+C) and paste it into the document with the other image (Cmd/Ctrl+V). Use the Move tool to position the pasted image so it fits over the second one neatly. TURN OFF CHANNELS James says… Head to the Layers panel (Window>Layers) and double-click on the top layer to bring up the Blending Options box. There are lots of different blending effects here, including the option to turn colour channels on or off. Toggle off the R box to turn off the red channel. TWEAK COLOURS James says… Double-click the bottom layer and turn off the G and B channels, so it’s just red, turn off the R channel on the other layer so it’s just green and blue. Merge both layers and open the Camera…