As I've been using Nikon Coolpix cameras for over 10 years I like to get the latest one and hope that it will solve all the problems of the others. I didn't expect too much of the new P7000 for digiscoping due to it's 28 - 200 mm lens. Anyway I wanted a replacement for my Canon G10 which I lost some months ago.
As I expected the lens causes big vignetting problems with most lenses and can only be used with a universal adapter with the lens wide open at 28 mm. There is a little vignetting here but it can be cropped out easily if the bird is in the center of the frame. With a long eye relief eyepiece though, like the Kowa 27x or 25x LER eyepieces you can get unvignetted views from about 30 - 80% zoom. This is a good range for Mai Po.
There have been some issues reported with this camera ( auto focus unreliable and Raw processing slow ) but these should have been fixed in the new Firmware 1.1 .
I have found the quality good, possible better than my G10, and I like the Continuous Raw and the iso handling of noise ( iso 800 is noise free and 1600 is acceptable ).
Here are some images taken with it.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/7892550@N03/sets/72157625019959005/
Neil
ps the files are too big to be shown here
Nikon P7000 plus Swarovski STS80HD scope and Sw30x eyepiece and UCA adapter ( modified for 30x )
Lamma Island,
Hong Kong,
China.
Dec 2010
