What's new
DPR Forum

Welcome to the Friendly Aisles!
DPRF is a spin-off of dpreview. We are a photography forum with people from all over the world freely sharing their knowledge and love of photography. Everybody is welcome, from beginners to the experienced professional. From smartphone to Medium Format.

DPRF is a community for everybody, every brand and every sensor format. Digital and film.
Enjoy this modern, easy to use software. Look also at our Reviews & Gallery!

Just released Nikon D2X

Thanks Paul for your intent to push me off the cliff of decisions. You may probably agree that the decision here to be made is not a 2 dollar issue and therefore all options must be considered. I have made my mistake twice, first was with d100 then the d2h all paid for at premium prices, so I will not be the first person to go for any new product, Canon, Nikon or Fuji or any other brand.

It is not only being foolish to learn from ones own mistake and not those of others, but I will be offending our forbearers' wisdom about learning from others experiences. Had I listened to Larry regarding the D2h I would have saved myself the agony of loosing over $1000 USD at a blink of an eye.

If I were earning a living out of photography, I will not stop to apply the best tool for the job, and by that I mean, I will not be brand lead but function lead. I will be more critical than I am now about the choice of equipment. All I try to do now is to build a collection of photographs on different themes, test them out with stock libraries, then when I'm done I'll publish them in a book and sell them to any willing buyer.

Everyone to his own, if the Kodak or Fuji serves your purpose so be it, but I will not no longer subscribe to the hype anymore.
 
Sorry Inocent... you don't convince me..... Here you go with more talk! Many professionals have produced great pictures using the D100 and D2H. As I have said in the past, I own a D70 and a D2H. Both of them have paid for themselves, for the work I do with them. They are mere tools that are very capable. They both have strengths and weaknesses.

I am not going to judge your skills, as I have only seen a mere handfull of pictures you have taken. I do however feel that it sounds more like you are paralyzed, and unless you have everything in hand and a guarantee that it is the best, you are not prepared to dive into it. That works in a perfect world, but this one is not. Every camera has its strengths and weaknesses, and you just work with the strengths, and around the weaknesses.

You should be able to accomplish most of your goals with any one of the cameras you have discussed over the past few months. None of these cameras will help you take better photographs. They may produce larger or smaller files.... autofocus faster.... let you take more pictures per second.... etc. etc., but they will not help you take better photographs.

Just think of all the shots you have missed in these past few months while you have been stalling.

You may not subscribe to the hype anymore, but you now have gone to the other extreme. Next month there will be a better camera than what is available tody, how many months are you willing to wait and not take digital pictures?

Paul

This time I am trying to push you off the cliff of indecision.
 
Hi guys

Just my opinion. I'm waiting for the d2x and though i've been waiting for 6 months for this (on the paper) perfect tool, I've haven't let my D70 sleep in the closet. (In fact I have taken more then 18000 pictures with it, without any problems at all). The D70 is a very capable camera, and in one week i'm setting up an exhibition with pictures only from this camera. My display-pictures are 30x45cm standard prints from an internet-print-shop, and though i've been shooting with contax/carl Zeiss on fujichrome slide in 15 years, the results have never been as clear and sharp as with the D70.

This of course might be because of the printing from my slides, but through the years I've had more than 100 prints made in the same size from slides, and none have had the same look.

Nikon might be out late compared to Canon, but I love my 12-24 and the 10,5 fisheye, and had I been choosing Canon, I would have had a mere 16-35 (like 26-55 in 35mm film SLR) as my widest lens.

So, give me the d2x, it will double the print quality on my display pictures and give me the most perfect tool for my photographic buisness.
The D70 is going to be my no. 2 camera, as backup, and the cost of it has been paid many times from digital work.

Innocent, maybe you should give your self a rest from buying new, until you have satisfying result with your present gear. New gear dont give you better picture, but worse, as you are more focused on functionality then creativity.


Just another month to wait.

Regards

Ole Bo Jensen
www.photos4u.dk
(lot of D70 pictures on my website)
 
Hi Paul, I am highly impressed with the shots on your website. If all that was made with the D70 then that supports the reviews I've read so far about that camera's capability in resolving colours and contrast and the more reason why I am in favour of it over the Finepix S3 pro.

It is unfair to say that I am only function minded which I'm not. I also favour creativity but with caution where money is involved. At least I am beginning to be reasonable with my money or lack of it.

I understand that no one single tool can perform all the tasks, but as far as slr photography goes the F5 does handle most if not all scenarios comfortably well. It is the F5 class of performance I expect of a digi slr in terms of response, handling, functions, adaptability and overall reliability among others which currently seem to be lacking in the Nikon digital line-up.

Like many Nikonians, I too is hesitant on moving to Canon for many reasons some of which you have highlighted and above all I simply can't afford any such move now. Having said that, from what I've learnt so far, I will prefer the Canon 20d + 24-70 L f/2.8 which cost approximately the same as the s3 pro body only. But because I agree with you that I should exploit what I've got so far to its optimum, I am strongly considering the d70 as a backup and as an alternative to the 'Polaroid back' for testing out my exposures during a multiple strobe setup along with my flash meter. For the prize that the d70 is currently being sold it will not break the bank and if it does deliver the goods as most gurus like yourself have said then the better still. So decision is made d70 period. If any extra cash is available I will consider other products at the due time.

Now on the practical side, how do you deal with the noise generated by the d70. I've tried noise ninja with some d70 s&les, but it does soften the image to some extent even when the property is adjusted. I am not quite sure whether such extent is tolerable in the industry. Secondly interpolation up to A3 size with a 6mp camera must be an art. I would have thought that 5x7 to A4 will be the utmost size. BTW I use GF Print Pro and I found that anything above A4 lacks sharpness.
 
Sorry, I must have been thinking about Paul in my last post, but I am actually addressing My Jenson and any other interested party. My apologies.
 
Hi Innocent

Apologie taken, and thanks for your feedback on my pictures.

I've only been disapointed over noise once, when I covered a wedding, handheld without a flash, inside the church. I had the camera set on 1600 iso, and that would be acceptable inside the church. But unfortunately I forgot to alter the ISO-setting afterwards and took all the portraits in the scenic park on 1600 iso. I was very sorry, but my saviour was the Neat Image software, and the pictures were soft like butter after some modifications in Neat.

I know the printable size from a 6MP is about A4, but it all depends on viewing distance. At 1 meter of distance the picture is a perfect photographic print, in 20cm of course, it lacks sharpness, try to go realy close to your TV, but you enjoy it anyway.

I hope your decision will bring you many pleasent hours of shooting, and that you'll let os peek once in a while.

Regards

Ole
 
Hi guys,

I guess you can say I'm a very passive participant to Nikon forum. I consider myself an advance amateur, have sold a fews items in the past and done some freelance work, but would not consider myself a professional. But I do like professinal looking images and would like do more professional type work in the future. I read reviews, read the forum, re-read the reviews, but I have not pulled the trigger on a digital camera because I was waiting for the quality to be as good as film.

At one time I was waiting to buy the D100, then I heard about the D70. I waited to read reviews, then before I knew it, I heard about the Fuji S3 and the DX2. Unfornately, the DX2 is out of price range, so I started comparing the differences between the S3 and D70.

Then, I read someone's comment about about being "pushed over the edge" to make a decision. I guess I recognized myself in that comment. I will buy my D70 today! I missed some great winter shots this weekend with the Midwest covered in snow. Maybe not missed...I still shoot with my N80, but I missed the experience with my new digital camera.

Thanks for the push. :)

Jeff
 
Hi Jeffery and all,
How are you doing with your d70. The price has just gone down by $200. Sometimes patience pays big time.

I'd been trying to find the post where comparison was made between digital and film but could'nt find it. However, I am just wondering why in all my digital shots the sky is so poorly resolved. I looked at the NikonPro s&les for the d2x same bland sky, no clouds at all in all the shots, compared it with the s&les from canon 1ds different picture. Is something going wrong here?

I should immediately acknowlege that I'm no expert in photography but the results I get from my film slr, even with some images I shot using consumer negatives and F80 are far more better than all the digitals Nikon had ever contemplated to produce. Therefore it seems Just for some of us to stay with the old tradition of films. By the way, it seems to me that most pros are still shooting medium format because the price on the shelf is still as high as it always was. Hardly can you find any used decent medium format kit at any pro shop, and if you do the price will tell you to buy a Canon 1Ds instead. So what is actually going on? are the pros telling us one thing but doing the other?
 
> > > By the way, it > seems to me that most pros are still shooting medium format because > the price on the shelf is still as high as it always was. Hardly can > you find any used decent medium format kit at any pro shop, and if you > do the price will tell you to buy a Canon 1Ds instead. So what is > actually going on? are the pros telling us one thing but doing the > other? > Innocent, I think we all are making the mistake of using the term "photography" as if all the uses of these tools are the same, and obviously that's not the case. Your post talks about the sky being bland - certainly this could be a result of your exposure (do you treat digital like chrome and not negative?) or simply the latitude, or dynamic range, of digital compared to film. I would guess that a lot of experimentation is needed on your part here, to figure out if you can correct the former (exposure errors) or if indeed it's a technical limitation of CCDs for those kinds of shots.

Meanwhile, remember that the "pros" of whom you speak do a wide array of different things - photojournalists and sports shooters probably need the quicker throughput of digital, but perhaps not all other categories of pro shooter are in such a rush (some, surely, but not all). Besides, it could be a mistake to regard retail prices of medium range gear as a barometer of their popularity or professional usage. First, no doubt a lot of amateurs with more time and love of the art than need for speed still buy MF and large format gear. Second, while market theory states that the seller can only charge the price the market will bear, this doesn't mean that MF camera makers all follow that logic. For all you know, when you see that Hassy or Mamiya selling for as much as ever it may mean that they just don't sell too many.

In a sense, cameras are like watches - nobody would argue that a $10,000 mechanical Rolex tells more accurate time than a $10 Swatch, the latter being digital. So in the sense that a watch is a tool to tell time, Rolexes make no sense any longer. But of course Rolexes and their ilk are not about telling time; they are about showing off or appreciating fine workmanship or whatever their owners feel. Likewise with film versus digital cameras - for the non-pro and some pros there are things about film that are older, to be sure, but still nicer on other grounds. The point is, it isn't always a rational decision when one buys a 6x6 camera today, at least in the sense that they are looking to take the "best" pictures.

So, no, the pros aren't trying to fool us. Those that need to, get digital. Those that don't, don't. They still take fabulous shots, still get paid for their work, still know the intricacies of lighting and composition etc., and those things don't change with technology.

BobF
 
Bob:

Please clarify this.

<The point is, it isn't always a rational decision when one buys a 6x6 camera today, at least in the sense that they are looking to take the "best" pictures.>

Thanks

Gilbert
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top