john nesselrode
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Depending on the budget, carbon would be extremely nice. But, man, they’re expensive.
I’ve got a Manfrotto 3221WN and 488RC2. It’s a sturdy setup, and would handle your big lens fine, but it’s a bit heavy to carry far.
Quick-release & plates are a very nice way to go. Essential, I’d say, now that I’ve used them for eyars.
The peel and scrape already mentioned can be easier if you warm the rod with a blow dryer. Any residue left can be removed with fingernail polish remover.
I’d second the Pentax WP. They’re billed as shock-proof too, and since the zoom is internal (doesn’t extend out) the chances of breaking that are less. ~ $250
Ness, no worries.
Lots of good imformation can come from threads that end up branch off. I dont worry about sidebars. Im pretty sure my next PC will be a Mac, worst case scenario if works still prickly about it, I keep the current one as well instead of passing it to one of the kids.J
I jokingly told our IT guy I wanted to switch to a Mac here at work, and surprisingly he said he wouldn’t mind having a few around. Of course, that was idle chit chat – we’ll see when the time comes.
Ness –
I think we see simultaneous releases a la the D300 and D3. Just my gut. 🙂
ZachMy gut says that too. I weight the chances of a D80 replacement higher than a new top end model. FWIW
I’m not shooting for publication, etc. Just doing all this for fun, so my bar may be lower. But, the epiphany for me came with adoption of Lightroom.
Before, I vacillated back and forth between RAW and jpeg because my work never flowed well for me using Photoshop Elements and ACR, or the other converters I tried.
With LR now the files are all RAW – I haven’t even thought of using jpeg in months. The files come into LR nicely and I do 95% of the adjustments there. I don’t do in-camera jpeg, nor do I create a jpeg in LR unless I plan on outputting is somewhere – like a printer or Smugmug or Blurb.
Don’t know that that helps, but for me life got significantly better with LR.
we both expect the body to retail between $2500 and $3000. Not exactly answering my prayers – I want a D300 class camera with a full frame sensor. 🙂 Meaning $1500 ish.
Zach
This is the most credible leak I’ve ever seen. But, I haven’t seen anything but pure speculation on price.
It wouldn’t be out of character for Nikon to deliver a feature set at a retail price below what your tummy says it should be. And they never seem to simply match the competition, but sort of pick a gap and exploit it very well.
Nikon is surely ready for a full-frame option for their advanced amateur/not-quite-pro segment, and it seems to me those guys need a price under your range. My wild guess would be $2,200 and a post-hysteria price of $1,900?
My other wild guess would be that the conventional wisdom of an imminent high-megapixel D3x is wrong. Emphasis on imminent.
John,
This doesn’t get to your immediate problem and is a bit off-topic, but a few months ago I was in the market to buy a new desktop. Vista was on all the floor models and there were a couple Macs out too.
The first draw to the Mac was the exquisite monitor. I played with it and quickly found my way around. You may know that all the new Macs have Intel processors and the ability to run Windows. I heard from a friend that Adobe would give me a Mac version of Lightroom fer free, and the computer salesman told me I had 30-days to return the Mac, no questions asked. So I took the plunge.
I sure wouldn’t turn back. Like they say, ‘it just works’.
I’m happy to report I deleted the Windows partition and have been totally clean for two months now.
I always take a little comfort that I’ve got some protection for my front element when I have on a lens hood. With the soft ones, you give that up.
It gripes me to pay $35 for a name brand lens hood, but that’s what I’ve chosen to do. I’ve got Nikon equipment, and they fit around the outside of the lens barrel rather than screw in, so I don’t have to worry (as much) about vignetting, especially when I’ve got on a filter.
One thing to keep in mind – something my daughter learned the hard way – is that waterproof cameras do not float.
Another thing to keep in mind – something I learned the hard way – is if you want a waterproof camera and your daughter wants a digital camera, don’t try to kill two birds with one stone.
Thanks Zach, that adds some perspective to the MP -> magazine photo questions I had.
It’s interesting, I found myself sitting next to a guy a few weeks ago who said he was a professional photographer for print catalogs here:http://www.peruvianconnection.com/ . He said he used a D200. I would have guessed a medium format film camera or digital back, or at least a ‘pro’ camera for that kind of work, before that conversation. So, my comments were in part based on that conversation – not a real understanding of the science.
It will be interesting to see if Nikon follows up with a big-MP ‘FX’ offering in 2008. I’d bet money they do.
I, for one, find the two new releases pretty exciting.
I think that 12MP are quite sufficient for most work, and don’t share the sentiment that this is somehow a dissapointment. Of course, Zach would know better than me what’s needed for magazine-type stuff, but I’ve got a feeling 12 is puh-lenty. 13×19 is easily possible with good glass and ‘only’ 10MP on my D200. Besides, the big emphasis for the D3 (and D300) is clearly speed and ISO performance. We’ll see how good the new sensors are in coming weeks, but I don’t feel like I’m stretching too much when I say the 12 delivered from the 24×36 sensor will likely be excellent, with significantly improved noise and dynamic range. And, I’d bet they’ve got it better on the DX-sized sensor in the D300 too. Stretching up to 6400 ISO will surely get some shots that would otherwise be missed, and who cares about noise way up there anyway?
The other specs, like the new AF module, live view, better LCD, better viewfinder, HD output are really interesting to me, but more just a technological progression.
That said, what remains is: will they come next with the large MP version in 2008 as most of the rumors say? Seems to make sense to me. Don’t know if we’re merging the high-MP and high-speed product lines or not, but I wouldn’t be totally shocked to see a D3x with a 20-ish MP sensor and no other significant changes.
Here’s a good article I was just reading the other day:
Hey Matt,
I’m curious – with your cataloging software do/can you give multiple ‘tags’ to a file so you can find it multiple ways?
My workflow needs improvement. Currently use Elements with ACR. Most always shoot RAW and divide the files into various bins depending on the conversion adjustments I expect to need. Then batch convert to JPEGs and then do further editing, reverting to the RAW original when more extensive editing is needed.
I too use a date-based folder system, but I’m planning to scrap that for a categorized folder scheme. I spend a lot of time searching, and date only gets me close a lot of the time. Sometimes it takes way too long to find things if I don’t have a mental time stamp for the picture. I find the organization features of Elements clumsy to use, and I don’t know that I’ll stay with that program long-term, so I haven’t made the large time investment to do it in there, though I like the idea of multiple ‘tags’ for photos. I envision only a few first-tier folders with layers of sub-folders.
I don’t rename files.
I back up all photos to an external HD that is stored offsite. Just can’t cozy up to the idea of DVDs, and another organization issue. I’m considering an additional external HD for another layer of protection. THey’re pretty cheap, compact and reliable.
Just bought a Pentax Optio W30, so I don’t have a lot of time with it, but here’s what I know: Quite small and easily fits in a shirt pocket; large, bright LCD; non-extending lens should be pretty durable; menus are intuitive and easy to read; has exp. comp, spot metering, etc; 7 MP allows for some cropping; price not too bad; nice to have a digicam I don;t have to worry about getting wet.
I almost always use them for both protection and lens flare.
But…a couple weekends ago I was trying to get some pics of the redbuds. I was struggling to find a good shot, and was trying a bunch of different stuff including filters. I took off the lens hood to make changing the filters easier. I finally found a spot I liked and took a shot. I was pretty close to 90 degrees to the sun, so I left the hood off. When I got home, I noticed a pretty nasty flare on one side of the shot that basically ruined the best one of the day.
Seafood,
Believe me when I tell you this: the camera is only a small part of the photograph. Where, when and what you shoot, how you compose it, and what you do with it after the fact, are way more important than brand name or how much you paid.
You’ve got a fine tool there. Your job now is to learn how to get the most out of it. It’s not perfect (none of them are; I don’t have anything specific) but basically all the DSLRs (and most point-and-shoots) will produce excellent results if you know what you’re doing. I try to never blame the camera when I screw up a shot, and I try to never give it credit for the good ones.
Have fun, and learn all you can.
John
I think it’s unlikely that Nikon will go with a 1.1x format. Their approach to date has been to standardize with the 1.5x DX format.
I think there’s room for a FF in Nikon’s lineup, but I don’t think DX is dead. The technology will contiunue to improve, the cost of FF will drop, and the image quality that can be had from a DX sized sensor will get better – and not necessarily due to more pixels. (Think noise, dynamic range, high and low ISO).
While it’s fun to speculate, and there’s certainly no shortage of it on the internet, we really won’t know until we know. If Nikon is true to form, whatever’s next will be killer, and fit nicely in between their main competitor’s offerings.
