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Archive 2012 · Using D800 after D700 or D3s

  
 
nick53097
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p.1 #1 · p.1 #1 · Using D800 after D700 or D3s


I have a question to those of you who moved to D800 after D700 or D3s, what are your thoughts and observations? Is that a better outcome, more possibilities or something else that you like/dislike about new camera.

I've been shooting weddings with two D700 and it was great, now I get one D3s and just love that camera and have to decide about my second body - keep D700 (which make my workflow really simple), or use D800 (I have it now and begin to like that camera more and more)

Please post your comments



Jun 15, 2012 at 10:14 AM
M. Magallon
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p.1 #2 · p.1 #2 · Using D800 after D700 or D3s


Shoot with a D800e and D3s and am very happy with the combo.

Throughout the course of a wedding shoot, I'll use D3s about 80% of the time, but it's nice to have the D800e for shots that could use more resolution, like wide angle ceremony, macro of details like rings, and large group portraiture.

Of course, 37 MP was never something I HAD to have for those things, but it's nice nonetheless. What I found, however, is that you're technique has to be sound and your shutter speed to be higher than a D3s in order to achieve sharp images at pixel peeping levels, because it's much, much less forgiving in regards to image blur.

Workflow wise, I find the tonality, color, and dynamic range very, very similar to the D3s, which makes my workflow easier because I don't have to make additional adjustments. The only times I find it to differ is ISO 1600 and above. I actually found a greater difference in those three areas when comparing the D3 to the D3s, which I thought was suprising.



Jun 15, 2012 at 01:08 PM
nick53097
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p.1 #3 · p.1 #3 · Using D800 after D700 or D3s


Thank your for your respond, I am thinking about adjusting my process in similar way (D700 has to go )


Jun 15, 2012 at 01:50 PM
danvprod
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p.1 #4 · p.1 #4 · Using D800 after D700 or D3s


This is what I am in the process of doing. I had been shooting with 2x d700 bodies, and just got a d800. I'm not sure if I can going to move to 2 d800 bodies or keep get a d3s. Who knows. We will see how much I like the d800.


Jun 15, 2012 at 03:46 PM
IzzyG
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p.1 #5 · p.1 #5 · Using D800 after D700 or D3s


Not too many responses so I'll bite. Used a D700 for about 2 weeks. I believe IQ is very similar in the conditions I shoot. The only plus I've had with the D800 is the extra reach the D800 gives me cause I can crop while still having a high resolution. This was very important for a sports event I was at. Longest lens I had was a 70-200 vrii and was still able to crop and save images.

Oh actually I did want to note that the ISO100 on the D800 performed amazingly well at the sports event. Was bright as heck, high sun, no clouds and colors were very good. Never tried the D700 in similar situations so can't compare. :P



Jun 15, 2012 at 08:14 PM
southwoodlaker
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p.1 #6 · p.1 #6 · Using D800 after D700 or D3s


Any new thoughts here based on your experience in the past months?


Jan 17, 2013 at 01:11 PM
Mark_L
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p.1 #7 · p.1 #7 · Using D800 after D700 or D3s


Coming from a D700:

Handling is worse, the ‘bulge’ is too small and without the grip my hand almost falls off the bottom

Metering in backlit situations is improved, AF feels the same really

The recoverability of shadow detail is outstanding and the extra DR is very noticeable in use

The detail from a 36MP file is amazing coming from 12MP, I always found 12MP was very limiting crop-wise and for large prints. Definitely need to be careful with shutter speeds and depth of field though (min for 85mm for me is 1/160).

High iso noise looks very different and very much for the better, it looks like fine grain without much detail loss rather than chunky. I shoot it at 6400 with no worries where the D700 I’d not want to go above 3200.

Minor usability tweaks are nice like easy iso, 1/focal length +/- on auto iso, turn on off auto iso without going into menu etc.

In short, this is the camera I wished the D700 was when I had it. Actually shooting with it it feels almost the same.



Jan 17, 2013 at 03:11 PM
jolahern
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p.1 #8 · p.1 #8 · Using D800 after D700 or D3s


Started with D3/D700 combo, moved to just the D3 and then rented D3/D3s. Recently added the D800 to go along side the D3.

Out of the above cameras if I had to use one to shot a wedidng it would be the D3s, IQ is more than enough, robust and has dual card slots, file size not too big to slow things down.

As for the second body, I would use the D700 if I already had one, you can also put the grip on it and use the battery from the D3. If the D3s failed and I had to continue on with th D700 my only worry would be the lack of dual card slots. As the D3s and D700 use CF cards and are the same MP sensor you don't need to fork out on new memory cards.

I have not used a D800 in a wedding yet, but from shooting to date the IQ is amazing, I have thought about selling my D3 and getting another D800, but my concern is the workflow slowing to a crawl due to the size of the D800 files. 36 MP is overkill for the majority of a wedding, but the DR and IQ is so tempting.

The only other concern I would have with a D800 is it is a bit smaller grip wise than a D3/D3s and I have large hands.

As for processing files from different cameras, I use Lightroom and have calibration profiles made for each camera, so that makes the images from each camera very similar on import. It is really the effect of different lenses and lighting that causes problems when making a group of images have a consistent look.

I could wave a magic wand and go back on my Nikon purchases, I would get a D3s and D700, saves a lot of money.

So the cheap option is to keep the D700, but if you want the ultimate in IQ, keep the D800 but in case your D3s fails, make sure you have enough batteries and memory cards for that camera to shot a wedding and hope your computuer and hard drives can cope



Jan 18, 2013 at 08:13 AM
moresnowdays
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p.1 #9 · p.1 #9 · Using D800 after D700 or D3s


Quick question to throw in the mix. I've read a number of the threads here where people have said that 36 MP is overkill for weddings, and some feel that the resulting file size is to much to deal with for weddings.

Does the D800 have the ability to shoot a smaller size RAW file, lower MP? If it does, why not just use that?



Jan 18, 2013 at 02:32 PM
Mark_L
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p.1 #10 · p.1 #10 · Using D800 after D700 or D3s


moresnowdays wrote:
Quick question to throw in the mix. I've read a number of the threads here where people have said that 36 MP is overkill for weddings, and some feel that the resulting file size is to much to deal with for weddings.

Does the D800 have the ability to shoot a smaller size RAW file, lower MP? If it does, why not just use that?


It doesn't for raw, a huge oversight by nikon much like the awful live view implementation.



Jan 18, 2013 at 05:08 PM
jolahern
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p.1 #11 · p.1 #11 · Using D800 after D700 or D3s


It does not have sRAW mode like Canon does but you can use the various crop modes to including one that brings the file size down to 24 mp but retain the FX crop ratio.

moresnowdays wrote:
Quick question to throw in the mix. I've read a number of the threads here where people have said that 36 MP is overkill for weddings, and some feel that the resulting file size is to much to deal with for weddings.

Does the D800 have the ability to shoot a smaller size RAW file, lower MP? If it does, why not just use that?





Jan 18, 2013 at 06:02 PM
D. Diggler
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p.1 #12 · p.1 #12 · Using D800 after D700 or D3s


moresnowdays wrote:
I've read a number of the threads here where people have said that 36 MP is overkill for weddings


I've happily shot weddings at 8 megapixels, never feeling like I needed more. And I've heard many stories of folks saying they shot weddings routinely at 4 megapixels without any issue.



Jan 18, 2013 at 08:04 PM
moresnowdays
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p.1 #13 · p.1 #13 · Using D800 after D700 or D3s


I'm comfused. 24mp crop with FX factor.

Does this mean that a (for example) a 50mm lens is still a 50mm?

If that's true, the. it,s not really a crop, but a lower res/smaller file?



Jan 19, 2013 at 12:01 AM
KibblesNbitz
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p.1 #14 · p.1 #14 · Using D800 after D700 or D3s


No, the crop modes crop the final image. He just meant it maintains the same aspect ratio, but it will reduce the field of view. There's a few crop modes like 1.5x, 5:4, 1.2x, but they all crop the final image.

Basically, no, there is no way to reduce the file size SOOC while shooting in raw while still maintaining an FX image area.



Jan 19, 2013 at 07:14 AM
D. Diggler
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p.1 #15 · p.1 #15 · Using D800 after D700 or D3s


One thing that concerns me a little about the D800 is that its sensor seems to be really only a D7000 sensor, but bigger. The 800 sensor, at the pixel level, seems no different from what's in the 7000. The individual pixels of the two cameras are the same size. And the results at DXO Optics show the two sensors to be about the same when their images are viewed at 100% magnification.

The D600 sensor, with its larger individual pixels, does much better at 100%.



Jan 21, 2013 at 05:13 PM
hendrikm
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p.1 #16 · p.1 #16 · Using D800 after D700 or D3s


The D800 has one quite unknown feature for us wedding photographers: the 1.2crop

You get smaller, 25MP files which help your workflow AND the coverage of the AF areas is much wider, just like shooting a DX body.

To use this feature efficiently there are two important things:
You can program a button to switch the crop modes. You don´t need the 5:4 or DX crop, only FX and 1.2 crop. I shoot 90% in 1.2crop and only if I need the wide angle focal length I switch to FX (using the button)

It is hard to tell, what crop mode you are using, so you are gonna make mistakes. But you can change an individual function (a[something]). If you turn off the af area illumination in the viewfinder, the unused area will be greyed out in the viewfinder. Very sleek!



Jan 22, 2013 at 04:41 AM
Cassario
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p.1 #17 · p.1 #17 · Using D800 after D700 or D3s


Mark_L wrote:
Coming from a D700:

Handling is worse, the ‘bulge’ is too small and without the grip my hand almost falls off the bottom

Metering in backlit situations is improved, AF feels the same really

The recoverability of shadow detail is outstanding and the extra DR is very noticeable in use

The detail from a 36MP file is amazing coming from 12MP, I always found 12MP was very limiting crop-wise and for large prints. Definitely need to be careful with shutter speeds and depth of field though (min for 85mm for me is 1/160).

High iso noise looks very different and very much for the better,
...Show more

I couldn't agree more, I was just about to post almost all the same points, as I've experienced the same. I actually kept my D700 when I bought my D800, making my D700 my backup. After a couple months of shooting with the D800 I honestly didn't like shooting with the D700 anymore and the AF actually was annoyingly slow, which I never thought before buying the D800. A few months ago I sold my D700 and bought a D800E, mainly to use as the back up to the D800 and to use for personal work. I now use the E as my primary because I have yet to have any moire issues, and when pushing it to purposely bring it on, I was able to easily remove it in Lightroom.



Jan 23, 2013 at 08:27 AM
D. Diggler
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p.1 #18 · p.1 #18 · Using D800 after D700 or D3s


Cassario wrote:
I now use the E as my primary because I have yet to have any moire issues, and when pushing it to purposely bring it on, I was able to easily remove it in Lightroom.

How? I've heard it's supposed to be difficult or impossible to remove.



Jan 23, 2013 at 06:55 PM
sozypozy
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p.1 #19 · p.1 #19 · Using D800 after D700 or D3s


D3s is amazing! I think you should use D800 as your second


Jan 24, 2013 at 10:09 AM





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