hashaama wrote:
Thanks everyone for your recommendations, there are valid arguments from both sides and that is what makes this tricky for me. I have decided to pick D700 at airport duty free on Friday when I fly out for my holidays. There is a new 24-85mm AFS available from a retailer for £350, is it worth buying this lens at this price? I will need to order this before mid day tomorrow in order to get it before I leave for hols. Also is 16GB SanDisk Extreme 3 card a good choice?
Thanks
Hash
Edit: the other option is to get 24-120 kit lens and it will end-up costing me about £450, but from what I have heard about this lens it doesn't sound that great....Show more →
Take your primes along. Shoot at hyperfocal. Have great fun!
Oh, and I would suggest 2 smaller CF cards rather than one big one Extreme 3s are a solid choice.
Aug 11, 2009 at 08:12 PM
Andre Labonte Offline • • • • • • Upload & Sell: Off
+1 on the Extreme 3s. Go with two 8GB cards over one 16GB card. Also, you might be able to get a good deal on some Extreme 4s for just a few extra bucks, so that would be the rought I would go ... assuming the price is right.
Congratulations on your choice. Enjoy her, the D700 is a beautiful camera.
I would get the 16gb cards if you can test it thoroughly before using it for anything significant. If you have no time to test, smaller cards may be a better choice. I use 32gb most of the time.
I have the 24-85 and its a stellar lens for its intended range/purpose. However, it does distort and vignette some. The macro feature is also great on that lens.
The "DX has lighter lenses" just isn't so, or rather, it doesn't have to be. Please explain how the 24/28/35mm wide angle primes, a 50mm prime, and 85mm 1.8 is heavy in any way, and how a zoom like the 24-85 is heavy.
Don't take this personally but your lens selection at hand is lacking, seriously. Now i don't have the most expensive lenses or the newest camera(still rocking a D80) and histogram metering with my ai-s"s is a pain but i do it.
If you had a ton of ai-s lenses already, which if you do you didn't list would make some kind of sense.
You are very limited with your kit with what you can do. I have friends that chased new bodies everytime one came out 200-300-700 and never had more than one to two cheap lenses at a time and maybe a tripod. They were always pissed when we'd go out shooting and i'd bring back better shot's with my inferior camera.
Get some lenses, gels, lights, remotes,battery grip, ballheads extension tubes , reversing rings, books on lighting and compostiion etc, etc for the money you could get a D700 for and your photography will benefit 10 fold what it would with a D700 and some consumer zooms imo.
If you really want to you can sell the D80 for almost the same thing as you can scoop up a D200 on ebay for so that will help out some.
And don't worry about dx vs fx, you cant tell in a print the differance between a shot on dx at 35mm and ff at 50 or so, so don't sweat it.
Your mileage may vary but this has been my experience...
Just get a D700 you can't go wrong the high iso and IQ is excellent...If it was going to be your back up camera the yes d300s all the way..But if I could only have one D700..
luminosity wrote:
Huh? My preferences are my own. Please don't presume to tell me what I may and may not prefer or like. I liked my N80 more than my D300 too.
"Actively" disliking a crop factor, and singling out the D300 really crosses the line between offering advice and bashing. That sort of behavior makes these forums much less pleasant and much less informative.
I said that *I* dislike the crop factor. I did not disparage it for everyone else, or presume to say that there's anything wrong with the D300. I just said (again) that I personally dislike it and prefer the D700's normal 35mm perspective.
Seems like you may be introducing some of your own biases into the mix. Maybe you could worry a little more about yourself and a little less about me. The D300 is a great camera, and I say that having owned one for eight months (and a problem-riddled one at that, which didn't reflect on the D300 model itself). Again, I owned one and took about 40,000 shots on it. I speak from experience with it, not abstract ideas and other people's reviews. It is great for sports and fast action and all but the most demanding of photography (i.e. high ISO). I work at a school and an 18x12 print of a shot of mine that I took earlier this year with a rented 70-200 hangs in someone's office. Despite its problems, it helped me learn a lot. I don't have a problem with the D300 itself. It's a great camera.
I have not "singled out" the D300 in any way except to observe that I don't like the crop factor and prefer the D700's perspective, along with stating obvious and basically factual things like the D700's higher ISO ability and also its cleaner ISOs past 640/800 or so.
No one else seems to have a problem with what I've said, so maybe it's just you.
luminosity wrote:
I said that *I* dislike the crop factor. I did not disparage it for everyone else, or presume to say that there's anything wrong with the D300. I just said (again) that I personally dislike it and prefer the D700's normal 35mm perspective.
You wrote that you "actively dislike that crop factor." You also wrote that, "I had a D300, and I'm glad I sold it." Those kind of remarks do not reflect the more balanced and (I think) fair presentation in your last reply.
I have not "singled out" the D300 in any way except to observe that I don't like the crop factor and prefer the D700's perspective,
Perspective is a function of distance the relative positions between objects and the viewer. Again, what you are saying is you would rather shoot with a 300mm lens than a 200mm lens, a 50mm lens than a 35mm lens, etcetera. It would be more accurate to say you like the perspective you get with your lenses on FX more than on DX.
Makten wrote:
As usual almost all replies claiming the difference between DX and FX to be unimportant, comes from DX camera owners. I wonder why...
Circular argument that is antedotal at best and adds nothing of value to the conversation. If we accept what you say at face value (which I don't) then the correlary is:
As usual almost all replies claiming the differences between DX and FX to be important, comes from FX camera owners. I wonder why...
The fact is there are people who own the D300 and D3 who have recomended the D300 to the OP. I myself, own the D300 but specify instances where clearly FX has an advantage. The issue is that FX has been imparted some "magical" power it does not have. FX has its advantages, but they are less than some people make those advantages out to be. AND often times, based on the OPs words, DX would more than suit their needs but the FX advocates keep pushing FX. I say use whichever format best suits your needs.
Finally, if you choose to quote me, quote my entire statement. You have a tendency to quote only part of what I say and thus take it out of context. Thank you.
Having had a D300, D700 and D3, I just recently sold the D300. 99 times out of 100 I always prefer the D3 or D700 with the exception of when I was shooting baseball from center field and already had an extender on my 400 and still needed more reach to fill the frame.
The crop factor advantage for maximum reach, for something like shooting homeplate, or wildlife photography are really the only advantages I can see to the D300(s).
Otherwise the D700 has better overall IQ, better viewfinder and IMHO is just plain more enjoyable to use/shoot
Andre Labonte wrote:
Circular argument that is antedotal at best and adds nothing of value to the conversation. If we accept what you say at face value (which I don't) then the correlary is:
As usual almost all replies claiming the differences between DX and FX to be important, comes from FX camera owners. I wonder why...
Flip it over once again. My view of this is that a larger sensor or film frame is better for almost anything, when cost is not a problem. I'd never claim FF "just as good" as medium format, just because I don't have an MF camera myself. Of course MF will be better IQ-wise. But I can't afford it. The DX guys seems to argue the opposite way: "DX is good enough". Sure, but I believe that all of us want the best IQ we can get, right?
The fact is there are people who own the D300 and D3 who have recomended the D300 to the OP.
Yes, but very few.
I myself, own the D300 but specify instances where clearly FX has an advantage. The issue is that FX has been imparted some "magical" power it does not have.
Maybe, and of course there's no magic. But 225% sensor size does matter.
FX has its advantages, but they are less than some people make those advantages out to be. AND often times, based on the OPs words, DX would more than suit their needs but the FX advocates keep pushing FX. I say use whichever format best suits your needs.
I'm totally with you here. The thing is that a D300 with expensive lenses in the "normal" FL range will not give better IQ than a D700 with much cheaper lenses.
Finally, if you choose to quote me, quote my entire statement. You have a tendency to quote only part of what I say and thus take it out of context. Thank you.
Alright, I've never thought of that before.
Edit: If this question had been over at the Canon board, things would be different. The 50D has better AF than the 5D Mk II, which makes the choice harder.
Makten wrote:
As usual almost all replies claiming the difference between DX and FX to be unimportant, comes from DX camera owners. I wonder why...
I'm not sure I would say the differences are unimportant, but sometimes they are overblown. The difference in price between a D300 and a D700 is still close to $1000 (USD) and while it is IMO not arguable that the D700 is the better camera, the question is really one of value. To quote a recent commentary by Thom Hogan:
"The FX Lust. I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that most people lusting after FX are using excuses to justify wanting it, not showing real need. Can you really say that you're hitting diffraction, ISO, isolation, or viewfinder brightness limits with DX? Right, most of you can't. Most of you would be better served by the D300's cover-the-frame AF, frankly. DX has advantages, too--cost being a huge one--so don't overlook them."
TonyBeach wrote:
I'm not sure I would say the differences are unimportant, but sometimes they are overblown. The difference in price between a D300 and a D700 is still close to $1000 (USD) and while it is IMO not arguable that the D700 is the better camera, the question is really one of value. To quote a recent commentary by Thom Hogan:
"The FX Lust. I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that most people lusting after FX are using excuses to justify wanting it, not showing real need. Can you really say that you're hitting diffraction, ISO, isolation, or viewfinder brightness limits with DX? Right, most of you can't. Most of you would be better served by the D300's cover-the-frame AF, frankly. DX has advantages, too--cost being a huge one--so don't overlook them."
That makes very much sense, indeed. I'm still not convinced with that cost thing. A D300 with 17-55/2.8 costs more than a D700 with Tamron 28-75/2.8. I'd never ever choose DX if these were my options.
Thanks people for suggestions. As I said in my first post don't need any camera actually come to think of it don't even need what I have. Photography being my hobby to means I do things that I enjoy so the argument that I don't need one thing or the other doesn't quite convince on the other hand if someone tells me I will have fun using something will.
I personally feel that I prefer the relative cheapness of obtaining a great 2.8 zoom lens that reaches out to 300mm on a DX body. You have to trade off either IQ, or weight and money to get that with FX. The wide end of the range does not make much difference on either format, and if you really want to recover those extra 5mm, the Nikon 10.5 2.8 and a simple program to correct distortion is all you need.
Now I do chose to use a tripod instead of increase my ISO in almost any situation where hand held is getting iffy, so the amazing ISO ability of a D700 just doesn't happen to be enough of a draw when I factor in everything I previously mentioned.
I did just face a similar situation where I had to chose between a D700 and upgrade my wide angle lens that I am happy with on DX, or just stick with DX and pre-order a D300s. I saved a significant amount of money, not just on the body, but mainly on the lenses; I would also have to purchase a 300 2.8 to match my current coverage on DX.
For me, high ISO ability would never matter if I didn't have the reach to get that shot in the first place. Not shooting pro, there is little justification to spend that much money to match my range with high ISO.
