The D800 and the D800E (4 Viewers)

[Dave Williams]

Took delivery of my new D800 Monday afternoon. Took a few shots last night before it got dark. Initial impressions? Excellent, the detail is superb, I took a few pics of the kids and the detail is everything I had hoped for. I've not had the chance to transfer any photos to the computer as yet but the screen display is great.
I need to go through the manual a bit as the metering is quite different to the D700. For instance the D800 does not have the switch to change metering patterns. I have an aversion to manuals, but reckon I will read this one to make the most of the new weapon.

It's a man thing with the manuals, who needs them !!!! One of our biggest problems is that we stop reading them before we have learnt how to use everything and never realise the true potential !
Slightly off topic but I recently purchased a used Canon 1DMK11. It has a mere 8 mp's but I have been amazed to find the image quality obtainable, especially for the internet, provided I can fill the frame reasonably full of the subject I want to show. What I do feel is lacking is ISO capability on a typical British dull day which limits shutter speed and f stop.
I am as interested in the D800/E 's ISO performance as much as anything and I wonder if 36mp will give as much pain as gain.
I have yet to see anything that makes me want to put an order in for one as it's not the camera I think I want but I remain interested. I have been awaiting the D400 so I can move on from the D300s but having sampled a pro camera in the 1D it does leave me wondering which way to turn next.. a D3s maybe ? You'll soon be able to pick them up with low shutter counts and below the price of a D800.

 

[rdspalm]

Trial photos with the D800

At last I have a few bird photos taken on the D800. These two tern photos are crops as the birds were fishing quite far off. I'm pleased with the results so far. Wish my flight photo technique would improve sometime soon!

Richard

 

[Dave Williams]

I'm interested to know if those who have bought a D800 have had knock on expenses like extra batteries, new SD or CF cards , maybe even a new computer to process the bigger files. What are the "hidden" costs ? cheers Dave

 

[Neil]

I'm interested to know if those who have bought a D800 have had knock on expenses like extra batteries, new SD or CF cards , maybe even a new computer to process the bigger files. What are the "hidden" costs ? cheers Dave

Dave.
All of the above. With the HD video I'm filling a 1TB usb drive every month, my iMac with only 3 gigs of Ram is way too slow and I have to have a 32 gig SD card and an 8 gig Compact Flash card in at all times.
Neil

 

[Dave Williams]

Dave.
All of the above. With the HD video I'm filling a 1TB usb drive every month, my iMac with only 3 gigs of Ram is way too slow and I have to have a 32 gig SD card and an 8 gig Compact Flash card in at all times.
Neil

Wow !

I guessed as much.
The 32GB SD card is £229, the fastest CF card is £129 for 16GB ( and you would probably need 2 of each), a spare battery £59, and a new laptop at least £650 and I would also need a new external hard drive for storage.
Well over a £1000 to add to the camera cost !
Thanks Neil.

 

[JPAC]

Dave.
All of the above. With the HD video I'm filling a 1TB usb drive every month, my iMac with only 3 gigs of Ram is way too slow and I have to have a 32 gig SD card and an 8 gig Compact Flash card in at all times.
Neil

Wow! One TB a month. Good job the D800 doesn't do 10 fps.

 

[Dave Williams]

D800 doesn't do 10 fps.

Which is another reason not to get one

That's me decided.I'll sit tight on my D300s for the time being..........
or should I take another look at that low mileage D3 going for £1850 ?!

 

[RMWD]

I'm interested to know if those who have bought a D800 have had knock on expenses like extra batteries, new SD or CF cards , maybe even a new computer to process the bigger files. What are the "hidden" costs ? cheers Dave

No Dave, the 64 gb 95MB/s SD card was bought as a deposit against the D800.
Still using my Macbook Pro.

One thing though about bird photography is that most small birds fall within DX crop, so for these I use the DX mode which is no bigger than the D7000. Only if the bird fills that frame do I switch to FX. I have the Frame choice programmed to a function button and wheel, so very easy to do on the fly.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/brandon_birder/sets/72157629726734905/

 

[RMWD]

Wow !

I guessed as much.
The 32GB SD card is £229, the fastest CF card is £129 for 16GB ( and you would probably need 2 of each), a spare battery £59, and a new laptop at least £650 and I would also need a new external hard drive for storage.
Well over a £1000 to add to the camera cost !
Thanks Neil.

The 64 GB Sandisk extrem 95mb/sec is very fast and costs £140.
If yu have a D7000 or V1 then they share the same battery and charger with the D800. Most people don't use it for lots of video. I reckon to fill my 500gb hard drive in about a year (half full now). But external 2 TB drive cost me less the £100 6 months ago.

 

[Dave Williams]

No Dave, the 64 gb 95MB/s SD card was bought as a deposit against the D800.
Still using my Macbook Pro.

One thing though about bird photography is that most small birds fall within DX crop, so for these I use the DX mode which is no bigger than the D7000. Only if the bird fills that frame do I switch to FX. I have the Frame choice programmed to a function button and wheel, so very easy to do on the fly.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/brandon_birder/sets/72157629726734905/

Thanks for the replies Rich.
The SD cards do appear to have halved in price when you look at Amazon, the extra battery is £59 but the laptop might well be an issue for many people trying to process big files, myself included, so I still think the cost of buying in to a D800 is in excess of £1000 on top of the camera body for me.
Of course this expense might well be necessary anyway if and when the D400 or whatever comes out next.
Whilst I appreciate you probably have more photographic interests outside birds than perhaps I do ( although I keep telling myself to widen my horizons) your use of the DX mode on the camera suggests you would be equally well served with the D7000 for avian photography at 33% of the price. Changing to FX to get the whole bird in the frame seems to be the equivalent of using a zoom lens and I'd have thought the time the extra MP's were useful would be to make big crops ?
I have only briefly tried a D7000 but I wasn't impressed with the build, the feel and the instrumentation.Put that camera's abilities in to a D300 style body and I'd buy one. Perhaps you feel the same way, and for you the answer was a D800 ?
cheers Dave

 

[JPAC]

A couple of links for D800 owners;

Card speeds; http://www.robgalbraith.com/bins/camera_wb_multi_page.asp?cid=6007-12451

Fastest on that test for CF was 69MB/s, SD was 42MB/s

Problems; http://nikonrumors.com/forum/topic.php?id=5517

I have no idea what Amazon.co.uk are doing as regards to the D800, they haven't listed it for ages. Nearly bought it for £2099 but I thought its new, it'll come down in price. Didn't anticipate Nikon UK's greed and price gouging?

The wait continues.

 

[Dave Williams]

A couple of links for D800 owners;

Card speeds; http://www.robgalbraith.com/bins/camera_wb_multi_page.asp?cid=6007-12451

Fastest on that test for CF was 69MB/s, SD was 42MB/s

Problems; http://nikonrumors.com/forum/topic.php?id=5517

I have no idea what Amazon.co.uk are doing as regards to the D800, they haven't listed it for ages. Nearly bought it for £2099 but I thought its new, it'll come down in price. Didn't anticipate Nikon UK's greed and price gouging?

The wait continues.

Thanks for the links,
Rob Galbraith must have been brain dead during and after writing that test up! The most interesting thing though is that the D800 will still accept SDHC cards and not just SDXC which is one immediate cost saving for me in trying to replace all my current cards.

The Nikon rumours discussions really echo many of my reasons for backing off the D800.

 

[RMWD]

Thanks for the replies Rich.
The SD cards do appear to have halved in price when you look at Amazon, the extra battery is £59 but the laptop might well be an issue for many people trying to process big files, myself included, so I still think the cost of buying in to a D800 is in excess of £1000 on top of the camera body for me.
Of course this expense might well be necessary anyway if and when the D400 or whatever comes out next.
Whilst I appreciate you probably have more photographic interests outside birds than perhaps I do ( although I keep telling myself to widen my horizons) your use of the DX mode on the camera suggests you would be equally well served with the D7000 for avian photography at 33% of the price. Changing to FX to get the whole bird in the frame seems to be the equivalent of using a zoom lens and I'd have thought the time the extra MP's were useful would be to make big crops ?
I have only briefly tried a D7000 but I wasn't impressed with the build, the feel and the instrumentation.Put that camera's abilities in to a D300 style body and I'd buy one. Perhaps you feel the same way, and for you the answer was a D800 ?
cheers Dave

Dave, I have a D7000 and IQ wise it is fine. It only lacked good AF for BIF, low light acquisition and it took some time to learn how to deal with it's larger single point AF point. Great camera. The D800 is a D7000 with D4 AF.
Howver I also have a fe other options. If I add a 1.4TC then I immediately double the pixels on each and every bird I photograph. The D800's better high iso performance and resolution along with it's brilliant low light AF make this a real possibility.

 

[JPAC]

Tested;
http://www.robgalbraith.com/bins/content_page.asp?cid=7-11676-12555


I don't see that much difference.

 

[Helios]

Would performing a bit of sharpening in photoshop get you the same result as a D800E, or am I missing something?

 

[JPAC]

Sharpening a digital image makes it look sharper but doesn't have any more detail. Even now, the difference is so small it wouldn't be worth the extra money especially when I see the moire in the E photos, IMO.


:news: More problems reported with viewfinder misalignments and camera lock-ups. Battery removal required to get them working again.

 

[ericbowles]

I just took delivery of the D800E. Image quality is absolutely stunning compared to any previous camera I have owned.

There is a difference between the D800 and D800E. The D800E is a little crisper. You can tell on some images but you need to look closely or be viewing a large print.

Sharpening settings make the image look sharper. There are different techniques for optimizing sharpness - but it is not something you maximize using software. Software settings for sharpening will vary depending on the product you are using and depending on the camera. Sharpening is still dealing with the resolution of the image. A soft image can only be helped so much with sharpening. And you are not going to turn a D800 image into a D800E image with sharpening, but they both will look very good.

I've seen little incidence of moire on bird feathers - just a little on a couple of images from one friend who heavily post processed to intentionally increase moire. I have about 100 bird photos so far with no incidence of moire. The resolution is significantly better than I expected.

 

[Dave Williams]

I am getting the distinct impression from reading various comments that the D800 isn't that brilliant for higher ISO shots and that it really is best a very low ISO. Can anyone verify it's limits in poor light conditions typical of a winter in the UK ? What's the noise like at 1600 and above ? Thanks Dave

 

[ericbowles]

I have the D800E - not D800 - but high ISO performance is the same. I am very comfortable using ISO 2000 and having virtually no noise. I'm sure I could go to ISO 3200.

For what it's worth, there is no sign of moire on the D800E after about 700 frames of bird photography.

One other note - I have seen one case where resizing in Lightroom caused moire in a D800 final print. The moire was not visible on the image but Lightroom apparently may have some issues with resizing the large high res files. Still working on the full explanation.

 

[RMWD]

I regularly go to iso 3200. The noise is very manageable. In good light iso 6400 is very good indeed.