Nikon Announced D800 and D800E, 36MP FX-Format

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<p>I am also unsure why the DX format is only 15.4 MP instead of 18 MP</p>

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<p>Because for the DX crop to be 18MP, the FX sensor would have to be 40.5MP and not 36; the crop factor is about 1.5 and (1.5x1.5=2.25).</p>

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<p>Is there any place one can download a RAW sample from the D800?</p>

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<p>Is there any RAW converter out there yet that you could use to process that file?</p>

<p>Two questions:<br /> - is there any official word from Nikon that the D800 is indeed replacing the D700?<br /> - is there any reason Nikon could not continue producing the D700 and sell it worldwide with the exception of Japan because of the battery issue?</p>

<p>It appears that the D700, D300S, and D90 have only been placed in the discontinued cameras list on the Japanese Nikon site - but are still in the catalog on the global site (and the US site as well). Does anyone know if Nikon still produces D90 and D300S bodies? Or are these cameras still listed as available until all the stock has been sold?</p>

<p>B&H Photo appears to have an error on their webpage concerning the battery grip for the D800/D800E. They show the MB-D11 for the D7000/D800/D800E. The only grip I have seen mentioned for the D800/D800E is the new MB-D12.</p>

<p>Not that relevant, but I felt compelled to post.</p>

<p>I was banned from the forums (for weeks) for posting a question about what people thought about the rumors for the D800. <br>

I was told that was inappropriate (even though every other forum that has anything to do with photography, graphics, web, architecture ,etc., had tons of forum posts about the rumors) and promptly banned.<br>

Needless to say, that irked me and I stayed away from this site for the last two years.</p>

<p>Well, here the D800 is. Surprise surprise (no, not really, two years ago everyone knew it was coming!)</p>

<p>Yes, I feel better now. :-) </p>

<p>I'm with Shun in two ways: </p>

<p>First, I am taking no further questions on moire, AA, filters, AAA, Alcoholics Anonymous, or the various aliases I had to use while I was in the Weather Underground in the 70s for that matter. So just stop asking me, all of you. </p>

<p>Second, for my taste, a D800-size camera with its various features and a D4 sensor would have been far more appealing. The file size is such I wouldn't just need a new computer, new drives, etc: I'd need a whole new apartment. </p>

<p>Two other points, one small one larger: the small first: Nobody's made a big deal of it but the first thing I wanted to know was whether the camera has a 100 percent viewfinder. This feature is the single most disappointing aspect (in every sense of that word) of my D700.It would have been unreal if Nikon hadn't solved the problem but still I expected to hear more celebrations on that issue.</p>

<p>The larger point: I have a D700. I have thirteen film cameras including two MF bodies. The D700 takes some stunning pictures, if I don't screw it up. On the other hand, I rarely feel that I am taking the picture. (If I were doing sports or news I'd feel differently but mainly I do either family or arty things and arty things on a D700 -- feh.) This fabulous machine is taking the picture. I'm pointing it. When I'm using film and a separate meter (for my eye-level F and F2, for instance, not to mention Contax and Leica bodies back from the 30s, 40s, 50s) and figuring out how the light and dark masses will create values in the photograph etc etc; and even better, when I'm not figuring it out but have internalized enough knowledge not to have to think -- then I'm the fabulous machine. It's a whole different feeling. And when I hang the wet negatives and get my first look, and later when I scan them -- I WISH I had a real darkroom and enlarger and could print that way, oh I do -- and a few of them, just a few, are good, occasionally very good, the feeling of accomplishment is like -- well it's a D800 compared to a Kodak point and shoot. Shooting and developing and processing film is like flyfishing. Yeah, worms catch more fish: we know. So do trawlers. </p>

 

<p>I use a pair of D700's in my studio. At this price point, I'll be getting a pair of them. It's a no brainer upgrade.</p>

<p>What are the benefits of having a filter that cancels the effect of the anti-aliasing filter instead of removing the anti-aliasing filter?</p>

<p>One thing is -- and I said I wasn't taking any more questions on this but, whatever -- you'll see from the diagrams the correcting filter replaces another filter in the D800. For production purposes it is vastly more sensible to make the cameras identical with a different filter (identical in terms of production, however) in one spot then to try to make one camera with a set of filters and another without it. </p>

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<p>Matt: I'm finding the concern about disk space for newer, larger NEFs to be a bit misguided....</p>

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<p>I agree with you about the disk space, Matt. That is increadibly cheap. However, what I fear with these file sizes, as a non-pro, is that my computer is simply too old to work on such large files in an efficient manner. Even Raw-files from my D300 are screaming when trying to work on them in LR3 through a USB2 cord and an external HD. </p>

<p>Buying a new computer? Yeah, but that is an added cost to the D800... :(</p>

<p>Although the resolution of the D800 may be somewhat of an overkill given the current lens capability on the market, where I find the extra mega pixel somewhat useful is in the post processing department (if one was to think outside the box of this camera's advantages). With every editing step images are degraded and so the added mega pixel count would be far more forgiving. That said, I also think smarter post production work outweighs the benefits of a forgiving pixel count. As suggested, by Shun, I too find that the announcement of the D800 makes the D3x obsolete. Comparing the purchase benefits of a D800 v D4 is like comparing apples and oranges. They're designed for different applications and should be valued on their own merits rather than a whole of application. Personally I find greater value in owning a D700 with optional battery grip giving me an effective 9fps and good ISO capability, instead of a D3s, and using the savings to purchase a D800. If I was a photojournalist or sports/action photographer where quick FTP upload of my images was essential in giving me the edge on my competitors then there's no doubt the D4 is the camera of choice. </p>

<p>My two cents with regards to the film comments FWIW:</p>

 

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<p>though I suppose there might be some very slow fined grained black and white emulsions out there that equal or best a D3x</p>

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<p>The latter. :-) And that's just 8-perf 35mm. But you're dealing with 32 ISO there.</p>

 

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<p>In practice 12 MP FX is easily better than 35mm color film in image quality;</p>

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<p>No, sir. Or, rather, you did not qualify your statement. Which film (and we'll stay with 35mm)? At ISOs higher than 1600 you might be right (and I think you are). 8-perf Ektar 100 is equivalent to 25Mpx or so. But as you said, there is graininess. Should Kodak 5203 motion picture stock migrate to C-41, you'll get better results, although that's an ISO 50 film.</p>

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<p> "do not rejoice in this fact. I have five Hasselblad bodies and several Bronica bodies, not to mention my F3HP and a few other assorted great cameras that I simply do not use. Those who are masters of film photography will continue to shoot film, and God bless them. I wish them well"</p>

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<p>Landrum,<br>

If it is just for the nails,there were plenty around before this camera, so it shall be something else that make others use film and you to have all this gear just laying there..<br>

But did you ever consider to buy a digital back for your Hassies? I'm sure that way you could enjoy the good things of digital at a level only MF digital backs can provide to you.</p>

<p>Shun,<br>

You said you will "not respond to further questions on the AA filters" and it seems fair enough, but my question is just related to the effects not to the filters and I hope you can give us some indication about the statement that Nikon Capture NX2 will have the facilities to deal with the moire.<br>

What do you think on this and how effective it can be, pls?</p>

<p>sorry for the double entry</p>

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<p>Vince Passaro:<br /> The larger point: I have a D700. I have thirteen film cameras including two MF bodies. The D700 takes some stunning pictures, if I don't screw it up. On the other hand, I rarely feel that I am taking the picture. (If I were doing sports or news I'd feel differently but mainly I do either family or arty things and arty things on a D700 -- feh.) This fabulous machine is taking the picture. I'm pointing it. When I'm using film and a separate meter (for my eye-level F and F2, for instance, not to mention Contax and Leica bodies back from the 30s, 40s, 50s) and figuring out how the light and dark masses will create values in the photograph etc etc; and even better, when I'm not figuring it out but have internalized enough knowledge not to have to think -- then I'm the fabulous machine. It's a whole different feeling</p>

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<p>I got exactly the same feeling after playing around a bit with a d4 and d800 (at Nikon product presentations). they are great (especially for sports or news guys), but somewhat I immediately thought about my fm2 and f5... and no, I am not talking film vs. digital. its about that "I'm merely pointing it" thing. those machines are simply too smart and they quickly get you an answer for most shooting situations. the restrictions imposed by earlier cameras (crappy iso above xxx, poor af in certain situations, etc) FORCED the photographer to think of possible ways to achieve the best technical quality possible (I am not talking about the creative aspects, like angle, composition, etc. ). Now you just point and shoot, even when the light is next to none. crazy...<br /> just for reference - I do theatre photography and have gone all the way from f5, through d100, d200, d300 and d700. the latter is a fabulous camera, but its results also heavily depend on post-processing. while the d200 (with iso set to <640) renders images that can be converted and used with little to no post. I am using nikon's software for raw processing and conversion.</p>

<p>I will sit back and wait till some friends get the D800, look at their results and then decide to buy one to replace my beat up D300. Reading all the preview chatter and looking at images from Nikon don't do much for me when I am about to spend $3000. I want real world results and a little time for Nikon to work out the bugs, which I am sure their will be a few. I also want to see what the replacement for the Canon 5DMII looks like.</p>

<p><em> the restrictions imposed by earlier cameras (crappy iso above xxx, poor af in certain situations, etc) FORCED the photographer to think of possible ways to achieve the best technical quality possible</em></p>

<p>Actually cameras like the D3X (and surely the D800) can get you a decent result out of the box but they will also brutally show the slightest focusing errors and vibration if any. For example when using the D3X for landscape I am frequently ending up using the PC-E Nikkors to get adequate sharpness and even the slightest error in the tilt setting can result in a disappointing sharpness whereas precise focusing and tilt setting can give you a mind-blowing print. These are extremely finicky cameras which will certainly give you a challenge in how to obtain the best possible result. So you don't have to worry about photography becoming too easy.</p>

<p>The D700 indeed is forgiving.</p>

 

<p>Tim, replacing a <em>'beat-up D300'</em> with a D800 will mean a DX>FX change and all the associated lens issues.</p>

<p>I'd wait a little while and see how Nikon are going to deal with the D300s's replacement. I guess it will have to be an interesting blend between the D7000's sensor and the D4/800's electronics esp. the focus module and high speed processing for a high FPS.</p>

<p>Pricing will be a deal maker or breaker for the D300s's replacement. The $3000 for the D800 is a huge amount of camera for the money.</p>

 

 

<p>I'll not be getting one at launch (as I did with the D700, knowing that all the components had been tested by the D3 and D300), but I'm definitely tempted in the future. It'd be alongside my D700, though - I spend a lot of time at high ISO and shooting at high frame rates, and the 4fps limit and noise in the sample images that aren't at base ISO mean a D800 would be an alternative (-ish) to a 5x4 for me.<br />

<br />

Most of the things I'm waiting for in a D700 replacement are firmware-based - I sent a load of feature requests to Nikon before the D4 was announced. Fingers crossed a few of them make it in - the focal-length-based auto-ISO was one of them, so that's a good sign. I'd love the split screen live view (four separately-positionable views) that I've mentioned before on this forum. I'm nervous that the AF controls seem to have gone left-handed, given how much I whinge that my left hand is usually busy holding a lens; fingers crossed you can at least map one of the right-hand programmable buttons (DoF, Fn, AF-on, AE lock) to alias the AF button, or it'll be a big negative compared with the D700 - I use the AF mode rocker quite a lot. I'm assuming that the firmware is still under development, so fingers crossed.<br />

<br />

Anyway, as a competitor to the 5D2 (lightweight camera for landscapes and weddings) it's looking pretty good. It's never been clear to me why the D3x and 1Ds series needed to be built like the photojournalist cameras (D3/D3s, D4, 1D series) - I'm glad they came to their senses.<br />

<br />

Now to save up... and worry about my 80-200.</p>

<p>Ilkka, show me someone who's shooting 110 images a day 365 days per year, and I'll show you someone who could delete at least 90% of their images without getting rid of any pix worth looking at.</p>

<p>Of course, eventually. But first I need to know exactly how the images will be used as sometimes a certain composition or type of image is needed to complete a set so I shoot a lot of variations so that I can make an image series that is as good as possible. If the images were to be used only as individual shots, then editing would be easy and quick. But it gets a lot more complicated when searching a 10 image or 20 image set every image of which fits optimally to the others visually, complements each other in terms of content and is not repetitive. That's why I do many compositional variations when shooting, because the layout of the outcome is not in my mind yet. It depends on what happens in the future and not just what happens at that moment. Also, as I shoot a lot at wide apertures (f/1.4, f/2 etc.) I shoot a lot of focus brackets. This is a habit I got into when using the D200 and I haven't given it up even though my cameras now autofocus a bit better. Invariably one out of three images of the same subject will have subtly better focus, or slightly better subject expression, or when shooting at marginal shutter speeds the VR worked to slightly better sharpness on one image out of a few. It is impossible to see this level of very small differences when shooting through the viewfinder, but these subtle diferences come out to a meaningful difference in the outcome. Of course, 90% of the images (maybe more) will be deleted eventually when everything that will be made of the images has been determined. </p>

<p>Anyway, just about every event shooter that I know about (and who doesn't pose shots) does the same - they shoot a lot of variations of the best moments - not because they couldn't get a good image by shooting less, but because the best moment <em>in light of all other moments </em> cannot be determined before the whole thing is over. You may need a vertical instead of a horizontal for a layout for example, or you may need to choose between different combinations of expressions in interaction between several people shots. I could shoot less, but the way I shoot I get to a different level of outcome. If there were an easy way to do it I would be happy to excercise it but I've learned to shoot first and regret later. The D800 doesn't seem well suited for this kind of work. It's more a camera for pre-planned shots on tripod or with controlled lighting. In those kinds of shoots the number of shots is far fewer than photography of spontaneous moments in uncontrolled light. A day of landscape shooting might give me 5-10 images that I like (out of 30 shots made, again most of those are subtle variations i.e. subtle movement of camera position, bracketing the exposure, making raw material for composite images etc.). A D800 (or the D3X) is perfect for that. I just wonder how many in the million people who will buy a D800 will simply end up shooting less and become disillusioned with photography because of the process. On the other hand it may be that they'll love it because of the quality. It depends on what they shoot and what their aims are. Many amateurs only have laptops to process images with because they can't afford the space (not the computer itself but the apartment space) for a desktop and those may be several years old. Out of that million buyers I would expect the number of laptop users be a double digit percentage. Or at least they try ...</p>

 

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<p>You said you will "not respond to further questions on the AA filters" and it seems fair enough, but my question is just related to the effects not to the filters and I hope you can give us some indication about the statement that Nikon Capture NX2 will have the facilities to deal with the moire.</p>

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<p>Please keep in mind that it is not like we have a D800 on hand to test it out at this point. I have requested to borrow both a D800 and D800E from Nikon to test out the difference. They told us perhaps by late March. However, I am sure a lot of people want to test out both as well, so it is not clear they can loan us both.</p>

<p>During out conference call, they also mentioned that the next version of NX2 will have a tool to reduce moire. How well that works (or not work) will have to be tested.</p>

<p>Below is an image of a "blue and gold" parrot I captured back in 2007 with a D2x and 70-200mm AF-S VR stopped down to f4.5. Moire on the feather is very obvious. It'll be interesting to see how the D800E works on feather and fabric.</p><div></div>

<p>Most modern hi-res A4 scanners use software based AAing to prevent Moire on scanning 'grid-based' printing. You can choose the dpi of the original print type too. If you forget to tick-the-box and scan a book plate, it's awful and <strong><em>cannot</em></strong> be fixed afterwards. I know you can scan in RAW (Equivalent) and apply the 'filter' later, but it's not a perfect system.</p>

<p>I've never read of an actual, physical AA filter on a scanner's linear array, but I'm sure someone here will correct me of this illusion!.... :-)</p>

<p> Well I guess it sounds like people would want the camera and will spend the money to get it. I kind of like the D700 better myself as it does not have video and the pixel count is reasonable. However I do not want another big heavy camera as I need something packable for bicycle trips. I would like to see some of these camera's someday. Once film hit skid row the camera stores all went out of buisness so I cannot actually see anything.</p>

<p>Ross - the D800 is lighter than the D700, although admittedly not much. I'm glad it's not much lighter than it is - I like a hefty camera for stability, and I can't hold a D90 or D7000 without thinking "oh, bless, it's so tiny". Admittedly the 5D2's lightweightness was a benefit for travel; I'm taking the D800 as an improvement over the D3x from this perspective (but then with the lens collection that I insist on carrying around, the camera is largely irrelevant).</p>

<p>If I was a digital user, the only thing which would put me off (other than the price) is the curvy shape of it. The boxy shape of the new Olympus OM-D is more appealing to me: <a href="http://www.techradar.com/news/photography-video-capture/cameras/olympus-om-d-gets-official-1061568">http://www.techradar.com/news/photography-video-capture/cameras/olympus-om-d-gets-official-1061568</a></p>