Nikon D70 freely available in India....why still no reviews on the net?

[2069]

Hi,

 

I inquired about D70 one week back, and it was available here in

bombay. Since i want to know about the image quality etc, i was

looking forward to standard reviews on popular sites. There is none,

only previews available. Can someone point to a link for a

comprehensive review?

 

anurag

[gsbhasin]

Maybe because only a few people can afford it in India, and they might not be inclined to expend energy to do a review.

<p>do you know what the price for the kit in Bombay is? and what is the warranty for the camera sold in India?

[msitaraman]

Anurag,

 

India has to be one of the very few places in the world where D70s are currently available easily; Singapore being another. No shops in the West really have them in stock, so no detailed reviews yet.

 

And I have the same question as Gurupreet. How many rupees for the 1) body and 2) Body and 18-70 lens kit?

[freeside]

I bought a D70 (kit including the 18-70 lens) in Singapore last week at Paris Silk in Holland

Village for a total of SGD$2100 which includes the 5% GST.

 

My previous camera was an F70 bought in 1995/1996 with 24-120 lens bought in 1997. I

have put several thousand frames of film through it with few problems. The camera has

been with me through thick and thin, including three trips to Burning Man. But in the last

three years I practically stopped shooting because film, developing, etc was all getting too

expensive and too much trouble.

 

Since last week my D70 has gone everywhere with me and I feel like a missing piece of

myself has been restored. The magic words are: Zero marginal cost! I've shot about 200

frames per day since I got the camera. I feel like a kid in a candy shop.

 

Some people have asked "body only or kit?" I strongly recommend the kit lens; this is my

first experience with AF-S technology and I think it's the best thing in the world. The

optics are excellent. The colour and sharpness are as good as the 24-120 and the barrel/

pincushion distortion is imperceptible.

 

One function I always missed in the F70 was the DOF preview. The D70 has DOF preview

plus 5-point AF and colour matrix metering. This is more than a digital version of the 70;

it's a definite step up. And it doesn't feel consumer-grade, either. This is a very capable

younger brother to the D100.

 

iPhoto 4 (part of iLife) plus OS 10.3.3 will correctly read the EXIF rotation data. iPhoto 2

will not.

 

Regarding resolution, I used to get my 35mm Sensia scanned at 3000x2000 so 6

megapixels is no compromise (modulo the Foveon argument re 3 vs 1 interpolation.) In

fact, I find the dynamic white balance and the Auto ISO features a huge improvement over

film. There's no way I'm going back now. Now I can proof my images minutes after

shooting them, and run a slideshow of the day's events and upload pictures to the web

that night.

 

Sample images are online at

 

http://www.mengwong.com/photography/20040314-jasperbirthday/dsc_0510.html

 

http://www.mengwong.com/photography/20040315-dinner/

(key light source was 4 candles, Auto ISO feature enabled so the camera was probably

exposing at 1600)

 

Most of the images are straight from the camera with default exposure settings; I don't

think I did any kind of tone/contrast/brightness/curves enhancement on the images

except possibly for one or two under http://www.mengwong.com/photography/

20040320/ (the "huge" versions may not be full-sized yet, I will upload the originals next

weekend.)

 

I have no gripes with the camera besides an irrational impression that the lens barrel is

flimsy. It's probably because it's plastic, and the zoom construction allows some play, so

when I shake it I can hear a kind of looseness in the barrel. But I tell myself that this does

not affect picture quality and that I am just being silly.

 

If you can find this camera, I recommend it highly. At time of purchase just remember to

buy three CR2 batteries and a 67mm UV haze filter.<div></div>

[freeside]

Oh yeah, the other thing that really stands out about the D70 is the ability to just keep

shooting at 3fps for something like 7 to 10 shots before the buffer fills up. For the past

three years the only reason I did not buy a camera was because of shutter lag and cycle

time. The D70 feels exactly as resposive as a film SLR.

[mike_morgan1]

Meng Weng Wong, how is the autofocus accuracy at wide apertures in less than bright cloudy conditions?

[freeside]

Outdoors, under an overcast sky, I've found the AF system works pretty well if you give it

something reasonably contrasty to work with. Most foliage will do. I found the AF system

somewhat better than on my old F70, keeping two things in mind:

 

Because the lens is AF-S, the hunt/rack time is much quicker, and if the camera cannot

obtain focus lock you can just do a manual override by twisting the MF ring. I've had to do

this maybe once or twice in about 1500 shots so far.

 

Because there is a 5 area AF, it's easy to nudge the camera just a little bit so the AF has

more to work with; once you achieve lock you recompose and just shoot. I found the AE-

L/AF-L button useful for this: if I was shooting a fast-moving portrait subject, I would just

thumb the button down throughout the "take" and thereby force a focus lock.

 

On the whole: I remember being impressed with Canon AF in the late 1990s. I feel that

with the D70 the gap has definitely closed.

 

Ken Rockwell review thread at http://www.photo.net/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg?

msg_id=007Uay

 

Some discussion of the AF subsystem at http://www.photo.net/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-

msg?msg_id=007QXV

[freeside]

I wasn't clear enough about how good the AF is compared to the F70. With the F70, the AF

was slow (because my 24-120 was not AF-S) and uncertain, failing to lock focus with

maddening regularity especially under low existing light conditions. With the D70, the AF

is incredibly fast and has only failed to lock focus maybe five or six times out of the 1500

shots I've taken, and those times were under low light conditions on a low contrast

subject, with the AF assist illumination turned off.

 

I disagree with Ken Rockwell that nobody shoots above 1/1000; today I shot some goats,

portrait style, at 70mm/4.5 under broad daylight. There are two things I want to note

about that shot: first, the exposure was 1/2500 because I was shooting wide open at 200

ISO; and second, the D70 has manual control of white balance, so I manually set the WB

correction to direct-sunlight. The result: really good colour on the goat coat.<div></div>

[erb_duchenne]

I believe the D70 is available in many Asian cities... Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand (where it's made), Japan etc. etc.

 

...and of course India

[william_john_smith]

http://www.kenrockwell.com/nikon/d70.htm

[2069]

Sitaraman and Sodhi,

 

With the kit lens the price is 60000 rupees.

 

However, this is 'market' price, not the official nikon price, so probably no legal warranties etc.

 

I don't know whether nikon is selling it here officially.

 

anurag

[2069]

Sorry,

 

Mani and Gurpreet...

 

anurag