ben_hutcherson

I'm wondering if anyone can offer any insight to this. Not too terribly long ago, I went on an equipment upgrade binge and bought an SB900 to supplement/replace my faithful SB800. I know the SB900 is dated now also, but bought from B&H used and liked the price a lot better than the SB5000(and yes I'm fully aware of the heat issues on it). In any case, in the past I've used an external pack with my SB800 so went ahead and also bought a(used) SD9 pack for the SB900. I'm not entirely sure it's working-or rather actually I don't think it is-and the manuals for the flash and power pack seem to reference each other but don't give me the full picture. I have the flash and pack both loaded with Amazon-branded high capacity(2400mAh) NiMH batteries. They are freshly charged, and all power the SB900 and all my other flashes fine. I'm going to pull out a voltmeter and check the SD9, but as far as I know there's no issue with it. It's not exactly complicated, or doesn't seem that way. Still, though, it doesn't seem to be working. When plugged in, the lights on the SD9 do not light as the manual says they should. I've tested the SB900 in manual 1/1, and the recycle time is the same with the pack plugged and unplugged. If I open the battery door on the flash, it powers off(I seem to recall that the SD8 would power the SB800 entirely on its own). As I don't have any other flashes that the SD9 is compatible with, I can't test to isolate the problem to the flash or the pack. Does anyone have any insight into this?

I'm glad I have an F6, but the F100 is 90% of the camera it is. I appreciate matrix with AI lenses(which the F4 also gives, but F6 has better modern compatibility). I never cared about iTTL on it until I went from an SB800 to SB900, which drops film TTL support. If you want a film SLR to keep in your bag with mostly a DSLR kit, the F6 is the one to have if you use a modern flash also although again the F100 does most of the same thing(and if you don't mind using an SB800 you can still get good compatiblity with reasonably current DSLRs along with basically all of the 90s film SLRs and even the F3 with the right flash shoe). The one big thing, to me, that the F6 lacks is support for E lenses. I don't know if that could have been added with a firmware update or not, but if it could have it would have been a really nice addition especially as the F6 was in production along side E lenses. At least I can put my 24-70 f/2.8 on it and use it wide open. The current prices of some film equipment are surprising, but then film is currently experiencing quite a renaissance. I suspect it may be a passing fad, but we will see. My pre-move local camera store use to have a few rolls of B&W and negative film kicking around, but now has shelves piled with film and they tell me it moves faster than it was moving in the 2005-2006 timeframe(when there was still a decent bit of pro film usage).

I agree it really isn't all that much of a real world advantage. I honestly tried to replicate it myself to show here and the results were so close that I had trouble doing it. There are a lot of reasons to like the D810, although the D800 is a sentimental favorite of mine(and one of the last I'd get rid of if push came to shove) as my first "good" DSLR and one that I'd not be ashamed to use in 2023 as my only camera. To me the tangible advantages of the D810 are the much quieter/more refined shutter and the more comfortable hand grip. I didn't buy mine until used prices were around $1K, and bought it with the justification that I could use a very familiar camera along side my D800(not necessarily as a backup, but to for example avoid changing lenses in the field). The D810 became my main camera for the above mentioned reasons, but my D800 has never really gone out of use. I agree that it's worthwhile giving the D800 a serious look for cost savings, especially if you can find a lightly used one. The D850 knocked both more or less out of rotation back in August when I got mine. IMO, it's possibly one of the best all around, well rounded DSLRs ever made. It is noticeably less noisy than D800/D810 and gets even better if I downsample it to 36mp. The AF is superb(nearly D5 levels of performance, although my D5 seems to lock easier and track a tiny bit better esp. in 3D tracking). It's a do it all camera with a more than acceptable frame rate for most uses with the grip+EN-EL18. I don't notice an image quality difference most of the time since I handhold a lot, although it did push me over the edge on buying the newer 24-70 f/2.8E. If I didn't have one and wanted to buy a DSLR in 2023, I'd pick a D850 again.

I can shoot comparisons later if you'd like but having shot the D800 and D810 side-by-side for a couple of years now, I would say above ISO 400 the two are effectively identical. The only real place where I see the D810 holding a slight but noticeable advantage is at base ISO, which is 64 vs. 100. A D810 at 64 is certainly cleaner than a D800 at 100. With that said, it seems that Nikon played with the amplifiers/ADCs to optimize base ISO on the D810, and as a consequence the D800 is actually a tiny bit cleaner at ISO 100 and it holds that advantage in the moderately low ISO range. It's subtle and in real world, non-pixel-peeping you won't see it. I had unilaterally considered the D810 better but someone pointed this out to me and I was able to replicate it myself. I consider output from the two cameras equivalent, but the only time to me where the D810 holds a marked advantage is if I know I can use base ISO. The D850 is a different beast and as I said in my previous post I can see about a one stop advantage at higher ISOs.

Last summer, I upgraded from a D810 as a primary camera to a D850. In all honesty, it COULD be the last camera I needed to buy, and it was for a while although I recently turned some liquidated excess into a D5 that still intimidates me a bit. The D850 is just that good. The extra resolution to me isn't a big deal as the D800 and D810 I have are plenty in that department. The incredible AF(not as good as the D5 despite having the same AF module) combined with the frame rate and high ISO performance make it such a great all around camera for me. AF has been a big deal in particular as I've been photographing a squirming baby a lot lately who will all too soon be a crawling/walking toddler. Yes they're what some would call boring family snaps but to me they're a big deal, and it's great to have a camera I can use there and turn around for any other type of photography I wanted. I find the D800 and D810(which are very similar in ISO performance) get pretty rough around ISO 3200. 1600-6400 are common indoor ISOs for me. Even though for the past few years I've HEAVILY used the 24-70mm f/2.8G, f/2.8 still gives unacceptably low shutter speeds even in decently lit evening home interiors and sometimes f/2.8 just doesn't give enough DOF for me. I'd often switch to the Df, which has the incredible 16mp D4 sensor and is at least one stop better in ISO performance, or really more like 1 1/2, in use. The D850 gives me more like D3s ISO performance, which is a high mark to beat(despite that being a 13? year old body now). I know the D5 is an even better high ISO camera-I'll see when I get it from the mailroom at work on Monday. Now my Df is mostly sidelined unless I want to play with old lenses. More recently too I've upgraded to the 24-70 f/2.8E VR, which gives me an extra stop or two handheld if the subject is still, but that's also only useful in limited circumstances. So, again, for me the D850 is nearly perfect and it could be the only camera I owned. The D800 and D810 are no slouches. I'll also mention that the D800 still very much hold its own, and despite a slight theoretical advantage in sharpness(that you need good glass+a sturdy tripod to see) and also a very, very slight noise at base ISO advantage(that evaporates once you go above base, and at moderately low ISOs the D800 is a tiny bit better like-for-like and not enough on either for me to get worked up) to me the real reason to use the D810 are the quieter shutter and slightly improved ergonomics. Since getting the D850, I've seriously debated selling my D810.

I'm offering this lens for sale. Basically, as stated, this is the older version of the F mount(SLR/DSLR) 24-70mm "pro" f/2.8 zoom lens. It was replaced in 2015 by the newer, only marginally better, bigger, and heavier 24-70mm f/2.8E VR. Note that this lens does NOT have VR, probably its only major shortcoming from being a near perfect lens. This older version is still decently popular as it is quite a bit smaller and lighter than the newer version. I'm only selling because this one has sat since I bought the newer version. If anyone wants the full alphabet soup for this one, it's "NanoCrystalCoat SWM ED IF Aspherical" and "AF-S Nikkor 24-70mm 1:2.8G ED N" As a "G" lens(no aperture ring) it is fully compatible with all Nikon F mount DSLRs, as well as late higher end film cameras like the F5, F6, F100, and N80. It will focus and work in "P" and "S" modes on the N90 and F4. Ask me if you want to use this on a film camera and want to know whether or not its compatible with your specific one. This one is in what I'd call well used but not abused condition. It has some wear on the barrel, a few paint chips on the filter ring(zero issues installing and removing filters) and probably most noticeable is some gold loss on the raised lettering. The glass is clear, blemish free, and fugus free. I do see two specs of dust inside the rear element(visible in the photo of the rear element with the aperture wide open), but I've never seen it on photos. It works perfectly and is fully functional. Zoom and focus are smooth(zoom resistance does change through the range, but every example I've handled is like this). Nikon branded front and rear cap included. These seem to run $500-600 on Ebay depending on the seller and condition, so let's try this at $475 inc. US shipping(message me for an international quote).

Thanks! Just found and bought a set like yours with the same Neewer branding. They should be here Monday and I'll have time to test/play with them. This isn't a paying job but a family event. Of course it's also the in-laws so that might be more critical than a paying customer 🙂 (if I even did paid work anymore-haven't since I was in college and don't want to). I'm going over to their house on Wednesday to play with the light set-up, and I'll bring a small on-camera and optical trigger as a just-in-case.

I've been using some ancient Quantum radio triggers for a while now, but for a couple of reasons they are becoming more and more difficult to keep going. My one hotshoe-equipped transmitter seems to have died, and they're big and heavy enough that I don't like dangling them by the PC cord. I'm looking for something that I don't have a huge investment in for a specific project. I don't need fancy. I'm using this on my D850 with my Norman lights. I don't need TTL. I don't need 2-way communication. I quite literally need something that will take the flash fire signal from the hotshoe or PC socket and close the trigger on the Norman power pack(household, PC, whatever I can make it work) to fire them. Everything I look at seems to have a bunch of superfluous features and many only seem to have a hotshoe on the slave. I guess I can make that work but I'd much rather have PC or some other proper sync port. It would be nice if long term I can tie multiple receivers to one transmitter(as I have several Norman power packs and every once in a great while will use multiple at the same time) It seems Pocket Wizards will do what I want but I'm not overly inclined to spend ~$200...although I imagine the Quantums I've been using were that expensive if not more so and they have certainly worked well for a long time. I'm reluctant to use optical slaves, although I have some. I don't like that the triggering flash can sometimes mess with the rest of the light I've set up, and also for my immediate time I may have spurious flashes from other people to deal with. Does anyone have any suggestions? Ideally I need to have these in hand middle of next week so I have time to play with them before the weekend. I'll do the Pocket Wizards if that's the best option.

I've not shot test charts, but I have three samples of the 55mm f/3.5 Micro-Nikkor. One is AI, one is non-AI, and one is AI-converted compensating aperture. All of them outperform the 55mm f/2.8s I have at macro distances. The f/2.8 is better at infinity, but the f/3.5s are consistently better in macro applications. The f/2.8, like every other floating element lens I've ever tested, falls apart when you start adding extension tubes beyond the companion 25mm one, and especially reversed or on bellows. On the 105mm front, I have a 105mm f/4 which is okay. My AF 105mm f/2.8D is a really, really good lens out to 1:1-not as good as the 55mm f/3.5-but really good. I find it better than the 105mm f/2.8 VR, which I had and sold.

So, actually the perhaps equally polarizing Df has a somewhat broader range of compatibility. It doesn't have "real" MLU, so invasive lenses are out(and I'm not sure how well they'd work on a DSLR even if they could theoretically be mounted). What it does, do, though, is extend compatibility forward to lenses that have limited functionality on the F4, and takes full advantage of features that don't work at all on the F4. It can use VR on any lens that has it, plus can focus(automatically and manually) with AF-P lenses, where the F4 can't even focus those manually. The F4 can only use E lenses at full aperture, and the Df is fully compatible. Also, the Df does offer something that the F4 doesn't offer with non-AI lenses. Metering with non-AI is stop-down only and AFAIK only center weighted or spot. The Df gives you open aperture matrix metering with non-AI lenses. It's a bit unwieldy, as it's not coupled and you have to set the aperture both on the aperture ring and in the camera, but it can be done and isn't bad once you've practiced with it a bit.

I know opinions will never change, but I still consider the New F-1 a FAR better camera than the F3, and I love the F4. Granted I have a lot of time with the New F-1 and not as much with the F3. The tiny little LCD is enough for me to dislike its other good points, though(like the smoothest film advance on any camera made). Funny enough, for me, I've noticed that I seem to like the "even numbered" Nikon pro bodies. The F2, F4, and F6 all rank highly in my book, and the F2 is my favorite of the bunch followed by the F6. I have a bunch of Fs as they're fun to collect, but I don't particularly enjoy using them(and if I do it will generally be an early plain prism one). The F3 I've given my thoughts on. I don't dislike the F5, but in 2021 for me it's kind of a "why?" camera as all the good stuff about it(the meter and AF) the F100 does the same or the F6 does better, and it's so big and bulky compared to the other two.

I've been using horizontal angle of view for a while when comparing between formats. In virtually every case, it's the single most important value for me in choosing a focal length. I consider diagonal nearly useless other than as a very rough comparison. Horizontal allows me to say "I'd use this like I would a 28mm lens on 35mm" or whatever(aside from the fact that I almost never use 28mm lenses...). I am fine with crop factors when the aspect ratio is the same, such as comparing APS-C and full frame 35mm. They're simple and straight forward, and it's easy for me to say that my 200mm lens is going to give the field of view of a 300mm lens. When you move to formats with more logical aspect ratios than the wide and short of 35mm film, that kind of falls apart(although I do appreciate when cameras can do something like mask a 4x5 aspect ratio area in the viewfinder..).

I'm someone too who thinks that the concept of "equivalent" focal lengths has value. Like many people, I learned on 35mm film, and now the unfortunate reality is that I shoot more 24x36mm digital than anything else now since I don't currently have a darkroom or otherwise good film handling facilities. I can "see" what a 35mm or 50mm or 200mm lens looks like on 35mm film/full frame digital. For that reason, when switching to other formats, thinking in terms of "equivalent focal length" helps me make intelligent lens choices. Yes, I know that my 50mm Distagon isn't EXACTLY the same as my 35mm f/1.4 Nikkor, but I can use the two lenses in similar situations...aside of course from the Distagon being 3 stops slower. And when I read this, my thought is "Of course a 1000mm lens on a 35mm camera looks like a 1000mm lens"

It looks like an "S" to me because the base appears to slope up at the end opposite the grip. Both the F4(plain) and F4e have flat bases. The F4s, which at least in the US is the most plentiful one, is the only one with the slope.

The way I was taught to agitate: Pick up tank, flip over and hold while listening to the air shift, wait two seconds, and then flip back over, setting down on the counter with a bit of a "smack" to dislodge any air bubbles that may have ended up on the film in the process. It's worked perfectly fine for me!

Mine had two of them that were sort of glued to the top of the viewfinder between the top plate and the top of the viewfinder tube. One was still attached. I used a tiny blob of RTV silicone, since original adhesive looked like a long-petrified "gummy" adhesive.

Serious price drop for hopeful quick sale. $200 inc. shipping

The teeny-tiny battery is one of several things that I wish Nikon would tweak/update, but of course we now know it's not going to happen. To its credit, the battery life is USUALLY decent and as long as I charged before going out, I've never had one run down in use(plus a spare disappears into your pocket), but I do use the "info" button on mine quite a bit to easily find information that's not as easy to ferret out on the tiny top display and in the viewfinder.

N80 is a good budget option that sells for a little of nothing. It's fully G, AF-S, VR, etc(not E or AF-P) compatible. The N80 actually made the rounds quite a bit as the basis for a lot of DSLRs both with Nikon themselves(D100), Kodak(DCS 14/N and SLR/N) and Fuji(Finepix S2 and S3). Going down another notch, the N75 has the same compatibility matrix(G, AF-S, VR) but is a one dial camera so isn't as convenient to use in manual mode. For build quality, features, size, weight, and current price I tend to think of the F100 as the default answer for this, though. In a round about way, you could almost think of the F6 as being a second-generation F100 that's been brought up to single-digit-F build quality and features. I love my F6, but I don't feel like I'd lose a lot if I decided to quit using it instead of the F100.

Unfortunately my Mac collection is mostly in storage now, but it's another hobby of mine, and unfortunately one that takes up a lot of space. Right now, actually, the only thing I have out of storage and in active use is also a 1ghz Titanium PowerBook. I love the Classic Mac OS, and in fact there's still a dedicated fanbase of users out there who are still trying to get the most out of it. A lot of those are folks doing digital audio/production work, and find that they can get a fast and capable studio going using OS 9 for a tiny budget using excellent but otherwise obsolete equipment. They've actually managed to accomplish things like relatively user friendly install processes on computers that weren't intended to boot OS 9, including the last generation Mirrored Drive Door G4, the first generation aluminum 17" PowerBook, and the Mac Mini G4. There's a sort of maintained browser for it, but it's extremely outdated now and isn't capable of doing much beyond browsing mostly text websites. With that said, I think they managed to walk themselves into a corner with OS 9, and it would have been interesting to see what they could have come up with to "fix" it. Basically, by the time OS 9 came around, the code was a convoluted mess and apparently no one completely understood what all was going on in it. The 68K emulator is tied in at a very low level of the operating system, which is great for a lot of purposes since on a PowerPC computer, 68K software runs seamlessly and I don't know if there's even any obvious way to tell if it's running in an emulator(Rosetta pretty much disappears into the background also, but it's still a bit more obvious). Part of the problem, though, was that the 68K emulator was SO good that parts of core OS were never ported to PowerPC, so you had basic functions of your computer running through an emulator and not natively on the CPU. There were a bunch of key things that were just missing completely like preemptive multitasking and protected memory, and I'm not sure if they ever could have been implemented without a "clean slate" rewrite. NEXT and OS X were the quick way to that, but they really didn't get the kinks ironed out until about 10.4(and IMO never really felt as fast or responsive as the classic OS until the Intel era).

I find one of my biggest "rate limiting steps" with most any scanner is in the film mounting. Even though the 8000 is in fact very slow(IIRC, I'm at well over two minutes to scan 6x7 at the highest res with ICE), I'll live with it and pocket the $2K I saved in buying it. Also, as repairs go, there is one person out there who will replace the Firewire chips and prefers just being sent the board. If you're comfortable, it's easy enough to pull out and obviously much easier to ship than the whole unit. I've never had him do any work, but did communicate with him re: a 4000 I have with this problem. Ultimately I decided it wasn't worth it, although if I ever came across an affordable full-stirp scanner or bulk slide loader I'd do it. As dust goes-initially my III(which I have used quite a bit) gave me terrible results that were about like the old trick of shooting through a vaseline-covered filter. I got brave, buckled down, and decided I was going to try cleaning the optics, figuring I had nothing to lose since these are not particularly valuable or desireable scanners. I found the main mirror not particularly difficult to reach with a Sensor Swab, so cleaned it with one of those and then used a Kimwipe and methanol on the lenses I could reach. It was a night and day difference.

A quick glance through the Coolscan II manual shows that it was an optional configuration. If mine weren't two states away, I'd already have the case open to see if the external one could be reconfigured. If it can be, the next "get it done" project is going to be actually installing one in a computer :) I have a "hotrod" PowerMac G3 Beige minitower that has a 1ghz G4 and boots off a 15K RPM 68 pin SCSI drive(via a separate SCSI card). It also has the obligatory USB/Firewire card and a Radeon 9200 GPU. The G3 minitowers have onboard SCSI(that's not usually used, but it's there) with a 50 pin ribbon cable header on the logic board plus an external DB25, and they have a couple of spare drive bays. That computer seems a logical home for a drive-mount scanner. The only other place I could think to put one would be a PowerMac G4 Mirror Drive Door, since that was the only G4 with a second optical bay. They're much faster than even a hotrod beige could hope to be since the system bus is over double the frequency of a beige. In OS 9, if you run NikonScan as a Photoshop plug in and install the PS 7 multiprocessor extensions, you can take advantage of the second CPU. Of course an Adaptec 2930CU gets you SCSI easily. You have no idea how badly I want to hop in the car now, drive to Kentucky, and actually try doing all of this...even if it means excavating an MDD from the back of a storage unit(the beige I mentioned is easily accessible).

I love VMWare. As it sits now, I have about a half dozen VMs set up in VMWare on my main computer, including OS X 10.6(for PowerPC software), WIndows XP, Windows 7, and CentOS. Admittedly my CentOS VM hasn't been started in a LONG time since I installed it to run one specific piece of software that has since been compiled for macOS. Still, though, it's great and integrates seamlessly with macOS.

I have a Sprintscan 35 that I have used a decent amount, and it's actually a surprisingly good unit. The resolution is nowhere near what the later Nikon scanners offered, but it's fast and does well at its designed resolution. It actually has one sort of unique feature among 35mm-dedicated scanners in that its sensor can scan over a ~40mm width rather than the 24mm of the Nikons and most other 35mm-dedicated scanners. For most folks, this means scanning slides in their "native" orientation rather than orienting correctly post processing. A big deal to some folks, though, will be that it can scan "Superslides"(4x4 127 slides in 2x2 mounts). I haven't used mine in years, but it's worked perfectly for me in the past in OS X Tiger with Vuescan. I would have liked the Polaroid software but never went hunting for it. Along those same lines, if you don't mind dealing with SCSI, there are actually some good Nikon bargains to be had, or really in most any scanner brand. The Coolscan II is a nice compact little unit that does slides only, and at only 1200x1200. IMO, the Coolscan III is an overlooked gem. The 3600x3600 resolution isn't appreciably different from the 4Kx4K of the newer scanners. It has the same single slide and autofeed 6 strip options. Of course, the catch is that it's SCSI, which means that it can be had for peanuts but can be daunting if you don't have...well...more than a few computers around where SCSI is no problem. On the Mac end of things, I THINK that the version of NikonScan it requires is OS 9 only(and Classic won't work with SCSI peripherals), but that's not a huge deal as long as your computer can boot OS 9. My preferred tool for all SCSI scanner work is a PowerMac G4 Quicksilver or Mirrored Drive Door, although on the latter for OS 9 friendliness avoid the version with a FireWire 800 port(there are ways to run OS 9 on it, but they're not obvious), and on the MDD be sure you either get the original restore disks or have access to a CD burner so you can make your own set. I tend toward the Quicksilver as I find them more reliable. My card of choice is the Adaptec 2930CU, which Apple shipped as a build to order option in G3 and G4 towers without built in SCSI. Not that it matters for running a scanner, but it's a firmware compatible card with an internal 50 pin header so you can boot off of an internal or external SCSI drive if you so desire. The external connection is LVD-50, which isn't AS common as a DB-25 or standard 50 pin Centronics, but is probably the 3rd most common SCSI connector and is what the Coolscan V has on it. Isn't SCSI fun?

I have both a Coolscan 8000 and Coolscan V in active use, and for very good reason. The 8000 gives unbelievable results when used to its full potential. I rigged a glass mount rather than paying nutty prices for the factory one and get good sharpness. Still, though, it's a pain to load, is noisy, slow, and a mechanical nightmare. Among other things, I'm always afraid I'm going to strip a gear lining up and pushing in the carrier enough for it to catch and the scanner to take over, but not TOO far or hard. I've never even taken the mounted slide and 35mm film strip carriers out of the boxes they were in when I got the scanner-I think I've only physically laid eyes on the 120 holder, but I've put my fair share of mileage on it. That's not to mention that the Firewire chip can fry if you look at it crosseyed. The V, on the other hand, is just a slick little device to use. The standard holder for these takes a 2x2 mounted slide that you just pop in and then eject by a button on the front. There's a strip "tray" holder that feeds into this, and lets you do a single frame if need be. Most of these come with an automatic film strip adapter, and I highly recommend seeking one out-the strip adapter lets you feed in a loose 2-6 frame film strip, and can move and manipulate the strip easily. It's nice to just load up a strip, have it auto-scan previews, sequence the final scans, and then let it do its thing for a few minutes and be ready to go for the next one. The V offers the same resolution as the 8000/9000, but is faster and doesn't have a serving tray to rack back and forth to scan. Plus, the V is USB, which both makes adaptation easier and frees you from the flaky Firewire chip. The 4000 offers the same resolution and similar speed, but is Firewire with, again, the flaky chip. If you want to pay big bucks and do some hunting, the 4000 and 5000(not the V, unfortunately) allow you to access a couple of potentially really useful accessories. Among them is an APS adapter(if you care about that), and the really useful one IMO, the strip feeder that can handle a full 36 frame strip. I THINK a slide stack loader also exists. The only potential advantage I see for the 9000 when doing 35mm is that it supposedly can do ICE with Kodachrome, something that can be a killer feature if you have a bunch of Kodachrome to scan. I honestly would really like to know what magic is involved in making that work. Given that the optics and AFAIK the electronics are the same in the 8000, I'm not sure why it won't work with the 8000 also. If the boards weren't already so fragile and the things weren't so dang expensive, I'd be tempted to see if an 8000 could be "flashed" or have an EPROM transplant to become a 9000 and gain this functionality.