Rainy day blues. And cold too.

I spent the day getting to know my new camera. Specifically, how the auto focus and metering are interrelated. No need to bore anyone here with the details. It has way more options that I'll probably ever use. Some pretty neat stuff, too!

Here's a pic out the back window.

 

I made this one from the lower right quadrant of the previous one, with a little help from Photoshop.

 

Black Beauties. :)

 

And something with a little colour ...

 

Big gun, little 'un

A bunch of people (well, okay, two of you) wanted an update on the Nikon D300. Did I end up buying it after all?

Well ... YES! I did.

I finally managed to put the order in successfully and bought the camera. I also bought a longer zoom lens, the Nikon 18-200 VR. The "VR" stands for "Vibration Reduction". There are sonic motors in the lens that vibrate one of the lens elements, the degree of which depends on how shaky you are holding it, which in turn dampens that shakiness. It seems to work! (see example below)

I was tempted to order it from either Adorama or Ritz, two huge US camera stores that are currently offering excellent prices on the D300/18-200 combo. But Nikon USA is not the same as Nikon Canada (I was warned about warranty issues) and I would've had to pay duty and brokerage charges and more GST, yada, yada, yada, so I opted for a Canadian supplier.

The best price in Canada I found was at Vistek but I would've only saved about $50 over Blacks and Blacks has a 60 day lowest price guarantee. If you find any advertised price in Canada that's lower than what you paid within 60 days of purchase, Blacks will make up the difference. They also offer their own image management software and free prints with each order, plus a DVD that has 1200 pages of info on all things photographically digital. So, I stayed with Blacks.

First blush

Here's the visual side by side comparison ...

 
D300 with AF-S Nikkor 18-200 VR and D40 with kit AF-S Nikkor 18-55

The D300 is twice the camera and twice the weight when compared to the D40. I was going to get the 18-200 lens, anyway, and planned to use it on both cameras, if I kept both bodies. On the D40, though, this lens throws the whole thing out of balance. It's like putting a V8 engine into a Pinto. Vaarooooom! It feels more balanced on the D300, but either way, it makes it necessary to support the assemblage by the lens. No more one-handed shooting.

The D300 is more complicated, too. If you can figure out how to attach the lens and install the battery and memory card on the D40, you're in business. The Quick Start Guide for the D40 is a fold-out sheet that explains everything from attaching the camera strap to loading the software to putting on a slide show on TV. The Quick Start Guide for the D300 is a 40 page booklet and barely covers what's in the numerous menus. Although most things are intuitive, to fully understand what you can do (there's a lot of customization available), you have to read through the 400+ page manual.

But does it take better pictures?

I've only had it for 48 hours and I've only had time to take one 10 minute stroll around the block, so I'm not entirely sure. Like Lance Armstrong, though, who says, "It's Not About the Bike", I believe it's not about the camera. A camera is a tool for recording what you see out there. One isn't better than the other, but it may offer easier ways to do things you do regularly that another one can't do at all.

When I'm shooting colour I like really saturated colour, the Velvia look. One of the big reasons I wanted a D300 was for its superior rendering of beautifully saturated, vivid colour. Others may think them a bit garish. (I ought to mention the pics on this blog look good on my monitor, but are a bit on the "high" side on my monitor at work. I'm trying to figure out how to compensate for this.) The D300 promises to offer up the Velvia look without having to resort to Photoshopping each image.

Before heading out I managed to navigate through the Shooting Menu to the Picture Control settings and changed it from Standard to Vivid, and then modified that to the most saturated possible rendering.

Here's what the colours look like right out of the camera without any Photoshop manipulation. The colours are much more saturated in the photos than they appeared to the eye at the time. Beautiful!

 
 
 

Normal vs. Extra Vivid

I like this saturated look for nature and man-made items found on my walks and bike rides, but even I agree it's too saturated for people pics. Skin tones come out way too red. So, I saved these settings in one of the custom menus and then set up another, less saturated one, for people pics, and saved that one, too. Now I can change back from one to the other as needed. It might be even quicker to do if I can program the Fn button, but I know there are predetermined limits, so I'm not holding my breath.

Here's a comparison of the two settings, "Standard" (for people pics) and "Vivid +" (for most saturated colours). Jule may not be happy to see these experimental shots of her here, but I'm sure she's willing to sacrifice some dignity in the name of science! Right honey? :)

 
 

Funny thing is, I printed 4x6" prints of these two shots and the more I looked at them, the less I notice the red cast ... I wonder if it's like those old ladies who douse themselves with perfume each morning because they've lost their sense of smell after using it all those years and don't realize how it can make the eyes water in a confined space

Tempting fate

When we want to do something and there's a "snag" which makes it difficult to continue, Jule says, "Well, that's just fate - it wasn't meant to be ...", or words to that effect.

Well, that's what happened to me last night when I tried to order a Nikon D300 from Black's.

I can't tell you how much this has been eating away at me the past two weeks. A dozen times I've told myself I will trade the D40 in for the D300, and then, no, I'll keep the 40 and just get the longer lens, and then, no, I'll keep the 40, anyway, 'cause it's so light, but get the 300 because it's the one that fits what I want to do and besides, it will be the last camera I'll ever buy (although with consumer electronics life expectancy these days, I wouldn't want to bet on that).

What happened with the camera purchase is that I misread the security code on the VISA card. I mistook a "0" for an "8" as the card had been swiped numerous times and there was a streak across the numbers. It didn't work when I put it through, offering me instead a "Declined" message. I got out a loupe and saw my error, magnified 30x, and redid it - another four times, but each to no avail. It wasn't going through. Then I had a slew of emails from the payment service telling me I was declined and a duplicate set from Black's saying I'd better call customer service to make sure no payment went through. Good grief! Was this fate saying, STEP AWAY FROM THE CREDIT CARD? Don't buy the D300?

So this morning I called Black's customer service and was informed it was too early - call back later. Figures.

Then the phone rang. It was a 514 area code and I hesitated in answering since it's usually someone wanting me to try the National Post on a trial basis. Turned out it was VISA informing me there was some strange activity on my credit card last night. I was thrilled to hear this, as I was not using my "internet VISA" (the one I got with a purposely low limit just for internet purchases) since the cost of the D300 was over its limit. He told me the first transaction had an error in the security code. The next four were done properly, but since the flag had been dropped on the first one, no others were allowed and it was too late to call and tell me about it last night. Excellent! And he hoped there was no inconvenience to me. Are you kidding? I'm totally impressed with this level of security. Keep up the good work, I said.

So, he wanted to know if the transaction was going to go through now that he had reset everything for me. They'd be expecting it. I hesitated. Ye-e-s-s-s-s, maybe, I said. I may do it from my home computer tonight. I hate to challenge fate, though, you know. Now I have the rest of the day to think about it. Again.

Decison time, but which one?

OK. I've spent about 20 hours reading and rereading articles on the net and I've only changed my mind twice a day, about which camera to buy. It really is a toss up. Unlike 25 years ago when glass ruled and you bought a lens system and the camera was only needed as a light-tight box to hold the film, today's cameras actually make a difference. Each processes data coming through the lens differently and yield, sometimes, drastically different results. All cameras do an adequate job of giving you adecent picture, but some cameras fit one's personal vision much better than others. And herein lies the problem, for me.

I've decided to go with Nikon over Canon. Canon is a great company and they have super products, but from a user-friendly pov, Nikon can't be beat. Their current crop of cameras are very intuitive for the photographer and some of the stuff they have as standard features make so much sense, I can't see why Canon hasn't incorporated them. I'm talking about things like one-button deleting and easy card formatting (which ought to be done after every upload) and data embedding into the EXIF file. Most photogs use this for copyright notice, but you're free to add two hidden lines of text as you see fit into every image.

So it's Nikon this time around. But what model?

I've determined that the D40, even though labeled as an entry level model, does quite a lot considering its price tag. In fact, the D40x, D60 and even the D80 don't offer much more, even though the D80 is twice the price. You're not really getting 2x your money's worth. So the D40 is a got bet.

Beyond that is the D200 the D300 and D3. The D200 has been replaced by the D300. In fact the D300 is SO good relative to the D200, it makes no sense to go the the D200 even at discounted, clearance prices. The D3 is $5350, and that's just ridiculous. And some say the D300 is pretty close to it, spec wise. The D300 is available locally for $1870, body only. (To put things into perspective, though, the Canon EOS-1DS MKIII lists for $8250 and is, arguably, the world's best, right now!)

But the D40 is only $540, and THIS week, it can be had at Blacks (web only) for $470 including the 18-55mm kit lens. I'd need this lens, anyway, with the D300.

So it looks like a no-brainer. Relative to the others it's practically free! Over the D300 it's a savings of about $1200 which can be put towards more esoteric glass, like a 12-24mm ultra-wide.

The only thing stopping me from putting in the order this minute is the thought that I'd eventually end up with the D300 anyway, so why not just get it over with and forget about the D40? The D40, though, is the light-as-a-feather-go-everywhere camera and that's important to me.

Maybe I need them both! :)