 "D700" | 2009-11-15 |
| - Reviewed By User: A2B6156ENOSTSH |
| This camera represents a great leap in digital camera technology. The standard Nikon quality is not new but shooting at high ISO's with no noise is transcending. The feature set is deep and will take some time to master - but worth every second. The only thing that falls shy of amazing are fleshtone colors when shooting portraits. The Fugi S5 still is the leader in that category. |
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 "Very Nice Camera" | 2009-11-09 |
| - Reviewed By User: A1KA4L3IZ5IRPB |
Very nice camera. I am a long time Nikon user and while their lenses have become less sturdy over the years, they are still very good glass (at least until after rough handling, then they become less sharp -- this is a departure from the lenses which made Nikon great historically which seemed to be able to withstand much more abuse). So now that I own three or four good lenses, I'm somewhat married to their bodies.
Anyway, this was a fairly big upgrade. Not cheap, and it is replacing an 8 year old D100 (not a bad camera, but 8-years is pretty old in digital camera years).
Why the D700? In a word "FX" or full size sensor, so that the lenses behave as they would on a 35mm camera (vis-a-vis their focal length). Of the options for Nikon body with FX sensor, this was the cheaper model.
Am I happy? Certainly! I love the camera and it takes wonderful photos. It is a little heavier than the D100, but it is sturdy and takes superb photos. Menus are fairly well laid out and powerful. I've had difficulty dealing with the camera's RAW output (.nef files), but I think it is just a matter of modernizing my software.
What's new in the past 8 years? Wow, a lot more than I would have guessed. Ask me again in six months (I've only had the body for a month now). Low light shooting really stands out. You can shoot at 6400 ISO and get pretty good results -- pretty amazing actually.
Why 4-stars, not five? Price. |
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| "Amazing" | 2009-10-24 |
| - Reviewed By User: A2VW3E1N678RC2 |
I have owned my D700 for several months now and as an avid amateur I am thrilled with the performance of this camera. I do a lot of local music venues and deal extensively with low-light conditions. The D700 is the premier camera for what I do. Shooting at 6400 ISO with my 50mm f1.8 has been the perfect match.
The portrait work I've done has yielded incredible results under changing light conditions and picture quality is simply amazing. It's a pricey option for a non-pro, but I want that level of quality, features, low-light sensitivity, and expandability. Having a motorcycle to sell to finance was helpful.
I hear this is the perfect camera for wedding photographers, but haven't had the opportunity to try yet. AT 5fps, it's not the king of sports cameras, but for the price between this and the D3, the real world has to go with the D700.
Amazing is the best word to describe. |
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| "The nearly-perfect camera" | 2009-10-23 |
| - Reviewed By User: A2KWC0U0G8F0XG |
I've been shooting for over 30 years, shooting Nikon, Canon, Leica and Olympus. I'm a believer that the photographer is far more important than the camera, and I can pretty much get great results from any camera. But this camera simply stands out from the pack. It is nearly perfect. And I say that as someone who usually gets professional cameras.
If you want to know about the camera, read the review on [...]. No sense in me adding more.
After living with this camera for 9 months, I have lost all desire for any other camera. I'm a gear-head and love to get my hands on new equipment. I love getting new cameras and always figure out what I would improve on it. But this camera just does everything and I (this amazes me) just don't care what else they come out with. The feel, the controls, the image quality and overall performance is simply amazing. It is nearly perfect - so what are the "flaws"?
Well, I wish I could lock the shooting banks. The camera lets you set it up and store your settings in a "bank". This lets you rapidly change to a particlar bank to load your settings. You might have one bank set for sports, another for night time shooting, another for multi-flash lighting, etc. The flaw? Any change you make changes the bank. So your bank changes as you change the camera. That nearly wrecks shooting banks for me. The workaround is to set your banks, then save them to a CF card (I use that old 1GB card I had laying around). Before a shoot, I pop the card in and reload all the settings. I just with I could lock the banks and not have to carry that card around.
And you can't combine the mirror-up mode with the self timer. You either have to use a remote release (another thing to carry) or let it time out (it fires after 30 seconds with the mirror up).
That's pretty much it. Well, it is not cheap, but considering you get the same performance as the Nikon D3 for half the price, this is an amazing deal.
Is 12 megapixels enough? Well, I have a 44" printer and print 24" x 36" all the time from Photoshop CS4. Yes, 12MP is fine for me. If you print larger than that, then more pixels would be nice. Of course, one of the advantages of this camera is with only 12MP, each pixel (sensel) is huge and captures a lot of light. I shoot at night without a flash all the time. This camera is simply capable of doing things that were never really possible before.
Just remember - the camera is an accessory to the lens system. I have a lot of Nikon pro lenses and this camera gets the most out of that glass. If you are thinking about getting cheap glass for this camera, you may wish to reconsider. I'd rather have a pro lens and a low-end camera than a pro camera with cheap glass. Glass lasts for a long time and this camera can use nearly every Nikon lens made since the middle 1960's. Invest in your lenses, because they tend to go up in price, while the cameras get cheaper and better.
If you want a suggestion, consider this camera with the Nikkor 85mm f/1.4 AF-D. This combination makes some jaw-dropping images and every girl loves it. |
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| "Nikon gets it right!" | 2009-10-18 |
| - Reviewed By User: A3J93QO9ZZP5C6 |
This is my fourth and best Nikon DLSR. I still use a D300 for wildlife photography and and D200 for infra-red photography.
The quality of the images with the D700 are outstandning. You will want to use your best fast lenses to get the most out of this camera. You get 95% of the features of a D3 at a fraction of the cost. If you have a D90, D200 or D300 the ergonomics are familar letting you get up to speed in a hurry. There is very low noise up to 3200 ISO. I don't know how Nikon can make it better.
I bougth the D700 with a 14-24 2.8, I also use it with my old reliable 28-70 2.8 and a 70-200 2.8 VR.
If you want outstanding landscapes and portraits, this should be your first choice
I expect to own this camera for a very long time.
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| "Amazing!!!" | 2009-10-16 |
| - Reviewed By User: ADMKHKKLWGO40 |
| Amazing high quality clean images. This is true not only for high ISO but even at low ISO. I shoot mostly landscape and find amazing detail and when using ISO 200 for example, the clean ISO advantage of this camera can still be seen. I just had a 32 by 21 inch print made, and it looks excellent! A perfect upgrade from my D200. |
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Expedited Available
