|
I am now into week 2 of my D200 - my diary continued...
24th December 2005
Today I went to Chester Zoo. This was the first day that I have had the right combination of time, weather and location to really test the D200. I have also just taken delivery of a 70-200mm VR lens so Christmas really has come early (well 3 days early as I got the lens on Thursday). So I pack my bag with 3 1GB cards (only enough for about 150 NEF + Basic shots!), D200, 70-200mm VR lens and SB800 flash in case I got close up to any of the animals.
I have to say that the combination of quality lens and D200 fits very well together. The focusing is just amazing compared to my old D100 + Sigma 100 - 300 EX lens in terms of ability to lock onto desired subject, speed of focus and performance in bad light. I have said this before but the screen on the D200 is fantastic - it was very useful to be able to check the sharpness of my images accurately, especially as I was a little unsure of how well the VR worked on a monopod. After reviewing the images I am still a little unsure as I didn't record which were taken with VR on and which with VR off and I couldn't find any info in the EXIF data (if anybody has any useful tips on this then please let me know - nigel@dansons.co.uk)
Anyway - I took about 400 shots (and still had about 40% left on the battery - a surprise as I though the lens may take up extra power). I ended up taking JPEG Fine images as I knew I wouldn't have enough storage if I used NEF. Next time I will take my Epson view with me.
Grandad - D200, Nikon 70-200mm Lens - 200mm F2.8 / 1/250s / ISO 650
This was taken on JPEG Fine and converted into B&W in photoshop. This is actually a 1/4 of the image as I cropped tight to remove some unwanted fence in the background. I have printed this at A3 size and it still holds out.
|
When I got back home and downloaded my shots I was quite pleased with the results as for the most part it was overcast and I though that a lot of the images would be flat. One thing that immediately strikes me with the images taken with the D200 is the colours and dynamic range available. I don't know whether this is just wishful thinking but it sure seems to be much better than what I could achieve with my D100.
Urban Camouflage - D200, Nikon 70-200mm Lens - 200mm F2.8 / 1/350s / ISO 250
Again this is a very small crop of the image. I like the way the camera has managed to expose the image correctly - as most of the images here this required almost no correction in photoshop for levels or colour adjustment.
|
I printed my first reasonable quality images out today on my Epson 2100 at A3+. The printed results seem to show a greater differential than when viewed on screen over my D100. The print of the animal grazing below looked fantastic when printed at A3+ full page. There wasn't any hint of compression artifacts or pixelation and this image was shot at JPEG Fine.
Grazing - D200, Nikon 70-200mm Lens - 200mm F2.8 / 1/320s / ISO 160
The colour shown here is exactly how it was taken. I have only slightly adjusted the levels in photoshop. One of my only issues with the D200 is that it does under expose - so I compensate for this in camera.
|
I will be posting other images that I took today here...
Ape Crossing - D200, Nikon 70-200mm Lens - 70mm F4.0 / 1/2000s / ISO 250
25th - 29th December
Well! - I have had quite an eventful Christmas! On Tuesday 27th December at 2:30pm Thomas Charles Danson arrived 8 weeks early! This was quite a shock to my wife and I (and grandparents!) as it all happened within 4 hours. Thomas weights 4lbs 6oz and is doing really well in the special care unit. Obviously I have taken many pictures of him but not really had chance to update the site. I have added a couple more pictures below and hope to add more to my diary in a few days time.
Thomas - D200, Sigma 15-30mm Lens - 24mm / 0.5s / ISO 800
This morning (29th) was very cold (-6oc) and I managed to stop and take a photo that I had wanted to take for some time given the right conditions. I have now started to use the RAW + Basic JPEG for all my landscape shots and using NC to process them until the photoshop plugin arrives. The quality that you get in a RAW image is excellent. It has many advantages over JPEG - however, the main advantage for me is that it is like using a undeveloped negative - you have not hardcoded any information into the image like a JPEG does such as colour balance, exposure latitude, sharpening and compression. I have now printed quite a few A3+ images and the results are so much better than I had originally hope for. Although it has to be said that you do need good lenses to see the improvements over a D100. The difference is much more pronounced with my 70-200 f2.8 VR lens than my 24-80mm f3.5 lens.
Sun Tree - D200, Nikon 70-200mm VR Lens - 155mm / f8 / 1/60s / ISO 100
|