Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2011/08/13
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]Peter, I bought the D7000 to back up the D3s. In many situations it had advantages over the D3s, which is again probably on stop better than the D700. Let me explain. I was 'forced' into nikon by the scuttling of the R system and my desire to continue using an SLR in far away places. I had already risked the DMR in the Arctic and Antarctic and had 'survived', but I knew that the dusty conditions of our next venture to Africa would sorely test the Leica: this was confirmed by Jay and Howard, who simply told me to "forget it". Using a DMR R9 I was used to the heaviness of the bigger pro cameras, so I decided that while I still "could" (read still strong enough) I should at least replace the wonderful Leica with a similar built/quality beast. Hence the D3s. It was not easy to get one, especially when the one I ordered was 'flooded' in the tsunami, but I picked up one second hand along with new lenses, concentrating on telephotos: 300 f2.8, 70-200 f2.8 and 24-70 f2.8 (the last one is NOT a favorite lens: great quality, but very bulky and stripped of VR, which is one of the advantages of Nikon V the older Leicas). So armed with the D3s, I needed a back up: after all that was one of the 5 reasons to go Nikon. (battery technology, auto/follow focus, VR, dust control and ongoing system). I looked at the D3x: too expensive, no dust control, huge files, D700: good price, great camera, slower fps and 'old' technology (surely due for an upgrade) and the D7000: great price, small, might convince Helen to use it and fantastic technology. As you know I also have the M9, a beast of another colour as you know. I chose the D7000, and am very happy. I should say at this point that the Canon system is probably better for someone wanting to go telephoto hunting for critters in that the cameras are the right way round. The super fast fps autofocus/follow focus machine is also the camera with the smaller "magnifying" sensor and the fantastically priced 5D is full frame with more pixels. My Nikon system has the full frame 12mp armed with fast fps autofocus etc 'perfect' for wild life, but boy to get an 800mm lens would be pec destroying, and the bigger 16mp 1.5x mag sensor on the 'lesser' performance beast, so I've found myself tempted too often to bolt the D7000 onto the big lenses to get that extra reach and resolution. I will try to post some examples, but overall, the speed features of the D3s are simply amazing, but the D7000 is not far behind. I do have trouble with both systems chasing the wrong focus point, but less with the D3s, in that regard the D7000 can cause you to miss occasional shots, but in some ways, I also found the focus tracking on the D7000 sometimes seemed better than the older designed top of the range beast. It certainly had a very high 'hit' rate when I was shooting birds in flight off a cliff top as I will show, and the extra resolution and mag factor mean that if I bolt the 300mm lens with 2x converter, I get a 600mm image on the D3s with 12mp of wonderful pixels, but 'feel' the temptation of either using only a 1.4 teleconverter and getting a similar 'reach' not allowing for the extra enlargement factor of those 16 very very good pixels, or with the 2x having 900mm equivalent, similar speed autofocus (its in the lens) similar VR (its in the lens) and the extra 4mp of data to play with in LR. I 'think' the pixel data looks slightly better on the D3s, and boy can it handle low light, but in good light the D7000's pixels look pretty damn good. For me, there was little hesitation in using the D3s at 6 to 12 thousand ISO and little hesitation in using the D7000 at 1.6 to 3.2 thousand ISO: EXAMPLES: 1. Full frame from the D3s. I was using the 70-200 with a 1.7tc. This image is half size, ie 1/4 the pixels to allow comparison with the rest: view large size. I took 6 to 8 with the D3s, missed a couple of the smaller birds you will see later and changed to the greater magnification of the D7000: no issue with light on this day of course. http://tinyurl.com/429l2qd 2. Full frame with the D7000 now of course with effective 500mm lens. http://tinyurl.com/3l2xrae 3. Full frame D7000. Smaller faster moving bird. I think the D7000 locked in on it slightly better than the D3s simply because it took up more of the frame now that I was using a 500mm equivalent, but remember the lens is much lighter than it would have been on the FF camera to get the same 'view'. http://tinyurl.com/4xdtknk 4. Full frame D7000 just to show it was not luck ;-) I had a very high hit rate on focus of better than 50% more like 75 http://tinyurl.com/443a54f 5. Full frame of very fast moving small bird heading east west across my line of sight: amazing. I have done this with the DMR, but hit rate was very much lower, and I had to pre-focus -- ie guess the range. http://tinyurl.com/3ec6424 6. Here is the same image magnified to show you the degree of magnification you get by having the extra pixels: ie cropped to be 12mp. http://tinyurl.com/3bno78y 7. Here the crop is 1/4 the frame to give you some idea of what the sensor on the D7000 is like. This is not really the 'fairest' example, as the bird was moving very quickly and there MUST be some movement blurr. Boy VR is great though: all these were hand held and I think the only real degradation is due to the minor movement at 1/2500th sec http://tinyurl.com/3oaj2jw 8. Static subject D3s 1/4 frame ie 3mp interpolated up to match the next D7000 image. http://tinyurl.com/3zl5rt6 9 Same magnification ie 3mp interpolated to 4mp but this time the D3s is at 1800 ISO as well http://tinyurl.com/3fchd98 10. D7000 using quarterframe ie 4mp image static subject reasonable light http://tinyurl.com/4x4fdkl 11. D7000 using 1/4 frame now in the jungle: its dark and I really needed the 3200 ISO. Not like those images at high ISO taken in sunshine, where they always look remarkable: this is the reality. No noise reduction http://tinyurl.com/3bnfggp 12. Same image with 50% noise reduction. I am not a noise reduction expert, it was done quick and dirty in LR http://tinyurl.com/3bswsgn 13. LAST IMAGE: for now. D3s at 3200 ISO when it was really needed. Here there is no image noise reduction and remember you are looking at 3mp image ie 1/4 frame interpolated to 4mp http://tinyurl.com/3op5u9d Tell me what you think Alastair > Today I was at Glazer's in Seattle, and had a chance to handle two > cameras that interest me--the Nikon D700 and D7000. I've long had a bit > of D700-lust, as it is one of the best available-dark cameras out there. > I liked the big viewfinder of the D700 But after hefting them both, I > looked at the D700 and thought, "would you really carry that around > much?" Hmm--maybe not. Still, the ability to shoot at ISO 3200 like I > shoot the M8 at 800 is very tempting. > > On the other hand, the D7000 seems like a "Goldilocks" camera--a lot > about it is "just right." It felt good in my hands. The viewfinder is > not as spacious as the D700, but quite usable. The new sensor (also in > the Pentax K5) has previously unheard-of performance (for an APS-C > sensor) in both dynamic range and low light ability. There are buttons > for the commonly-used functions. The shutter is relatively quiet (the > D700 is MUCH louder). Dpreview and DXOMark comparisons indicate it might > have a 1-stop low-light advantage over the M8, compared to the D700's 2 > stops or more. But that's lab tests. How about in real life? > > So... I would be interested in anyone's experience with the D700 and/or > D7000--particularly those who can compare it to the M8 or M9. I know > the difference between an SLR and a rangefinder. I'm most interested in > image quality, handling, and real-world available-dark performance. K5 > users are welcome to chime in, too. > > --Peter > > _______________________________________________ > Leica Users Group. > See http://leica-users.org/mailman/listinfo/lug for more information >