D800 continued problems. Going to return

[manaheim]

Much better to find out here that you made a mistake, then to return a perfectly good D800. =)

+1

Don't worry about it. If you're like me, you're super apprehensive after buying something expensive, wondering if you did the right thing.

It's easy, when in that state, to jump to alarming conclusions.

 

[orb9220]

"It's easy, when in that state, to jump to alarming conclusions"

Yep do that myself every morning when I get up and look in the Mirror!

But glad you resolved it. And don't be so quick to condemn a whole model based on one camera? As no matter what the price there can be lemons out there in the wild. So I always buy from a reputable dealer with excellent Return/Exchange policies.
.

 

[Eireann]

My D800 backfocuses sometimes but mostly not. I do have problems though with close objects.
Another problem I have with the D800 is oil splatter on the sensor which I accidentally discovered in a photo with a lot of blue sky in it. I increased the contrast and there were suddenly all those darkish round patches, all in the top left quarter of the photograph.

 

[gsgary]

All the test i have read any small movement with thar much resolution you will get a bit of blur one test said high shutter speeds are needed and top quality lenses

 

[matthewo]

All the test i have read any small movement with thar much resolution you will get a bit of blur one test said high shutter speeds are needed and top quality lenses

this just isnt true. if you are coming from a d700 then i could see you could say this, but if your using any of the newer DX cameras suchs as the d7000 with pretty much the same pixel density then blur or small movement wouldnt be any different and require the same level of lenses(other then needing to work well on FX) and user ability


Nikon D800

• 24 X 35.9mm sensor hosting 36.3 mega pixels
• Sensor is 861.6mm squared
• Pixel Pitch is 4.88 microns

Nikon D800 in DX shooting mode

• 24 X 16 sensor hosting 15.4 mega pixels
• Sensor used is 384mm squared
• Pixel Pitch is 4.88 microns

Nikon D7000

• 23.6 X 15.6mm sensor hosting 16.2 mega pixels
• Sensor is 368.16mm squared
• Pixel Pitch is 4.78 microns

so as you can see, even in DX mode the pixels are bigger then the d7000. thus the d800 is only using the center of the sensor and cropping it. also iso sensitivity on the d800 kills the d7000, so why even use a dx body for wildlife / sports.

 

[gsgary]

All the test i have read any small movement with thar much resolution you will get a bit of blur one test said high shutter speeds are needed and top quality lenses

this just isnt true. if you are coming from a d700 then i could see you could say this, but if your using any of the newer DX cameras suchs as the d7000 with pretty much the same pixel density then blur or small movement wouldnt be any different and require the same level of lenses(other then needing to work well on FX) and user ability


Nikon D800

• 24 X 35.9mm sensor hosting 36.3 mega pixels
• Sensor is 861.6mm squared
• Pixel Pitch is 4.88 microns

Nikon D800 in DX shooting mode

• 24 X 16 sensor hosting 15.4 mega pixels
• Sensor used is 384mm squared
• Pixel Pitch is 4.88 microns

Nikon D7000

• 23.6 X 15.6mm sensor hosting 16.2 mega pixels
• Sensor is 368.16mm squared
• Pixel Pitch is 4.78 microns

so as you can see, even in DX mode the pixels are bigger then the d7000. thus the d800 is only using the center of the sensor and cropping it. also iso sensitivity on the d800 kills the d7000, so why even use a dx body for wildlife / sports.

I couldn't give a toss about all your maths i'm going on what a top UK pro magazine where a top pro said what i posted

 

[matthewo]

maybe they where compairing FX to FX, cause pervious FX was 1/3 the pixel density. but a lot of people here have DX cameras also or before so probably most of us on here dont just deal with FX cameras. like me im sure a lot of people went from d90, d7000, d5100, d300s, etc to a d800 FX.

and its not my maths, it was pulled from a website. but it makes sense, pixel density is the import part

 

[gsgary]

maybe they where compairing FX to FX, cause pervious FX was 1/3 the pixel density. but a lot of people here have DX cameras also or before so probably most of us on here dont just deal with FX cameras. like me im sure a lot of people went from d90, d7000, d5100, d300s, etc to a d800 FX.

and its not my maths, it was pulled from a website. but it makes sense, pixel density is the import part

Its shooting in the real world that matters, not in a lab

 

[manaheim]

I've seen some top minds say the whole mp/have to be super careful thing is pretty much bunk.

If it'll blur at 36, it'll blur at 16.

 

[gsgary]

I've seen some top minds say the whole mp/have to be super careful thing is pretty much bunk.

If it'll blur at 36, it'll blur at 16.

It must be all down to user error

 

[Overread]

Here the thing - if you're comparing a 100% crop from a 12MP camera to a 24MP camera you basically have to double your min shutter speed for a sharp shot with the 12MP camera for the 24MP camera.

This is ONLY when comparing the 100% crops - because the double MP value means that the image is that much more enlarged when viewed at 100%. In short you're looking at a much more magnified photo and thus the chances for showing up blur and other errors is that much greater. This doesn't take into account resizing for prints or web display or any other real world normal output of a photo and is only talking about 100% crops.

100% crops are great, but you've got to learn how to read them and how to judge what they are showing you will mean to your real output size. Myself moving from a 400D to a 7D I tend to view more at around 60% instead of 100% on the 7D because the results I see are about in line with what I was used to at 100% with the 400D

 

[spacefuzz]

Ive been dissapointed with my D800 focusing in low contrast scenes / near dark but other than that its been doing great. Hopefully a software update fixes that.

 

[Overread]

Ive been dissapointed with my D800 focusing in low contrast scenes / near dark but other than that its been doing great. Hopefully a software update fixes that.

All cameras struggle in low light low contrast scenes
What you need there is a speedlite flash with an AF assist beam

 

[manaheim]

Here the thing - if you're comparing a 100% crop from a 12MP camera to a 24MP camera you basically have to double your min shutter speed for a sharp shot with the 12MP camera for the 24MP camera.

This is ONLY when comparing the 100% crops - because the double MP value means that the image is that much more enlarged when viewed at 100%. In short you're looking at a much more magnified photo and thus the chances for showing up blur and other errors is that much greater. This doesn't take into account resizing for prints or web display or any other real world normal output of a photo and is only talking about 100% crops.

100% crops are great, but you've got to learn how to read them and how to judge what they are showing you will mean to your real output size. Myself moving from a 400D to a 7D I tend to view more at around 60% instead of 100% on the 7D because the results I see are about in line with what I was used to at 100% with the 400D

That doesn't make sense to me, though...

Imagine we have 100 golf-ball diameter water glasses glued to a table, all right up against each other in a grid pattern (10x10). Imagine I have 100 golf balls hanging directly above those glasses. If I bump the table as I drop the golf balls, they will all miss. The same thing happens if I have 2x as many water glasses and 2x as many golfballs.

Shake is shake.

If you think about it, you could actually argue that with 36MP you can down-sample to hide some of the camera shake, thus making the 36MP camera SHARPER than the 12MP one with the same amount of shake at the same amount of pixels. But let's not be silly. Shake is shake.

Yes?

 

[Overread]

I think thinking of it like golfballs and waterglasses is just going to make a lot of confusion


But think of it like this. If you take a 100mm and a 50mm lens - you can see far more shake on the 100mm than on the 50mm at the same shutter speeds whilst they are below around 1/100sec. The same is true of the MP - if you magnify the final resulting image twice as much you'll see far more blur to the edges.

You can easily see the reverse of this yourself, just downsize photos and you'll see details get the chance to become sharper and less blurred as images get smaller and smaller. Heck take a semi-blurry shot at fullsize and by the time its avatar for a forum size it would be plenty sharp enough .