My thoughts on the D600 for bird photography

[coastalconn]

Just in case anyone cares. I met up with a friend today that has a D600. You know I've been adamant about DX for my birds and my opinion hasn't changed. I thought IQ and DR was actually pretty awesome on the D600. Hands down the D600 smokes the D300 with noise levels across the board. I would even agree with the masses that the D600 is downright awesome in general...

A few things that didn't work for me... I was not fond of the crop mode at all. Maybe I would eventually get used to it, but looking through the nice bright viewfinder and only using the rectangle in the center seemed strange. I also found the AF system not on par with the D300 for acquisition and tracking which would be the biggest downside. For me the framerate would also be a big disadvantage.

I know the cool thing about full frame is having such a narrow depth of field, the problem is I often had to stop down to get the whole bird in focus which actually counteracts the advantage of the ISO performance a bit.

I'm not trashing the D600 at all, like I said I think it is an awesome camera. I just wanted to post this for anyone that is predominately a bird photographer like I am. I couldn't find any really cool birds so I found some gulls and a Vesper Sparrow... just for some samples... There are a few more on my flickr page in this set... Nikon D600 Sigma 120-300 F2.8 OS test - a set on Flickr

1

Vesper Sparrow by krisinct, on Flickr

2

Seagull testing with D600 1 by krisinct, on Flickr

3

Seagull testing with D600 4 by krisinct, on Flickr

4

Seagull testing with D600 3 by krisinct, on Flickr

 

[TheLost]

Thanks for the quick review...

Did you end up shooting anything in DX/Crop mode? How did you find the buffer in real life shooting?

I've got some cash set aside for a D600 but i keep thinking "wait for whats next!!".

 

[coastalconn]

I thought the buffer was very good. The crop mode seemed kind of goofy to me. It was my friends camera and he had the grid turned on in the viewfinder so it basically just highlighted the rectangle. The way prices are dropping The D600 is a lot of camera for the money especially if it gets down to the 1K mark. The problem I ran into was the max 1/4000th, even at base ISO I had to stop down my lens on white birds so it didn't over expose. The conundrum I'm facing is that DXO mark just put out a review about the sigma 120-300 OS and it scores really high on FF cameras. I'm not sure what all the mumbo jumbo means on dxo mark, but it scored 10 mpix on the D300 and the 500 F4 only scores 9.. by comparison on a d600 the sigma scores 18 mpix and the 500 f4 scores 15...

 

[TheLost]

I'm thinking of getting a D600 for indoor sports (mostly basketball) to supplement my D7100.. The 1/4000 shutter won't be much of an issue for me.

DXO scores are great for internet forums ... A great example is this chart:
Best Zoom models for the D7100 - DxOMark

I've owned two copies of the Sigma 70-200mm F2.8 EX DG HSMII.. in my YEARS of actually using that lens i would score it below the Nikon 70-200 VR1 not higher. There is no way i would give up the Nikon and go back to the Sigma.

I wouldn't put too much faith in the DXOmark scores

 

[JTStrong]

I've pretty much decided on a D610 for my pet photography in part because of the buffer size and the ISO performance. However, when it comes to "crop" mode, I use the one in Photoshop.

 

[Derrel]

I looked at the 1600x reductions you have on Flickr...wow...the 120-300 looks pretty good on that sensor. At to the DxO Mark "Mpix" rating...it's sort of their new system of quantifying how much "sharpness" information a particular camera and lens pairing can actually resolve and show...the performance of a lens is tied to the sensor. "Some lenses" perform well on one sensor, while the same lens can perform less-well on another sensor, based on the MTF of the lens and the sensor's pixel pitch. The difference between 10Mpix and 18 Mpix is pretty significant...the D600 and the 120-300 OS lens shows a hell of a lot more detail on the 24MP FF sensor.

FF sensors tend to "get more out of" a lens than do APS-C sensors, when the same, exact lens sample is mounted on two identical pixel-count sensors.

As to the above reference to the DxO Mark's Mpix scores on the Nikon D7100: They showed the Sigma 70-200 EX-II scoring a 12 Mpix and the 70-200 VR 1 Nikkor scoring 11 Mpix...that's not much of a difference....the "old" Sigma 70-200 scored a 10 Mpix mark on the D7100, while the "old" Tamron 70-200 2.8 scored a disappointing 6 (yes, a SIX!); the NEWEST Tamron 70-200/2.8 with Vibration Correction scored a 16; the newest Nikkor 70-200 2.8 VR-G, the Mark II model, scored a 15 Mpix rating; the Sigma 50-150 scored a 17 Mpix.

The 120-300/2.8 Sigma scored a 16 MPix on the D7100.

So...those are the tested relative sharpness results DxO Mark gathered.

 

[coastalconn]

I looked at the 1600x reductions you have on Flickr...wow...the 120-300 looks pretty good on that sensor. At to the DxO Mark "Mpix" rating...it's sort of their new system of quantifying how much "sharpness" information a particular camera and lens pairing can actually resolve and show...the performance of a lens is tied to the sensor. "Some lenses" perform well on one sensor, while the same lens can perform less-well on another sensor, based on the MTF of the lens and the sensor's pixel pitch. The difference between 10Mpix and 18 Mpix is pretty significant...the D600 and the 120-300 OS lens shows a hell of a lot more detail on the 24MP FF sensor.

FF sensors tend to "get more out of" a lens than do APS-C sensors, when the same, exact lens sample is mounted on two identical pixel-count sensors.

As to the above reference to the DxO Mark's Mpix scores on the Nikon D7100: They showed the Sigma 70-200 EX-II scoring a 12 Mpix and the 70-200 VR 1 Nikkor scoring 11 Mpix...that's not much of a difference....the "old" Sigma 70-200 scored a 10 Mpix mark on the D7100, while the "old" Tamron 70-200 2.8 scored a disappointing 6 (yes, a SIX!); the NEWEST Tamron 70-200/2.8 with Vibration Correction scored a 16; the newest Nikkor 70-200 2.8 VR-G, the Mark II model, scored a 15 Mpix rating; the Sigma 50-150 scored a 17 Mpix.

The 120-300/2.8 Sigma scored a 16 MPix on the D7100.

So...those are the tested relative sharpness results DxO Mark gathered.

I'm loving the lens, I had a moment of panic when I saw the review and it seems that the D300 doesn't do the lens justice. Nikon is so cruel not to give me a D400

Anyways I uploaded 2 different versions of the seagulls... I think the lens is pretty awesome on the D600 for sure.. These are not resized just cropped so you can really get an idea. I only did a quick in the field AF fine tune, but still gives a pretty good idea...

100% crop

Seagull 100% crop Nikon D600 testing by krisinct, on Flickr

1960x1168

Seagull only cropped not downsized D600 test 1 by krisinct, on Flickr

for full size... All sizes | Seagull only cropped not downsized D600 test 1 | Flickr - Photo Sharing!

 

[DarkShadow]

Nice and there is no WD-40 splats in your images.:mrgreen:

 

[Derrel]

I'd seen the earlier test shots done with the D300, and thought that the sensor was not doing the lens justice; I've shot a LOT (since 2005) with the D300's contemporary 12 MP APS-C Nikon body, the D2x...12 MP is not enough megapixels on crop-frame to do a modern lens justice. It's just....not. Seeing what the D600 can do reaffirms my suspicions.

 

[DarkShadow]

I'd seen the earlier test shots done with the D300, and thought that the sensor was not doing the lens justice; I've shot a LOT (since 2005) with the D300's contemporary 12 MP APS-C Nikon body, the D2x...12 MP is not enough megapixels on crop-frame to do a modern lens justice. It's just....not. Seeing what the D600 can do reaffirms my suspicions.

Makes a lot sense to me but what do I know. That lens and D600 look like a great match.