| Joined: | Mon Apr 2nd, 2012 |
| Location: | South Lakeland, UK |
| Posts: | 4066 |
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It was chunkier and heavier than I was expecting. Showing signs of heavy use despite only about 78,000 shutter clicks. The missing paint doesn't bother me, more concerned about the image quality from long exposures.
I forgot to take my PB4 bellows with me because I think it will be a perfect camera to duplicate my negatives and slides at last. I can't mount the D3 on the PB4 without an extension tube, which makes the focus too close to copy slides with any lens I have. I will go back for that.
We set the camera up outside on a tripod with a Nikkor 24mm AIS f/2.8 and a sigma 50mm f1.4, we tried some 30second exposures at 3,200 and 1,600 ISO. Long exposure noise reduction turned off. The results were quite remarkable, there was some noise and a couple of hot pixels but otherwise the images were very good.
The light gathering capability of the 36Mp sensor is quite remarkable. We captured the images as NEF's.
This is with the Sigma, ISO 3,200 @ f11 processed in Lightroom Classic WB and exposure adjustments only (auto AI), no sharpening or noise reduction
This is an 'as shot' 24mm ISO 1,600 @ f/9.0 unprocessed.
After basic WB and exposure adjustments in Lr (auto AI), no sharpening.
Above image cropped to 1:1, 100%, screen pixel to image pixel.
The TV aerials were barely visible to the naked eye. The hot pixels can just be seen towards the right side of the roof, I haven't been searching with magnifying glass but I did spot about 6, there may be more, I don't call that excessive.
I see the D800 (or newer) as a way of photographing the night sky with more dynamic range, better resolution and less noise than the D3 can achieve. I don't see it as a replacement for the D3, far from it.
I need to see it fit a PB4 bellows and make at least 40 repeated night sky 30 second exposures without image degradation. On paper the D810 is better spec, and obviously the D850 is bees knees but I have to consider if the D800 gets me near enough to satisfy my needs.
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Robert.