K10D to D300, was it a good move ?

Well Dan prompted me to get my butt in gear and do what I said I would do. Been hell of a busy lately with work so I’ve not had a lot of spare time to get fully up to speed with the D300/Nikon system. I’ve only done a couple of studio shoots and some snapping around the garden etc.

Here’s a brief summary of the pro’s and con’s I’ve observed so far compared to the K10D/Pentax system.

Con’s first…………
Comparing K10D + Grip to D300 without grip, It’s heavier, very noticable.
Lens release button is on the wrong side, you can’t change a lens with your left hand while holding the grip portion of the body like you can with the K10D, annoying at best.
4 way control pad is in line with your nose for left eye users, pain in the a…
Nikon Control Pro not as user friendly as Pentax Remote Assistant, Pentax interface is far superior but the Nikon software has lots more options.
Miss my DA16-45

Pro’s……..
Metering is spot on, not 90% or 95% but 99.99% of the time.
Focus system, well I was fairly happy with the K10D focus speed and accuracy, the out of focus shots I did get I put them down to me, focusing is very very quick and accurate (even better with last weeks firmware update), I think I’ve had 4 shots out of focus in over 1500 taken apart from the ones where the subject is flying, you get to choose between 11 or 51 points and dynamic groups of 9, 21 or 51 (seems to linked to the meter).
I’ve never had the desire for machine gunning, but there’s something pleasureable about pressing the trigger and doing 8 frames a second.
3D colour traking is very effective, lock on, keep the subject in the 51point focus area and the focus point moves with the subject.
But the most significant (by a long long way) feature is the flash system, there are too many differences between the Nikon and Pentax flash usage to list but this feature alone is worth the defection.

This is by no means an exhaustive list as I’m still in the midst of getting to know the whole Nikon system, do I regret moving…no….sad…yes….I wish I could run the two systems side by side.

Here’s some pic's from a studio shoot on Sunday past, these are NEF’s (14 bit) processed in LR 2.1 with no adjustments except output sharpening set to Low for screen and resized (i've kept them small, hope they are not too slow at loading)

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Cheers
Brian.
LBA is good for you, a Lens a day helps you work, rest and play.

Nice set of shots Brian.

Tell us, as these where taken in a studio environment, presumably with studio flash lighting, does the Nikon flash system actually give you much advantage?

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Peter E Smith

My flickr Photostream

Looks like the Pros outweigh the cons to me.
I know that had money not been an issue I would have gone for a D300 instead of the K10D but saying that the money I have spent on lenses that I don't need and flashes that are the wrong type (thanks to Clarky ) I could prob have bought one in the first place along with a couple of decentish lenses.

I have seen someone selling a Sigma 150mm f2.8 macro for £270 on another forum and seeing as they dont wasnt to bring it out for Pentax Im thinking of buying it along with a used D50 just for macro.

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. My Flickr

Without a doubt

Take the onboard flash to start with, it can be set to iTTL(PTTL equiv) or manual, in manual mode you have complete control from full power down to 1/128 and high speed sync, it also work as the controller in wireless mode just like the K10D but it can control two banks of compatible flash guns all controled from the camera.

Stick an SB800 on the shoe and the available options become enormous. The two options I really like and have played around with quite a lot are distance priority, you set the distance on the flash, also in iTTL when using bounce, it works it all out for you, it even detects when you stick the defuser on (aka Stofen). To get a handle on how configurable it is Thom Hoggan has written a book especially for the Nikon flash system, for location shoots it should prove very good.

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Cheers
Brian.
LBA is good for you, a Lens a day helps you work, rest and play.

Very nice shots Brian, but certainly no better than those you showed us in your Pentax days - which I take as meaning the Pentax kit is just as capable for a fraction of the cost. Happy days for the rest of us!

Now I know the Nikon iTTL is superior to the Pentax P-TTL system, but what I think Mannesty meant was that under the conditions these were taken surely everything was set manually using studio equipment? If that's the case then you're just swapping a mediocre protocol that you don't use for a better one that you still don't use? Either way the end result is identical - or am I missing something?

Glad you have no regrets though - as long as you're happy then that's the main thing.

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Joining the Q

Looking at those photos I am less thinking "I have the wrong camera" and more thinking "I am in the wrong job..."

Cheers, Kris.

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Kris Lockyear
It is an illusion that photos are made with the camera… they are made with the eye, heart and head. Henri Cartier-Bresson
Lots of film bodies, a couple of digital ones, too many lenses (mainly older glass) and a Horseman LE 5x4.
My website

The reason for a system change was explained in the fire sale post but just to reiterate, two tog job, one system. I've never ever said that the Nikon system was any better at producing images over the Pentax system, in fact I said privately to another forum member that the Pentax would be hard to beat in the studio



Not had the time or occasion to do a location shoot yet, need to grab another SB800 before I do.


You and me both

BTW: Thanks for the comments, appreciated.

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Cheers
Brian.
LBA is good for you, a Lens a day helps you work, rest and play.

In which case I missed that bit - my bad!

I look forward to seeing some location shots when you get your other flash - it'll be nice to see what it's capable of.

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Joining the Q

It looks like the D300 is a good move, just for the flash control.

I am still stuck in the dark ages with an istDS, but I generally prefer available light, so flash is generally no an issue, but image stabilisation with any lens might be if I moved to K10D/K20D. Arguably, D300 high ISO performance might be the answer to this.

But the K20D high ISO performance is excellent as well
Matt

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http://www.mattmatic.co.uk
(For gallery, tips and links)

Actually I would quite like to see some photos taken with the K20D using high iso. I would also be interested in how users would rate the Iso performance against the K10D as in is the K20D 1600 iso the same as the K10D 800 iso (or worse/better).

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. My Flickr

So they should, given the price differential.

At SRS, body only, a D300 is £925.00, against £540.00 for a K20D.

And, of course, O'Brien omitted a few cons:

The D300 provides fewer pixels, is less well-sealed, and lacks image stabilisation.

And of course, it doesn't take Limited lenses.

For a studio photgrapher, camera flash is irrelevant. If O'Brien is using the Nikon flash system for his studio shots, he's crazy. And if he's not, what's the value of it?

Likewise, speed is of little benefit in the studio.

So where is the benefit of the D300? It's heavier. That's good, I'm told. Probably by a weight-lifter.

G

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Keywords: Charming, polite, and generally agreeable.

ISO3200
The K10D and K20D do have different qualities - CCD vs CMOS.
However, I have found that when shooting RAW I can go one or two stops further with the K20D. Even up to ISO2500 the images come out surprisingly clean.
Sorry I don't have other examples I can post online.
I'm happy
Matt

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http://www.mattmatic.co.uk
(For gallery, tips and links)

Thanks Matt, thats pretty good.
Im presuming it would be helpful when doing macro as well, will the extra mp also give a better crop factor?

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. My Flickr

Mike,
We've been using the K20D with extension tubes + SMC-F 100mm/f2.8 and a tethered AF540 for doing very high macro work. Took images of BGA (Ball Grid Array) components that have tiny balls, 1mm apart (IIRC). Magnification was pretty impressive and having the extra MP did help in that case.
Not sure how useful it would in other circumstances though...
Matt

PS. Sorry for going off topic

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http://www.mattmatic.co.uk
(For gallery, tips and links)