Marcello Geerts
Leading Member
Dear all,
In a previous post I reported the receipt of the D3S and compared the body to the D300 with grip. Saturday and Sunday I gave the D3S a first workout and these are my findings. I am not doing a direct scene comparison but I am trying to find out my comfort zone during real life shooting. So no 100% crops, just my experience with some pictures.
When using sports I fully rely on autofocus and I am using 3D color tracking a lot on the D300. And I did not have any problems and I have a high keeper rate. The AF of the D3S is faster (especially getting initial focus) and I did not experience any hunting in low light. Tried it in extreme low light and it still focusses quickly in scenario's where the D300 starts hunting and never stops hunting. I am very happy. I would not upgrade from D300 to D3S only for tracking, but would consider it for low light focussing (if I had to make the decision again), because that is significantly better. Tracking is better but not by a mile, I have a very high keeper rate with D300 also.
Then high ISO. On Saturday I took pictures on the ice and snow. Some simple tracking:
No problemo.
After a while in the snow, light was fading quickly. My ISO comfort zone with daylight is 1600. At 100% you see noise and details are disappearing. The D3S is great with 1600:
The light was fading fast and I dialed ISO 3200, I would never consider this with the D300 (out of my comfort zone):
Wow, very good for 3200 even at 100%, trust me.
Then my normal high ISO shooting, a stage with difficult light, singing, moving, spot on faces, darker background and a lot of black. My comfort zone for shooting this with the D300 is ISO 800. Going higher means to much loss of detail (and higher noise, but the details are most important for me).
First show of my wife ISO 800 as reference:
More details and more clear picture, definately better, but not from another world. Am I expecting too much?
Next is 1600 and 3200. Now I notice something funny. These look almost the same as the 800 and are from another world compared to the D300. And now I can dial in a higher shutter speeds and F4 instead of F2.8, which increases the keeper rate. The ISO 3200 example:
Now I am impressed.
Then ISO 12800:
This is amazing and compares to the D300 ISO 800. A 4 stop difference. This means that my comfort zone changes from 800 to 12800.
I am very pleased.
And the weather sealing:
No problems with heavy snow.
If you have any question, please let me know.
Regards,
Marcello
In a previous post I reported the receipt of the D3S and compared the body to the D300 with grip. Saturday and Sunday I gave the D3S a first workout and these are my findings. I am not doing a direct scene comparison but I am trying to find out my comfort zone during real life shooting. So no 100% crops, just my experience with some pictures.
When using sports I fully rely on autofocus and I am using 3D color tracking a lot on the D300. And I did not have any problems and I have a high keeper rate. The AF of the D3S is faster (especially getting initial focus) and I did not experience any hunting in low light. Tried it in extreme low light and it still focusses quickly in scenario's where the D300 starts hunting and never stops hunting. I am very happy. I would not upgrade from D300 to D3S only for tracking, but would consider it for low light focussing (if I had to make the decision again), because that is significantly better. Tracking is better but not by a mile, I have a very high keeper rate with D300 also.
Then high ISO. On Saturday I took pictures on the ice and snow. Some simple tracking:
No problemo.
After a while in the snow, light was fading quickly. My ISO comfort zone with daylight is 1600. At 100% you see noise and details are disappearing. The D3S is great with 1600:
The light was fading fast and I dialed ISO 3200, I would never consider this with the D300 (out of my comfort zone):
Wow, very good for 3200 even at 100%, trust me.
Then my normal high ISO shooting, a stage with difficult light, singing, moving, spot on faces, darker background and a lot of black. My comfort zone for shooting this with the D300 is ISO 800. Going higher means to much loss of detail (and higher noise, but the details are most important for me).
First show of my wife ISO 800 as reference:
More details and more clear picture, definately better, but not from another world. Am I expecting too much?
Next is 1600 and 3200. Now I notice something funny. These look almost the same as the 800 and are from another world compared to the D300. And now I can dial in a higher shutter speeds and F4 instead of F2.8, which increases the keeper rate. The ISO 3200 example:
Now I am impressed.
Then ISO 12800:
This is amazing and compares to the D300 ISO 800. A 4 stop difference. This means that my comfort zone changes from 800 to 12800.
I am very pleased.
And the weather sealing:
No problems with heavy snow.
If you have any question, please let me know.
Regards,
Marcello
