Nikon gear for a situation like this?

Hey,

I haven't posted in the Nikon forums before, as I own Sigma equipment, but I'm thinking I need to expand my gear... here's the story...

This weekend I had an assignment. Photos at a dinner theater (no lighting other than ceiling lights in a restaurant, and some fading sun through windows at the beginning). Luckily, the play was "Murder at Cafe Noir", so monochrome was the correct output for these images, and the SD14 at high ISO in monochrome produces quite nice, film like images. With a 70-200 2.8 lens, I was shooting at 1600 iso, at a manual setting of 1/60 @ 2.8 (at least equivalent to a -1EV). Here's one of the shots.





But this event left me a bit worried. If I needed to use a high ISO at an event and present color images with decent WB, I don't think Sigma gear might have been able to do the job well enough for commercial purposes. I'm thinking either 5D Mk II or D700 would far exceed the Sigma in the quality of color images.

I don't personally know anyone who owns a 5DMkII or D700, and stores here don't carry these in stock. So maybe from your experiences (real world please - I'm reading lots of reviews out there) I can get a better feel for the pros/cons of these (or other recommended) cameras in real high ISO settings. Maybe in reality, these two are essentially the same, and either one would work just as well for me.

Thanks,

-John

--
http://www.johnlindroth.com/gallery/
[email protected]

My future starts when I wake up every morning ...
Every day I find something creative to do with my life.
--Miles Davis

I came from a Canon 5D2 to a D3s. My experience with the 5D2 is this ... shadow noise with banding starts at ISO 800, and gets downright ugly at ISO 1600+.

The D700 will produce shoot clean images up to ISO 3200. it will outperform the 5D2 for low light photography, guaranteed.

Thanks, that's very helpful. The SD14 gets noisy. Newer RAW processing software seems to help this, but I'm looking for something where I can get clean images with little need for over-processing.
-John

gashford said:

I came from a Canon 5D2 to a D3s. My experience with the 5D2 is this ... shadow noise with banding starts at ISO 800, and gets downright ugly at ISO 1600+.

The D700 will produce shoot clean images up to ISO 3200. it will outperform the 5D2 for low light photography, guaranteed.

Click to expand...

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http://www.johnlindroth.com/gallery/
[email protected]

My future starts when I wake up every morning ...
Every day I find something creative to do with my life.
--Miles Davis

I can only speak for my D700 and I think they are grate. I shot the birth of my daughter Elin 5 weeks ago. only one light in the room at night mostly between 4200 and 6400 ISO.
take a look.

35mm f2.0 6400 ISO no PP only resize in PS



--
http://www.andreaslamm.de

Andreas,

Elin is a beautiful baby, thanks for sharing the photo. I like the results, I'm sure the D700 would work well. I like the B&W of this photo, but how does the color version look. I probably didn't post the question well enough, since I used a B&W image. In color, I can't get good enough response to make it presentable.





Thanks for the input.
-John

lammi said:

I can only speak for my D700 and I think they are grate. I shot the birth of my daughter Elin 5 weeks ago. only one light in the room at night mostly between 4200 and 6400 ISO.
take a look.

35mm f2.0 6400 ISO no PP only resize in PS



--
http://www.andreaslamm.de

Click to expand...

--
http://www.johnlindroth.com/gallery/
[email protected]

My future starts when I wake up every morning ...
Every day I find something creative to do with my life.
--Miles Davis

Maybe try to find a D700 or 5D user in a local photog group? Consider getting a couple of fast primes?

Otherwise, I can say that the D700 is stunning in low light. I feel I gained two stops of flexibility over the D90 with like ISO noise levels.

F2, 1/100, ISO 6400



No noise reduction...
--
Taking pictures of what I want to...
http://www.photobriangray.com/

Brian,

thanks, good idea. I have a few friends in a newly formed photo group, they might be good resources I hadn't considered. Cool shot.
-John

BrianHalcYoN said:

Maybe try to find a D700 or 5D user in a local photog group? Consider getting a couple of fast primes?

Otherwise, I can say that the D700 is stunning in low light. I feel I gained two stops of flexibility over the D90 with like ISO noise levels.

F2, 1/100, ISO 6400



No noise reduction...
--
Taking pictures of what I want to...
http://www.photobriangray.com/

Click to expand...

--
http://www.johnlindroth.com/gallery/
[email protected]

My future starts when I wake up every morning ...
Every day I find something creative to do with my life.
--Miles Davis

The D700 will make nice, low noise images in a situation like your sample. The major problem with that image is the mixed lighting. No camera can get a very pleasing single white balance when the color temp varies so much in the scene. A lot of post processing to get the varied regions closer might help. Capture NX2 with its control points makes this a little faster than most of the other editors. Viveza works well inside Photoshop too.

hi John,

here is the colorversion Adobe Camera RAW - profile Camera Standard



--
http://www.andreaslamm.de

JohnLindroth said:

I don't personally know anyone who owns a 5DMkII or D700, and stores here don't carry these in stock. So maybe from your experiences (real world please - I'm reading lots of reviews out there) I can get a better feel for the pros/cons of these (or other recommended) cameras in real high ISO settings. Maybe in reality, these two are essentially the same, and either one would work just as well for me.

Click to expand...

Rent online for a weekend and see which you like better. IMO, spending that much money, if you don't know for sure, you should play with both with an equivalent lens.

It may be that like many you have issues with the Canon AF module, or it may be like many you don't- but until you've shot them side-by-side under your shooting conditions you really can't compare them well.

Paul
http://www.PaulDRobertson.net

JohnLindroth said:

This weekend I had an assignment. Photos at a dinner theater (no lighting other than ceiling lights in a restaurant, and some fading sun through windows at the beginning). Luckily, the play was "Murder at Cafe Noir", so monochrome was the correct output for these images, and the SD14 at high ISO in monochrome produces quite nice, film like images. With a 70-200 2.8 lens, I was shooting at 1600 iso, at a manual setting of 1/60 @ 2.8 (at least equivalent to a -1EV). Here's one of the shots.

But this event left me a bit worried. If I needed to use a high ISO at an event and present color images with decent WB, I don't think Sigma gear might have been able to do the job well enough for commercial purposes. I'm thinking either 5D Mk II or D700 would far exceed the Sigma in the quality of color images.

Click to expand...

As Bill fagan pointed out earlier, the biggest trouble in situations like that usually the mixed WB which just cannot be well handled by any camera - like when one face is hit by natural light and another by incandescent light ... Trouble whatever gear you use - unless of course you invest in lots of flashes and just obliterate that annoying light ... Which of course instead wreck havoc to the ambience of the situation. There are just no easy wins in mixed light situations

JohnLindroth said:

I don't personally know anyone who owns a 5DMkII or D700, and stores here don't carry these in stock. So maybe from your experiences (real world please - I'm reading lots of reviews out there) I can get a better feel for the pros/cons of these (or other recommended) cameras in real high ISO settings. Maybe in reality, these two are essentially the same, and either one would work just as well for me.

Click to expand...

The D700 is an awesome low light camera, and has some other nifty features as well (like fast AF, fast framerate and so on). The Eos 5D is, I dare saying, still a somewhat better generic jack-of-all-trades camera. Both cameras have their respective sets of advantages/disadvantages and for anyone doing a bit of everything, I really do think the Eos 5D offers a broader balanced feature set. But for low light shooting specifically, and if you only rarely would really use the 21,5 MP of the 5D, the D700 would be my choice. And in low light, its AF will work better too (aside from the noise and colors at high iso).

I have shot with the D3 (essentially the same sensor and image quality) for 2.5 years now, and I am still amazed what I can pull out of iso 3200 images ...

All the images below are at iso 3200 with the D3. Should give you some idea what can be done.

This first example is shot in a TV studio (after a show), and first the full image:



Then a crop, at 100%, with no noise reduction whatsoever, just pulled straight through Lightroom without any adjustments:



Now, mind you, the above image was shot in studio lightning for TV, really good light, perfectly even WB and all other things that makes it easy for the camera. But still ... Its freaking iso 3200 straight from the camera

Next shot is in more mixed light, plain old bulb lightning from the front, some daylight from the back, first the entire shot:



Then a crop, at 100%, here some quick noise reduction has been applied in Lightroom:



Not so perfect stadium light just the other night, first the whole image:



Then a crop at 100%, some moderate and quick noise reduction in Lightroom:



(btw, for all interested in the new 200-400 ... the above is shot from the dugout, probably about 55-60 meters distance to the player ... seem to do distance pretty well )

This is shot in incandescent light, mixed with some halogen spots ... Ouch.



A crop at 100%



Last but not least a shot from a venue with decent, but far from perfect lightning, first the whole image:



Then a crop at 100%



--
-----------------------------------------------------------
I don't suffer from insanity, I enjoy every moment of it!

By the way, film is not dead.
It just smell funny

thanks for taking the time to do that. I like the monochrome better, but those colors are very reasonable.
-John
--
http://www.johnlindroth.com/gallery/
[email protected]

My future starts when I wake up every morning ...
Every day I find something creative to do with my life.
--Miles Davis

one more thing you should know, besides the high iso capability, the D700 focus better in low light condition.

that's why we get crispier images at high iso with d700

i shoot wedding
--
briand liong
http://www.PANDA-link.com
http://www.BriandLiong.com

For low-light conditions, I'd recommend the D700 for the following reasons (I'm currently borrowing the 5D mark 2 and comparing it to my D700):

1) faster low-light focusing: the D700 SNAPS/Slams the AF into focus even in dark, low-contrast--it never hesitates (fast and extremely sensitive to very low EV levels with limited contrast). The 5D mark 2 is also excellent (one of Canon's best for low-light focusing body, however hesitates a bit then locks). This may be critical for that "special moment" shot you posted: AF speed w/ sure accuracy MATTERS. And forget using the off center AF points in low light with the 5D mark 2, they don't even budge (while the D700's AF points (even the VERY FAR LEFT AND RIGHT POINTS) will lock/snap into focus). You can even track (using AF-C) on the D700 with fast glass and it still tracks like a heat sink in low light (its crazy).

Also, the mirror black-out time goes "TOOOOOOOONK" on the mark 2 and is slow (not that this matters), while the D700 goes "TAT" quickly.

2) shadow lifting at high ISO levels: the D700 does not show as much noise as the mark 2 when lifting dark/contrasty shadows at high ISOs. Banding becomes apparent with the mark 2 around 1600 ISO, while the D700 stays smooth as the FILL sliders are increased.

3) low light metering: the D700 tends to overexpose a bit in dim situations (runs a bit hotter on the meter), while the mark 2 tends to be more accurate. This I thought was kinda strange: I haven't gone through the review again to check if the D700 is a bit more sensitive than the stated ISO on its meter, but if for sure is more sensitive than the mark 2 when shooting FULL manual with same exp. settings on both bodies (same ISO). The 5D is more neutral with its exposure in low light, and its white balance is more accurate with mixed lighting, while my D700 is a bit more on the yellow side (AWB).

Personally, (I) think the D700 is a better still camera. You get D3 technology: pro-grade/fast fast fast AF, metering, spot-metering linked to selected AF point, CLS flash/Nikon iTTL technology/accuracy and a body built to pound nails and sealed body.

The 5D mark 2 is the jack-of-all-trades with its monsterous 21mp files with clean high-ISO (watch that fill slider though/less dynamic range than the D700), and excellent full HD video I WANT SO BAD!!!!

That baby pic was Iso 6400

At Iso 1600 it would be very clean

By the way you look like Scott Kelby

JohnLindroth said:

thanks for taking the time to do that. I like the monochrome better, but those colors are very reasonable.

Click to expand...

D700 AF is way better than 5D2. The 3D tracking, the Dynamic Area, the low light AF the D700 is perfect. My experience with people or kids jumping around the D700 is the best in this comparison.

I think 5D2 is aiming for static landscape where you only need manual focus. And I remember some postings backward people were talking about 5D mark II problem with banding at low iso in shadows area (they even talked about that on Nikon forum).