Do real pros use the Dimage 7? I think ....

[Joo]

Anyway back to the subject at hand, it is my opinion (as a pro)
that most established pros will not elect to use the D7 for work.
This is NOT to say that it can not be used, but in most situations
a pro is going to need longer battery life. AS I said earlier in

My guess would be that only "some established pros" would both care
about battery life and not be willing to carry spares/hook up a
mambo external battery.

I'm a professional photographer, and I care lots more about having
28mm-200mm focal lengths instantly available in a circa-one-pound
camera that quivers not on a three-pound tripod. I simply don't
know of any other camera in the world with such a
weight-to-capability ratio. How many F2.8 28-200 variable-focus
lenses are there in the world? Final weight of lens and camera body?

Every ounce I save with the D7 means I can carry more support
equipment, flashes, umbrellas, gray cards, (soon) a portable
printer, etc etc. And the ease/speed of never changing lenses has
already proven to be a stress reliever that leaves my mind free to
concentrate on aesthetic and social matters on the job. Of course
it will take years to tell durability but the camera and controls
just feel amazingly light to me, not flimsy. (Wish there was an
outside single button for set-custom-white-balance).

The contrast and saturation controls have let me calibrate my
camera to take modest-tonal-range photos without image
manipulation, saving time and money in overall workflow. And I now
realize what a nightmare the macro range of my old Nikon 950 was,
only active at the WIDEST focal lengths--just the opposite of the
great working distance of the D7 full-telephoto macro.

Do all digicams now show you (or let you set) precisely where in
the frame the autofocus has chosen as lock target? Another major
professional stress reliever.

I don't do sports or animals. I do a lot more thinking, composing,
light-judging and waiting than I do shutter-button pushing. To
comfortably carry a contrast-adjustable five-pound 28-200
tripod/rigid ball-head/camera rig all day in one hand that gives
near-35mm-quality, with quicker overall workflow, is such a bigger
deal to me than being able to take 200 pictures (who has that many
good ideas, insights and subjects in a day?)

I believe people (myself included, but I'm not a professional, not even close) who take 200 photos in an hour go by the credo, "Quality by Quantity".

without spare or
external batteries.

 

[Russell Bozian]

Joo wrote:
I believe people (myself included, but I'm not a professional, not
even close) who take 200 photos in an hour go by the credo,
"Quality by Quantity".

This is funny post.

I will further add that just because I'm a professional photographer doesn't mean I'm particularly good at my profession. I only mean to supply another data point in the responses to the original question, which is "are there any people using the D7 professionally?".

And by the way a professional has no special ability to make complex brilliant judgements about what "the best" cameras are, or which ones are priced fairly, or predict durability, or predict ease of learning or use, or predict final consumer happiness.

I suppose that if there is any point in paying special attention to what a professional thinks about a piece of equipment, it is when the person using the stuff for a living has frequent physical experiences that dissipate illusions. For example I've got lots of gadgets that seem in my mind might be heavily flawed in design, perhaps poorly made, often overpriced, yet have proven to be extremely useful.

The injustice of such recurring ironies is a continuing irritation--but (fortunately?) my clients are not paying for me to attain a peaceful mental state. They just want images created that are useful, or that have something about them that makes you want to look at them. And as part of the daily task of creating such images, the objects in my museum of bizarre buying decisions that will help are lugged on location, and the things that are of less usefulness for their size or weight are ignored.

In short the pros get their noses rubbed in messy truths. I would love for my D7 to have the smooth tonal qualities of the big, heavy Canon or Nikon cameras. And it'd be cool if a D1x (or my 4x5 view camera) had the wide-to-tele focal lengths and awesome depth of field at a given shutter-speed of half-inch-CCD D7. Would be nice if I could march around easily with the multi-pound cameras on a tripod in one hand. I wish the $3,300 Epson 5500 printer I just bought didn't produce what so far are disastrously poor 8x10s. But none of these things are true, as my profession constantly reminds me.