I,ve become very confused over camera prices just lately and camera specs too. I have just bought a Nikon D7100 for less than £800.
From reading all the reviews, Nikon has "nicked or borrowed" quite a few features from the likes of the D4 and other Nikons.. The camera itself has a few tricks up its sleeve too.
Why then, pay up to £4000 more for a camera which is virtually going to do the same thing ?
Would it make my natural history pics that much better ????
Beyond me.
JR
Its a bit like family cars, look at the specs of cars now compared to 20 years ago - high end technology filters down the range over time. That said there is still the added question of overall build robustness - "prosumer" spec cameras are not usually waterproof, dustproof, (despite the claims...) have a reduced shutter life spec. and are rarely capable of being dropped and survive.....
Its a question of how brutal you expect to be with the body, or actually need a heavy brick to balance a "big gun" lens..... properly
Looking at the D7100 specs, personally I'm not sure about leaving off the optical low pass filter (AA or Anti Alias filter in old parlence), image resolution increases at the cost of potential or increased moire pattern issues - I used to shoot the Canon 1D and under certain situations it had bad moire pattern issues with its sensor which I recall was a CCD with low AA filter strength (ie pre CMOS sensors) - generally with the introduction of CMOS sensors the AA filter strength increased resulting in slightly less image resolution but it now seems to be the trend by the DSLR manufacturers to reduce the AA filter strength.
D7100 for less than 800 wow, where from my dad wants one! I suppose it's all relative, what's worth the money to some is a waste to others. Renew John wont be the same without you, :
There are many factors John. One of them is the DX sensor, while not that much smaller than an FX sensor in real terms it is way cheaper to manufacture as A)you get 3 times as many sensors on a wafer and B) you waste quite alot of the wafer with FX sensors. This image points the way: http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/406/sensorss.png/
I also had another image showing what happens should there be any faults on the wafer, which effects the FF sensors greatly.
I too tend towards the cheaper (at least, middle range) cameras, John. In part it is because they weigh a lot less, and I find I have enough weight to lug around carrying things like lenses. I don't pretend to understand camera pricing issues, all I do know is that the longer any model is on the market, the more the price drops. I think you get what you pay for to a certain extent, and if you need that extra reliability or last few features than you have to pay the rate to get them. If you can do without them, all well and good.
A typical Nikon FX sensor is 36x23.9 mm = 860.4mm square; an DX 7100 is 366mm square; if you class THAT as not much smaller then you are a lot more generous in nature than I am !
24Mb shoe-horned onto a sensor less than half the size of an FX sensor just leads to large degrees of diffraction and a lower signal to noise ratio due to the small photosites relative inability to gather photons compared to an FX sensor of the same pixel count; and no amount of fancy "internal gubbins algorithms" will get you past these cold hard facts.
John, I think you'll find the 90+ frame burst rate on the D4 and a few other attributes it has is what makes it a £4K body.
Discussion
6 repliesFrom reading all the reviews, Nikon has "nicked or borrowed" quite a few features from the likes of the D4 and other Nikons.. The camera itself has a few tricks up its sleeve too.
Why then, pay up to £4000 more for a camera which is virtually going to do the same thing ?
Would it make my natural history pics that much better ????
Beyond me.
JR
Its a question of how brutal you expect to be with the body, or actually need a heavy brick to balance a "big gun" lens..... properly
Looking at the D7100 specs, personally I'm not sure about leaving off the optical low pass filter (AA or Anti Alias filter in old parlence), image resolution increases at the cost of potential or increased moire pattern issues - I used to shoot the Canon 1D and under certain situations it had bad moire pattern issues with its sensor which I recall was a CCD with low AA filter strength (ie pre CMOS sensors) - generally with the introduction of CMOS sensors the AA filter strength increased resulting in slightly less image resolution but it now seems to be the trend by the DSLR manufacturers to reduce the AA filter strength.
I also had another image showing what happens should there be any faults on the wafer, which effects the FF sensors greatly.
David
A typical Nikon FX sensor is 36x23.9 mm = 860.4mm square; an DX 7100 is 366mm square; if you class THAT as not much smaller then you are a lot more generous in nature than I am !
24Mb shoe-horned onto a sensor less than half the size of an FX sensor just leads to large degrees of diffraction and a lower signal to noise ratio due to the small photosites relative inability to gather photons compared to an FX sensor of the same pixel count; and no amount of fancy "internal gubbins algorithms" will get you past these cold hard facts.
John, I think you'll find the 90+ frame burst rate on the D4 and a few other attributes it has is what makes it a £4K body.