My Nikon D300

This is my principal camera, the Nikon D300. It exists in the professional DX/APS-C sensor-sized camera line. This lineage consists of the Nikons D100, D200 and D300. The D100 was the original prosumer/pro camera introduced in 2002 with many decidedly pro features, based on the N80 film body. The D70 was subsequently introduced as the "Canon Digital Rebel Killer" in 2004, and as their consumer camera of the time, did feature some improvements over the D100, but fewer controls on the body. The D200 came out in 11/2005, still as a semi-pro camera, now in a magnesium-alloy body, as befitting semipro/pro bodies. Now with the D300, Nikon has split this camera line and the D3 into their pro line, and they've filled in their consumer line (D40(x)/D50/D60) and prosumer lines (D80 and D200, still in production as of 3/27/08) nicely. The D300 replaces the Nikon D2x for those who wish to remain with the DX format. Nikon starts the full-frame sensor line with the D3, hopefully with other full-frame bodies at various price points (such as the price point of this camera) forthcoming.

The 12.3 megapixel D300 features a DX/APS-C sized CMOS sensor (23.6 x 15.8mm), which greatly improves power consumption over previous Nikon DSLR models, as CCD sensors have higher power requirements. One caution for those who perform "wet" cleans of their sensor: You'll need to switch from Eclipse solution to their E2 solution, as this sensor uses indium tin oxide, which is vulnerable to damage from a pure methanol solution such as Eclipse. I've never personally had to perform a wet clean, and have only manually cleaned using the Copperhill SensorSweep dry-brush method. This body is Nikon's first to feature self-cleaning by rapidly vibrating the AA filter to shake off dust, so perhaps the number of dry brush cleans I do (not that many) will be reduced. ISO signal-to-noise ratio has been improved some more in this model, and I would not hesitate to go above ISO 400 on this model if needed.

The D200 was absolutely no slouch and was more camera than I'm capable of taking full advantage of. I did get quite a few good pictures out of the D200 over the years. Initially I vowed that I was going to sit the D3/D300 generation out and wait for the next generation. My move, you could say, was to "keep up with the Joneses." I wanted to upgrade before the D200 value dropped too far down...I was able to get the price I was hoping for by selling the D200 just after getting the D300 on 3/27/08. I do stock photography, so the added pixels give a little greater cropping room. It wasn't hugely necessary, as 2mp extra over 10.2 isn't a huge margin. The overall rationale here is that of currentness...being in stock photography means that your pictures are available to a wide audience for purchase, and having the latest gear may give a leg up (photography/artistic skills aside...the D200 is plenty capable of accomodating any level of artistic capability, so I don't want to discourage anyone from buying a D200 second-hand to save some money.)

I love it not so much for just the major features, such as live view, nor the photo-finishing stuff like on-the-fly D-Lighting, nor inclusion of TIFF, nor uncompressed and lossless-compressed NEF Raw, nor is it sensor cleaning, nor even the 2 extra MPs...and not even that new-fangled AF system. That's not to say I don't appreciate any of those things. It's really all the small things. The D300 is much better at power consumption than the D200 (thanks to CMOS versus CCD technology.) This is probably my favorite of the "small things." I really love the keeper gaskets over the 10-pin socket and PC Sync...I don't know how many times I've torn off a corner of my fingernail unscrewing those little black caps which the D200 used...and then keeping track of those little things when I wanted to use my cable release. I love the additional viewfinder coverage...those extra 5% coverage does help and now I really know that what I see is what I'll get...no more tree branches or other supposedly outside elements creeping into the edges of my photos. The auto-CA elimination in-camera is pretty handy from time to time, though now I have the 14-24 2.8 zoom, which is far less prone to CA than the 20 and 24 2.8 primes I used to use on the D200. While I'm on "small things", another thing which influenced my switch was the inclusion of the free keycode for Capture NX.

The one major thing I have to balk about on the D300 is the lack of the dedicated BKT button...it got "kicked off" the body by the "Playback" button...in part because of a dedicated "OK" button...I'm not too OK with that! The designers of the D200 and professional D3/D2(x)/D1 thought it was serious enough to have its own dedicated button for. Not a deal-breaker as you can tell.

My Nikon D300

This is my principal camera, the Nikon D300. It exists in the professional DX/APS-C sensor-sized camera line. This lineage consists of the Nikons D100, D200 and D300. The D100 was the original prosumer/pro camera introduced in 2002 with many decidedly pro features, based on the N80 film body. The D70 was subsequently introduced as the "Canon Digital Rebel Killer" in 2004, and as their consumer camera of the time, did feature some improvements over the D100, but fewer controls on the body. The D200 came out in 11/2005, still as a semi-pro camera, now in a magnesium-alloy body, as befitting semipro/pro bodies. Now with the D300, Nikon has split this camera line and the D3 into their pro line, and they've filled in their consumer line (D40(x)/D50/D60) and prosumer lines (D80 and D200, still in production as of 3/27/08) nicely. The D300 replaces the Nikon D2x for those who wish to remain with the DX format. Nikon starts the full-frame sensor line with the D3, hopefully with other full-frame bodies at various price points (such as the price point of this camera) forthcoming.

The 12.3 megapixel D300 features a DX/APS-C sized CMOS sensor (23.6 x 15.8mm), which greatly improves power consumption over previous Nikon DSLR models, as CCD sensors have higher power requirements. One caution for those who perform "wet" cleans of their sensor: You'll need to switch from Eclipse solution to their E2 solution, as this sensor uses indium tin oxide, which is vulnerable to damage from a pure methanol solution such as Eclipse. I've never personally had to perform a wet clean, and have only manually cleaned using the Copperhill SensorSweep dry-brush method. This body is Nikon's first to feature self-cleaning by rapidly vibrating the AA filter to shake off dust, so perhaps the number of dry brush cleans I do (not that many) will be reduced. ISO signal-to-noise ratio has been improved some more in this model, and I would not hesitate to go above ISO 400 on this model if needed.

The D200 was absolutely no slouch and was more camera than I'm capable of taking full advantage of. I did get quite a few good pictures out of the D200 over the years. Initially I vowed that I was going to sit the D3/D300 generation out and wait for the next generation. My move, you could say, was to "keep up with the Joneses." I wanted to upgrade before the D200 value dropped too far down...I was able to get the price I was hoping for by selling the D200 just after getting the D300 on 3/27/08. I do stock photography, so the added pixels give a little greater cropping room. It wasn't hugely necessary, as 2mp extra over 10.2 isn't a huge margin. The overall rationale here is that of currentness...being in stock photography means that your pictures are available to a wide audience for purchase, and having the latest gear may give a leg up (photography/artistic skills aside...the D200 is plenty capable of accomodating any level of artistic capability, so I don't want to discourage anyone from buying a D200 second-hand to save some money.)

I love it not so much for just the major features, such as live view, nor the photo-finishing stuff like on-the-fly D-Lighting, nor inclusion of TIFF, nor uncompressed and lossless-compressed NEF Raw, nor is it sensor cleaning, nor even the 2 extra MPs...and not even that new-fangled AF system. That's not to say I don't appreciate any of those things. It's really all the small things. The D300 is much better at power consumption than the D200 (thanks to CMOS versus CCD technology.) This is probably my favorite of the "small things." I really love the keeper gaskets over the 10-pin socket and PC Sync...I don't know how many times I've torn off a corner of my fingernail unscrewing those little black caps which the D200 used...and then keeping track of those little things when I wanted to use my cable release. I love the additional viewfinder coverage...those extra 5% coverage does help and now I really know that what I see is what I'll get...no more tree branches or other supposedly outside elements creeping into the edges of my photos. The auto-CA elimination in-camera is pretty handy from time to time, though now I have the 14-24 2.8 zoom, which is far less prone to CA than the 20 and 24 2.8 primes I used to use on the D200. While I'm on "small things", another thing which influenced my switch was the inclusion of the free keycode for Capture NX.

The one major thing I have to balk about on the D300 is the lack of the dedicated BKT button...it got "kicked off" the body by the "Playback" button...in part because of a dedicated "OK" button...I'm not too OK with that! The designers of the D200 and professional D3/D2(x)/D1 thought it was serious enough to have its own dedicated button for. Not a deal-breaker as you can tell.