Thank You!
GearHead Wednesday 14 – 27
Got a gear question you want/need answered? I want to help and answer it. Send your gear questions to me at Gear Questions and I’ll do my best every Wednesday to answer as many questions as I can. Keep in mind the answers are just my $.02 worth and you have to take what works for you and your photography and embrace it and ignore the rest. So here’s this weeks questions ….
Moose:
I have a D800 and D4 and have always preferred the “look” of the images from the D4 over those that come from the D800. It is hard for me to explain but it seems like D4 images have more depth and smoother, warmer color tones compared to the D800. First, has this changed with the D4s? And, has it changed with the D810? I know this is subjective but I would like to hear your opinion about this area.
Adam
Adam, a really DARN GOOD question! Color is SO essential to our visual communication, it is very important we take it seriously in every step of the process. I need to start off by saying that this entire discussion could be considered meaningless. Let me explain why I say that.
Since you weren’t with us when we shot this sunset last night, you have no clue if this color is accurate, true and knowing or not knowing this doesn’t change how you feel about the photo. At the same time, what you’re seeing on your monitor more than likely isn’t exactly what I’m seeing. And if you just had too much coffee, you’re seeing 5pts magenta and if you’re having a bad day at the office, you’re seeing 25pts magenta (“seeing red”). So, unless you’re doing product photography, having 100% accurate color is a mute point in life. But color is very important!
With that said, IMHO, the D4s / D810 / Df are delivering the best color out of the camera but we are truly splitting hairs. Keep in mind, I shoot in the Landscape mode and underexpose, both to bring out every oozy pixel of color I can. Now you ask about about the D4 & D800 and I always thought the opposite of what you propose. I wish I had the luxury of time to explain how I work with color because as you might figure, it doesn’t fit conventional wisdom. But how I determine what is working, camera body / picture mode / post processing is by that big, 24×30 print out of the Epson. Other than my critters, I finish the color in a photo to make the most of color psychology to reach out and tug at your heart strings. In doing so it raises the question, am I being faithful to the subject or to the story? Answering this question for your own photography in large part dictates your style of photography. I often tell photographers we deal in a world of perceptions, not reality and this holds true for color as well as many other aspects of photography. I imagine I have created more questions than answers but in this format, I hope I’ve provided you some thought and possible direction to find you own answers for your own photography.
Brent, Video and Photoshop
Last week I was braggin about our boys well, Brent just posted the Bumper they created for the client which you can see above. The really, really cool thing is it was all created in Photoshop! Brent talks about how here. What amazes me still is, Brent taught himself how to do all of this!
A Test Time Lapse Testing “Exposure Smoothing”
I love doing time lapse (latest one I shared)! Been doing them for a long time and quite often, I do them just as a way to remind myself of the time and place, not to be shared. The D810 has a new “exposure smoothing” algorithm that is part of its Time-lapse that I wanted to try out prior to hitting the field with it (this was shot from our deck).
Time-lapse Photography is in My Menu so I selected it, set Interval to 15″, Shooting time to 6:25′ hours, Exposure smoothing On and got ready to go. The rig, D810 / 24f1.4 AFS loaded with Lexar 128GB SD (I have video saved to the SD slot) with the battery fully charged and hot out of the charger. The Time-lapse feature in the D810 (like in the other bodies) processes and saves the time lapse as a .mov when done. With the afternoon thunderstorms dancing about, I thought it would be a cool end result. And while we didn’t have a killer sunset, the final clip worked very well, better than with the D4s actually I think when it comes to exposure. I was impressed that the time lapse (I stopped it at the 5hr mark when clouds didn’t disperse so we could see the stars) took only half the battery and produced a 90MB file. With this baseline test done, it’s off to do more.
A Moment with Albert
Anxious to test the D810 video capabilities, I had it out today trained on Albert. He’s a very willing subject so we had fun. He’s so willing I even had a silver reflector bouncing light up into him so the suckie light didn’t suck quite so much. What you’re seeing was shot with the D810, 80-400, MS-77 Shotgun Mic (recording on Lexar 128GB SD) being trigged with the Pocket Wizard (CS#g4 making that work, another new feature). The D810 was shooting 1080p60, Manual exp mode using AF with the new Subject-tracking Mode in LiveView (as you’ll see did a great job!). I used the Zebra Stripes for highlight warning (new feature) which I haven’t used in a long time. I think I underexposed 1/2 too much. But that’s why I test at home when it doesn’t count. My good friend / producer Adam at KelbyOne helped with the ideas that you’ll see in the video. For example, you’ll see to “slowed down” landings in the beginning. That was done in post in Premiere where the 1080p60 was slowed to only 25%.
Many have asked why I’m looking at the D810 for video. The reason is pretty simple, it’s a much smaller form factor than the D4s, weighs less as well. And buying another D4s just for video isn’t really cost effective either. I have a LONG ways to go still in my learning / testing but it’s been a ton of fun so far and we’ve just begun
GearHead Wednesday – D810 Edition
Got a gear question you want/need answered? I want to help and answer it. Send your gear questions to me at Gear Questions and I’ll do my best every Wednesday to answer as many questions as I can. In this case, had a WHOLE bunch of D810 questions that I wanted to answer in this Thursday Edition of GearHead Wed. Keep in mind the answers are just my $.02 worth and you have to take what works for you and your photography and embrace it and ignore the rest. And at this point, I have had limited time with the D810 but here it goes with the most common asked question first ….
Is the D810 a game changer? Is it what the D800 should have been?
NO, it’s not for either! It’s hard to understand where I’m coming from, I realize that but I make my living by my clicks. The tools I have MUST deliver on many fronts, not just what you might read on some review as being important. The D810 has Raw Small which I think is really, really important making the camera multi functional. I know there are occasions I would like that big file, most of the time, not. The D810 provides me that option which is important but as a package, it’s not a game changer just next in the evolution of digital photography. As to the second part of the question, I never understand why that is asked. I guess coming from a biological background where evolution is a given, I see all aspects of photography just the same. It’s like you just learned a new photographic technique today. One might ask why you didn’t know that yesterday and use it? It’s because your photography evolved just like camera bodies do.
Moose, what’s the sleeper feature of the D810?
Raw Small!!!! and most don’t seem to be even aware of it! You have a Raw large 36MB and Raw Small 9MB which means you can shoot is FULL FRAME FX killer quality Raw Small and then when you need SUPER KILLER quality, switch to Raw Large. Raw small provides fast camera, fast computer response saving the big, slow stuff for only those times you require it. I think this is HUGE!!!!
Moose, it’s no secret you aren’t a D800 fan … WHY?
It’s true, I never was a fan of the D800 because of weird Moose reasons. Tried to help a photographer once who got the D800E when it was first released get his HDR 9 frame photo through his old computer. After that multi hour struggle, come to find out that he only posts his images on the web, he never printed them! He then told me he got the D800E because he wanted to carry only one lens and if he needed a large subject size, he had the big file he could crop the crap out of. TO me, that’s just not photography and not what the D800 was all about. I’ve seen that alot!
The other thing is, the D800 just never fit in my hand right. I’m very happy to report that the D810, they changed the size of the handgrip and for me, it feels a whole lot better and I can grasp it tightly, comfortably now.
So my not being a fan of the D800 had nothing to do with the D800 and its quality but rather, how I saw its files abused and fit in my hand.
Moose, I bought the D800 because of your glowing reviews, why should I believe what you say about the D810?
Sorry to hear that, I truly appreciate your trust and faith and don’t like the thought I lead you a stray. Understand that I don’t write reviews, I write field reports which might not seem like much of a difference but in my mind they are. Field reports report what I find from my shooting, my photography. That’s very important because what I do and how I do it will most definitely won’t be how you do it. But the bottom line is, you’ve gotta buy the best tool for YOUR photography which is why I suggest none stop to rent before you buy and you see a BorrowLenses.com banner on all my pages. But I hear you, and will work to do better!
Moose, I’m thinking of moving up from a Nikon 1 V2 to the D810, how do I learn all the D810 features?
To be honest with you, I never learn all the features. It’s like Photoshop, so much there that there’s not enough time to learn or master them all so go after only those that effect my visual communicating. All I can suggest is what I do, learn those you need at the start, master them and then slowly start adding to them. While I have the D4s, Df and shot the D800, D600 & D610, I treat the D810 as “new” so start from scratch. When it comes to learning new features, the first thing I do is download the PDF form of the instruction book to my iPad and to the ManualViewer app on the iPhone. I then start going over it, multiple times and highlight those features that either sound like they work for my photography or make no sense. I then dial them in and look at the results. I will be married to the D810 for the next three weeks doing just that process. Getting older, it seems like it takes me longer to retain it all and for some things to sink in :-)
OK Moose, you buying a D810, straight answer please!
Right this moment, I would say yes but I have not pulled the trigger yet. I actually take my own advise and have a borrowed D810 that I am now evaluating. For my current book project it would be very cool to shoot in hi res, opens up some possibilities otherwise not possible. The “Unlimited” Continuous, GREAT Video features and Raw Small bring a versatility to the table not available before. And I can hand hold it securely getting sharp images at slow shutter speeds. It then comes down to the business question, money out vs. money in. The D4s will always be my main body and I love the Df but the D810 does solve a problem they do not.
Moose when it comes to seeing how “sharp” a file the D810 produces, how do you test?
My answer will disappoint most, but I shot with my basic kit of lenses everyday work in my everyday way and then make 24×30 prints. It’s what matters to my work and my clients. I use the KISS theorem as much as possible, Keep It Simple Stupid.