Full Frame Questions

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Hey I need to upgrade to a full frame camera. I'm working as a part time pro and I need full frame. I shoot everything to portraits to sports. I have a lot of money in nikon gear so I'd like to stay with nikon. I'd like to spend less than $2000 usd. I'd appreciate any responses.
 
Do you have any lenses that will work on full frame or do you have to buy these as well?
 
Why do you NEED ff? What is your current camera not doing?


^This.

What's making you feel you NEED full frame?

B&H have the D610 listed at just under $1900 so that's doable, but if you currently have crop lenses, you'll need to update those as well... in which case, for $2K... forget it unless you start looking at used items.

I'd seriously consider whether you actually do NEED full frame or not.
 
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FF certainly does have some advantages in certain situations, but as the others have said is it really going to make a difference to what you shoot?

There seems to be a misconception that you must have FF to shoot professionally, but that's simply not the case. I know of amateurs who have the best kit going, and pros who shoot weddings with 2 crop cameras.

I'm not saying don't go FF, there's nothing wrong with wanting the best equipment, but I would think long and hard about what it will give you from a business point of view, especially vs the cost.
 
There seems to be a misconception that you must have FF to shoot professionally, but that's simply not the case.


I've just checked the metadata using Lightroom, and out of all the images in the folders set aside for permanent archiving of professional work, the top three cameras used are.....




1st - D7000
2nd - D800
3rd - Phase One IQ180

There's also a scattering of randoms in there too... Canon 350D for example, and even a bridge camera!

I've used a non-professional crop sensor DSLR professionally than any other camera apparently.

People take photographs, not cameras.
 
d700 is a bit bigger than d7000/d610 as its pro rather than consumer and it only has one card slot, but it is the perfect camera for someone who cannot quite afford a d610
 
Well, personally I would get the lens if you don't have that range covered already (and I'm a D610 owner), the D7000 is a very capable camera.
 
Tbh I completely agree with @Nawty the D7000 is a super camera and one i am no where near the limit of yet. The lenses you have mentioned are great and will offer alot of performance when coupled with the D7000. Maybe look into your processing techniques with regards to noise reduction aswell?

Would you miss the crop factor for your sports if you went FF?

But, we can't tell you what to do, only what we would do. It's your choice at the end of the day. :)
 
Tbh I completely agree with @Nawty the D7000 is a super camera and one i am no where near the limit of yet. The lenses you have mentioned are great and will offer alot of performance when coupled with the D7000. Maybe look into your processing techniques with regards to noise reduction aswell?

Would you miss the crop factor for your sports if you went FF?

But, we can't tell you what to do, only what we would do. It's your choice at the end of the day. :)


I have tried the noise reduction softwares and I don't like how they soften out the image and since the d610s sensor resolution is larger than the d7000s couldn't I crop it down to the d7000s image size?
 
Yea I think I'm gona pull the trigger on the d610 and save up for the 70-200 2.8 later. Thanks for all the help everybody. I really appreciate it
 
You'll be amazed at the low levels of noise you'd get with a Nikon D7100. I haven't used one myself, but I've seen sample photos from several resources, and it definitely looks printable at ISO 6400. Pair it with an f/2.8 zoom lens, and you shouldn't have a problem, neither with low light performance, nor with minimizing depth of field.
 
I've used crop lenses on the D610 and it drives me mad having to compensate for cutting feet off etc. So I'll be upgrading my lens as soon as poss :) It was a big step up from the D3100 and I love it!
 
Ok so I can swing a d610 is that comparable to a canon 6d?
It's very similar to the 6D in many ways and aimed at the same market sector (ie high end consumer)
http://snapsort.com/compare/Canon-EOS-6D-vs-Nikon-D610
The 6d has 100-25000 iso and the d610 has 100-6400 iso but the d610 still wins on high iso noise by 0.3 stops. The d610 has a 100% viewfinder which is handy for framing, and has a built in flash, and dual card slots, and it will use excellent bargain older lenses from the film era - I think canon changed their lens format so the older lenses will not work. I'd imagine the 6d is excellent for someone who already has many canon lenses.
 
It's very similar to the 6D in many ways and aimed at the same market sector (ie high end consumer)
http://snapsort.com/compare/Canon-EOS-6D-vs-Nikon-D610
The 6d has 100-25000 iso and the d610 has 100-6400 iso but the d610 still wins on high iso noise by 0.3 stops. The d610 has a 100% viewfinder which is handy for framing, and has a built in flash, and dual card slots, and it will use excellent bargain older lenses from the film era - I think canon changed their lens format so the older lenses will not work. I'd imagine the 6d is excellent for someone who already has many canon lenses.

Ok thanks I was just wondering because my boss uses a 6d and I wanted to have similar image quality to him
 
Ok thanks I was just wondering because my boss uses a 6d and I wanted to have similar image quality to him

Full frame craves good glass....you can have a great sensor but if you're not making the most of it it kind of misses the point (IMO).
 
Full frame craves good glass....you can have a great sensor but if you're not making the most of it it kind of misses the point (IMO).

Well, yes and no.

Because FF equates to less magnification through the lens it is actually more forgiving on lenses than DX. That said, lenses are worst at the edges and a FF sensor will be using all of glass to get its image, DX uses a smaller portion of the image so doesn't collect the extreme edges that a FF sensor would which can result in better edge-to-edge sharpness (assuming you are using FX lenses on DX).

Also, good FF glass tends to be pretty pricey as it requires bigger bits off high quality glass which is difficult to make and therefore expensive.
 
Well, yes and no.

Because FF equates to less magnification through the lens it is actually more forgiving on lenses than DX. That said, lenses are worst at the edges and a FF sensor will be using all of glass to get its image, DX uses a smaller portion of the image so doesn't collect the extreme edges that a FF sensor would which can result in better edge-to-edge sharpness (assuming you are using FX lenses on DX).

Also, good FF glass tends to be pretty pricey as it requires bigger bits off high quality glass which is difficult to make and therefore expensive.
I paid only £39 for my "main" lens for my D610 - a 28mm f/3.5AI
 
Yea I understand about the glass. Mostly I just want the ISO performance
Well, with the right lenses, you can get similar results with DX. Just read dpreview's article about equivalence: http://www.dpreview.com/articles/26...tm_medium=sidebar-block-Homepage&ref=features
If you must use zoom lenses, and you're using an f/2.8 zoom and still need a full frame sensor's superior high ISO capabilities, fine. If you use f/1.4 primes and still need a FF sensor's superior high ISO capabilities, fine too. But don't go out and buy a FF camera for its clean results at high ISOs, and pair it with a lens that does have a class-leading maximum aperture.
 
Well, with the right lenses, you can get similar results with DX. Just read dpreview's article about equivalence: http://www.dpreview.com/articles/26...tm_medium=sidebar-block-Homepage&ref=features
If you must use zoom lenses, and you're using an f/2.8 zoom and still need a full frame sensor's superior high ISO capabilities, fine. If you use f/1.4 primes and still need a FF sensor's superior high ISO capabilities, fine too. But don't go out and buy a FF camera for its clean results at high ISOs, and pair it with a lens that does have a class-leading maximum aperture.

I understand I have a 1.8 prime and will buy a 24-70 2.8 along with a 70-200 2.8
 
Well, with the right lenses, you can get similar results with DX. Just read dpreview's article about equivalence: http://www.dpreview.com/articles/26...tm_medium=sidebar-block-Homepage&ref=features
If you must use zoom lenses, and you're using an f/2.8 zoom and still need a full frame sensor's superior high ISO capabilities, fine. If you use f/1.4 primes and still need a FF sensor's superior high ISO capabilities, fine too. But don't go out and buy a FF camera for its clean results at high ISOs, and pair it with a lens that does have a class-leading maximum aperture.

That's a good article on equivalence by DPreview, as far as it goes, but unfortunately it completely misses the main reason why full-frame is often considered superior to APS-C - it's sharper.

Everything relates directly to the larger sensor area of FF - it's slightly more than twice the area of APS-C (crop factor squared) and collects twice as much light/photons. This brings some fundamental advantages, such as ISO performance is about one stop better (comparing similar generation sensors), there is greater dynamic range (roughly one stop more shadow detail), and the bit that so often gets overlooked - it allows lenses to perform better, with sharper results.

Sharpness is a combination of resolution (the fineness of details) and contrast (how clearly those details are shown). Those are the two axes on a lens MTF sharpness graph - those wiggly things put out by Canon, Nikon, Sigma etc - and a fact of optical physics is that when resolution goes up, so contrast goes down. Therefore, since FF is twice the area of APS-C, the lens doesn't have to work nearly so hard to deliver a given standard of resolution for same size of output. Therefore, image contrast is higher and the FF image is sharper.
 
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