Not may posts here for awhile, so here goes. Pace yourself.
I went to the Photography Show in Birmingham today with the aim of seeing the D500 for myself. To save some cash (for the D500 ;-)) I left early at 5am and got back at 10pm. :-/
Anyway, I got there and Nikon had a stage demoing stuff, and a raised platform with cameras attached to their big zoom lenses, but more importantly a counter with all the Nikon cameras including 2x D500 and 2x D5’s and a load of lenses. Memory card slots taped up, and running in the Demo mode as some people found at other events.
There were normally 3-4 people waiting to try the D500 all throughout the day, so I went back a number of times checking stuff. So here’s random stuff from the day.
The Grip. The grip is bigger that the D300S as people have said. Whereas the tips of my fingers hook on to the grip on the D300S and easily touch the body, the D500 grip depth seemed to go to my 2 knuckle and tips of my fingers just about touched the body. It felt similar to what the 7D felt like many years ago when I picked one up, it filled my hand. Not uncomfortable, just different. There was a small woman next to me on the last visit, and she felt it was too large for her, so if you have very small hands, try before you buy if you can. I had my D300s with me btw to directly compare how it felt, though on each of the say half a dozen visits, I didn’t have too long to try stuff.
The first Demo which went through some of the features of the D500 and D5. In one of the slides it said ‘Gapless microlens and colourfilter design with increased sensitivity per sensor pixel unit’ And ‘New, optimised pixel structure ensures maximum dynamic range’. May that is why people are seeing ISO improvements. And speaking of high ISO….
High ISO. I didn’t take pictures at different ISOs with each to compare, as we don’t yet know what jiggery pokery is going on with files and LCD screens. I asked the chap who did one of the D500 demo’s on the stage what he thought was the D500 equivalent of ISO D300S at ISO 3200. I said without any files for anyone to compare yet, he was one of the few to know the difference.
He said maybe ISO 104k match D300S ISO3200. I think he understood the question, and he said it to me and about half a dozen people around me. I think I could live with that as an improvement. He did quickly take a pic at ISO 104k and it looked a bit more desaturated than my D300s image, but like I say there are to many different variable to compare on the back of the screen, so I didn’t bother. And I didn’t really have the time either.
So he seemed very positive, as you would expect, but if he wasn’t sure I would have expected him to hide behind the ‘firmware not ready‘ party line, but he didn’t. I asked the chap about Noise Reduction being applied after the first ‘tech’ demo, before the 2 encounter above, and he said there was Noise Reduction being applied above ISO 12000 to RAWs and Jpegs, but you could change the intensity or turn it off on the RAW files. Not sure he understood that question, or maybe that was the right answer. Time will tell. :-/
I put all the focus points on and to see them light up at the edge of the frame was great. It didn’t seem appreciably faster to me (but that may be just me not concentrating). I had the 16-80mm which I was most interested in, but other lenses were the 24-70mm, 70-200mm II and I think there was another one, but not sure which. He did mention in the spec tech demo that using multiple focus point groups, (can’t remember the numbers of them) may slow down the AF as they have to calculate more and use more processing power.
The Viewfinder seemed a bit bigger, but I can’t speak of if it is a lot brighter as they had all f2.8 lenses or better, and I don’t have one my D300S to compare to. The colour of the information has changed from green to white with a slight bluish tint. The EXP Comp info has moved to the side (I think, it has been a long day) lol
The LCD. I’m not too keen on the articulating screen as the movement seems so limited to the other Nikon swivel screens. The touch screen worked well and was very nippy.
I asked one of the Nikon reps about the Virtual Horizon feature in the D500, hoping that it had left/right tilt (like the D300S) and forward and background tilt. He said it didn’t have any, and I would have to get one of the bubble levels that go into the hotshoe. L Not believing that they would have got rid of the feature completely, even if they didn’t improve it, I went to look for it in the menu. Lo and behold the Virtual Horizon was there. He said, “Oh, I’ve never seen that before”. lol
It showed left/right unevenness, but when it tilts forward or backward a distorting rectangle appears indicate how far the tilt forward/backward was. It is very hard to describe but makes sense when you see it. So it can show you tilt left/right and forward/backward.
It looks like you can input more IPTC info into the Meta data.
All the buttons down the left hand side on the rear can light up in the dark. The WB/Meter/Mode/Quality buttons also light up. The D5 has four extra buttons on the back below a small extra LCD screen which also light up.
The D500 is classed as professional model and can be used to qualify for NPS and Nikon Pro User schemes, though may need other ‘pro’ equipment to actually qualify.
There was something else I think I asked but it has gone right out of my head. It may come back to me, it may not, it has been a very long day, and the memory is going with age anyway. Lol
They didn’t have any brochures which I found surprising at such a big show.
And surprising bit of info dropped, did you know that the D5300 is the best selling DSLR ever? I would have though one of the D3*** series if it was any Nikon that was the best seller.
I can’t think of anything else atm.
Oh, and there was a Comic con at the same venue and we had a walk through of many Storm Troopers, other Star Wars characters, including a Wookie, and various other Sci Fi characters. Lol
