This review will be broken into two parts, this one on the camera and and the article following on image quality.<\/p>\n
I bought myself a new Nikon D600 last Thursday, and this weekend is the first time I have been able to “play” with it. There is lots to learn with this camera, the owners manual is the size of a small novel (and yes that is only the English). For these reasons, this will be an evolving review as I learn more….<\/p>\n
Of course the first thing I did after I bought my camera was to charge the battery. I wish the charger displayed the battery level, but that is not a big deal, as the camera seems to be accurate (no I have not killed a charge yet, but I am not one for taking thousands of images on a shoot). Once I got home from work, I started reading the manual. The manual will take a couple of reads before I learn everything, but a quick browse gave me an idea of some of the things I wanted to customize. Since I am coming from a much older and simpler camera, I probably have more to learn than someone upgrading from a more recent model. I am not one for gadgets on my cameras…<\/p>\n
Out taking photos, the camera handles well. Honestly I don’t think it feels as good as my old Fuji S2-Pro, but that might just be a familiarity thing. I know build quality is better on the D600. The viewfinder is nice and bright, and seems to show everything you really need. One feature I did not think about was live view. When shooting at an unusual angle, I did not have to contort to see through the viewfinder to compose. Again, I prefer using the viewfinder, but the live view was a help for a couple of shots.<\/p>\n
One thing I did not like was the remote release. The cord can be plugged in backwards. It takes a very little extra effort, and I am afraid it could break some contacts or something. I will have to mark the plug somehow (I am thinking of a dot of bright red nail polish). I will also need to figure out a way to mount the release to the tripod. I tend to leave the camera on the tripod and carry it over my shoulder. If I leave the remote plugged it, it swings. In other words, it is not a well designed remote. There is available a wireless remote, but having used those in the past, I’m not a big fan…<\/p>\n
When I got home to download the images I was in for another surprise. My Linux computer recognized the raw files fine, however my windows machine did not. A download from Nikon enabled me to see thumbnails, but that was about it. Lightroom 4 recognized the files, but Photoshop CS5 did not. Contrary to what seems like most photographers, I don’t really like Lightroom, and I don’t see a real need to update to Photoshop CS6. Thank goodness Digikam understands the files. I do miss some of the controls and ease of ACR, but I can work around that. I will have to figure out a workflow…<\/p>\n
Back to the camera though, Image quality is amazing. I could get very good images with my old Fuji, but I felt like I was pushing it right up to, and even past, what it could provide. I often had to work pretty hard to get what I wanted. With the D600, I get the feeling I have room to spare. The image files just keep going, amazing detail, tons of dynamic range, and very malleable.<\/p>\n
Of course the camera is new, and I have to justify the cost, but I think as I learn the D600, it will prove to be a versatile tool.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
This review will be broken into two parts, this one on the camera and and the article following on image quality. I bought myself a new Nikon D600 last Thursday, and this weekend is the first time I have been able to “play” with it. There is lots to learn with this camera, the owners […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,6,7,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1208","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-medium","category-computers","category-photography","category-uncategorized","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alanklughammer.com\/info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1208","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alanklughammer.com\/info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alanklughammer.com\/info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alanklughammer.com\/info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alanklughammer.com\/info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1208"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alanklughammer.com\/info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1208\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alanklughammer.com\/info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1208"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alanklughammer.com\/info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1208"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alanklughammer.com\/info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1208"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}