Nikon D3!

Photography has been my passion for almost as long as I can remember. I must have been near the grand old age of about 10 when I got my first Kodak Brownie Reflex camera, using the popular 127 roll film. My mother obtained my first 35mm rangefinder for me while working at Stillwater Photo, a Kodak Retina IIIc. (lowercase "c" model) As much film as I ran through that camera in my early teens, I quickly ran out the limitations of that precious little gem.

When I entered high school, I had access to a number of Minolta and Fuji SLRs, and I was "hooked". My high school purchased the new Minolta MD-11, which was a technical breakthrough at the time! In the meantime, Canon came out with their "A" (Automatic) series cameras, the AE-1, AV-1 and the ultimate A-1. With Canon's brilliant marketing, I was really convinced that the Canon AE-1 was my next camera. My father convinced me otherwise...

Dad was a Nikon user! In 35mm photography, the "Chevy vs Ford", we have "Nikon vs Canon". Dad was not as enthusiastic of my SLR choice. Since giving up his Rolliflex, Dad owned a pair of Nikon F bodies with Photomic finders. The Nikon F body goes back to about 1959 and had been Nikon's work horse for decades. Even the F2 was little changed other then the light metering system and the F3 didn't replace it until the early 1980's.

So, Dad convinced me to pass on the high-tech bells and whistles of the Canon line for the durability and stability of the Nikon. Dad arranged for me to purchase two Nikon F bodies and finders, one from the want ads and one from Dad. I had no idea how glad I would be to have made the choice to go Nikon!

Through my high school years and my first marriage, I ran hundreds of rolls through those Nikon F's. Over the course of time I'd accumulate lenses, finders, screens, flashes and close up accessories for those F bodies. Except for the demise of the Photomic finders' resistor rings, those bodies never failed me. It wasn't until about 1993 when I finally spotted my new love, the Nikon F4s.

The Nikon F4s was "love at first sight"! I loved how it fit in my hands. I loved how the manual metering functioned. I loved it's flexibility. AND IT WORKED WITH ALL MY EXISTING EQUIPMENT! How great was that? While Canon and Minolta forced their customers to replace ALL their lenses when upgrading to the autofocus bodies, Nikon retained the mecanical linkages and mounts which permitted the new and old lenses to be fully compatible (with minor limitations) with newer and older bodies. This was a great win for me, as I was primarily interested in using this new fully automatic Nikon F4s in all manual, spot metering modes.

There isn't any camera I'd run as much film through as would run through that Nikon F4s. During my parenting career, I'd run thousands of dollars of film through that body! During the 15 years of my Nikon F4s' reign, I'd add more flash equipment, lenses, closeup accessories, and two used Nikon FM bodies with motor drives to the package! Those cameras and accesories would serve me well into the digital age!

With the increasing power of the home PC, archiving my film work to digital format became a prority. Add to the Nikon F, F4s and FM accesories, a Nikon Coolscan V high resolution negative scanner and an Epson flatbed scanner with 8" x 10" transparancy capabilities. At this point, the 100% digital imaging is becoming of age, but I'm not being sold on the options yet. So, add to the "Chevy vs Ford" argument of "Digital vs Film". I classified myself as a "hybrid", recording on film then scanning and editing digital. Even though this offered my the best of both worlds, it was a major investment of time and energy. Not a great option for "snapshots".

In preparation of my second divorce, the ability to quickly document and share was a distinct advantage of the digital camera. Still, I saw nothing that would compare with the quality of my Nikon F4s, but I new I'd be frustrated with most of the consumer digital cameras. Keeping my financial investiment to a minimum, I purchased a Kodak Z740 "SLR-like" point-and-shoot digital camera which offered a surprising amount of manual control and it offered sufficient quality optics to keep me entertained for a few years. Most of the photos on this website (to date) are with that little $300 Kodak Z740! But I'm really missing my Nikon equipment!

On February 20th, 2008, we were offered a great lunar eclipse show! That event motivated me to rediscover my Clestron Celestar C-8 telescope and Nikon F4s. However, due to the sub-zero cold, batteries failed and I spent a fair amount of time running in and out of the house, keeping the camera batteries warm. Meanwhile, weeks will pass before the film is processed and I'll know if ANY of the images are usable. Wanting to share the event "now", I brought the Kodak Z740 digital out and snapped off a few exposures. The edited digital images conveyed the escence of the event, but were extremely poor in quality. Astrophotography, sports photography, and anything beyond "snapshots" is not what that Kodak Z740 digital camera is designed for. Too bad that Nikon F4s isn't digital!

Motivated by my frustrations of the lunar eclipse event, I decided to visit the Nikon USA and Popular Photography websites, to see where Nikon is at, with professional digital camera development.

What are the chances? Nikon had recently (Late 2007) pre-released their latest digital flagship... the Nikon D3, and was filling customer backorders by year's end. The Nikon D3 has been marketed with Nikon's NEW "FX" format sensor. The "FX" is Nikon's first "full-sized" (35mm) sensor, with claims of unbelievable low light sensitivity and low noise at high gain settings. I'd say it was "love-at-first-sight", but I hadn't even seen it yet!

After a lot of research and contimplation, I decided that there wasn't a question IF the Nikon D3 was going to be my next workhorse, but WHEN.

I did a lot of on-line shopping that final week of February 2008. As it turned out, the Nikon D3 was backordered EVERYWHERE! But on February 25th, during my commute home, I decided to detour by way of Golden Valley's National Camera Exchange to inquire regarding the Nikon D3 backorder status.

Well, they had a poster of the Nikon D3 on the display case AND had an ACTUAL Nikon D3 on display! ADRENELINE RUSH! When I finally inquired about the inventory status, I was told he had one IN STOCK ... IN THE BOX! Nearly wetting myself with excitement, I said, "SOLD"!

So here I am! Finally! 100% digital!

My first project here is to push this tool to it's limits. Once I find what the Nikon D3 CAN'T do, I'll be better at finding out what the Nikon D3 CAN do. I'll be posting samples of my discoveries here!

Though the following won't be any works of art, and the compositions may stink, I hope to discover the technical ranges this new tool has to offer. So far, the reviews have been outstanding! Already, I've found issues that I hope will be addressed in future firmware updates. (The Nikon D3 may be revealing flaws in my other equipment already.)

Stay tuned...