A and N Photography: Initial sample images of the new Nikon D3

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Initial sample images collected from a production Nikon D3
November 11, 2007

Information

Here are some sample ISO capture images I was able to get from a production Nikon D3 at the San Diego Photo Expo. Nikon had some of their new announced toys there: D3, D300 and the 24-70mm. The goal of these image captures was not to show off artistic ability but rather the low noise capture ability of the D3. One of the biggest complaints about the Nikon DX camera format has been the "noisy" low ISO dark performance. With an FX format sensor (the same size as traditional 35mm film), the low light image performance of the D3 is expected to exceed the D2Xs by a significant margin. Even though people have forgotten how grainy ISO 1600 images from film were, it is now expected that digital sensors can perform without noise up to amazingly high ISO settings.

The D3 is heavy and it felt like a serious camera with a 24-70mm lens attached. The D3 buttons are a different than the D200, so it took a few seconds to dial in some basic settings. As I am a fast and light shooter, the D3 / D2Xs are not my usual camera choices. But after a few moments of looking around the spacious D3 back, I was able to get the basic ISO control and gather some sample images. With only a few minutes with the camera, one can't expect exciting images from a trade show, but these will give the reader a taste of the noise and image quality performance of the D3.

The below images are JPGs taken directly out of the Nikon D3. As tempting as it is to correct out the color and other factors of the camera, you can see what is deposited right on the CF card. If you wish to download full JPG or RAW images for yourself, right-click and select "Save target as..." on each of the labeled sample images or text description. You can then look at the full D3 4256x2832 Fine JPG or RAW images and examine them for yourself. Do not judge the image quality from the thumbnails below, as I only resized the JPG images and made no color correction, sharpening or otherwise. Whatever the camera settings were is what is here. The average JPG size is 5MB and the average RAW size is 19MB.

JPG ISO 200, 1/15 second, f5 RAW ISO 200, 1/15 second, f5	JPG ISO 400, 1/15 second, f5 RAW ISO 200, 1/15 second, f5
JPG ISO 800, 1/20 second, f5.6 RAW ISO 800, 1/20 second, f5.6	JPG ISO 1600, 1/40 second, f8 RAW ISO 1600, 1/40 second, f8
JPG ISO 3200, 1/40 second, f8 RAW ISO 3200, 1/40 second, f8	JPG ISO 6400, 1/50 second, f16 RAW ISO 6400, 1/50 second, f16
JPG ISO 6400, 1/60 second, f5 RAW ISO 6400, 1/60 second, f5	JPG ISO 6400, 1/100 second, f6.3 RAW ISO 6400, 1/100 second, f6.3
JPG ISO 1000, 1/80 second, f3.5 RAW ISO 1000, 1/80 second, f3.5	JPG ISO 1000, 1/60 second, f3.2 RAW ISO 1000, 1/60 second, f3.2

Conclusion

The D3 high ISO samples I have seen thus far have been very impressive. The images shown by Dave Black at the Photography at the Summit event in Jackson, WY were 10x better in time performance in long exposure times. Instead of 1 minute for a good image from a D2Xs, the D3 showed great performance at 10 minutes. The above samples show terribly green images due to the fluorescent lights and my not correcting the white balance. The target of the Nikon D3 is sports shooters, but I'm sure other shooters will be quite happy with the D3 performance.

Read the D300 first image sample report.

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