Worth every penny | Nikon D300 DX 12.3MP Digital SLR Camera with 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6G ED-IF AF-S VR DX...

A milestone camera | Nikon D300 DX 12.3MP Digital SLR Camera with 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6G ED-IF AF-S VR DX Nikkor Zoom Lens

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	• Nikon D300 DX 12.3MP Digital SLR Camera with 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6G ED-IF AF-S VR DX Nikkor Zoom Lens Nikon Nikon average customer review:based on 161 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

Best Budget DSLR

D300 is my first dslr and I am so happy with that. I bought it with the 10-135mm lens and it is perfect for everyday shooting. My last camera was Coolpix 8800 and I am not going to compare it with d300. If you are planning to buy your first DSLR, D300 is the best.

Worth every penny

Others have covered the basics, so let me just say that this camera simply helps me take better pictures than any other camera I've owned, period.

Yes, there are lots of cool features that do all sorts of wonderful things, but at the end of the day, I seem able to take my D300 out with a few of my favorite lenses, and even just walking around town, I always come back with at least a few gallery-grade shots. Between the camera's capabilities and the comfortable controls, it just always seems to be ready to do exactly what I have in mind, and my results show it.

I tried the 18-200 zoom, but wasn't impressed - I found it a bit soft. The 16-85 has become my favorite "walk around" lens, supplemented by the magnificent 70-200 2.8, the 10.5 fisheye and the 60 micro. Together, these give me about all the options I'd want, and the whole thing fits in a backpack style case.

Don't forget to buy large (8GB) memory cards...they fill faster than you might think, especially if you choose the option of shooting raw (NEF) and JPEG at the same time - that's nearly 20mb per picture.

Also don't overlook the very good Nikon Capture NX2 software that comes with the camera. I have Photoshop and lots of other applications, but while Capture NX2 isn't as flexible as Photoshop, it also seems somehow a lot simpler to go from the idea I have in my head to a finished print in my hands.

Only minor gripe I have is with battery life...I find that on my typical mix of flash and non-flash shots, reviewing images on the built-in screen and so on, I get about 150-200 shots per battery charge. I have a few spare batteries, but perhaps it's a reason to buy the add-on grip.

Bottom line is that the D300 has proven to easily be the best thing I've done in a long, long time to improve my photography.

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A milestone camera

The Nikon D300 is one of those 'keep forever' cameras with capabilities more than any serious photographer could want, except of course cheaper price. I am almost overwhelmed by the options and versatility of this camera. I travel a lots and have graduated from an Olympus OM-3(film) to digital point and shoot and now the D300. Happy birthday to me from me.

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Unbeliveable clarity and sharp and crisp

The first, the very first image from the Nikon D300 with it's 18-200mm lens (all around lens for me) showed me I had made the right choice.
Snapped an image of neighbor across street standing beneath his American
flag. On the computer screen I could see the stitches in his pants and some loose threads hanging from the flag's edge.
There are many features and options on the camera I personally will not need (it is loaded) but I believe it will fit each amature and professional requirements alike whatever they are.

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Nikon D300 the best you can get!

I ordered my D300 on July 24th of this year after reading hundreds of reviews on Amazon, Adorama, Ritz, Newegg, Ken Rockwell and others. Every once in a while, Nikon will produce something that it's users absolutely fall in love with. In the entry level market, it's the D40. At the advanced level it was the D70. In the high end market, the one between the advanced and professional market which only Nikon has established, it's is the D300! Many try to compare the D300 with Cannon's 40D. No, the 40D is not in the D300 class, it's better compared with the Nikon D80. There's a reason the D80 and 40D are around the same price and are 600 dollars cheaper than the D300.

I moved up from a D40 which I only shot with for about 7 or 8 months. Often there is a learning curve spoken of, this depends on your current shooting style and can be either steep and challenging or shallow and easy. Because of the way I shoot with my D40, this learning curve was easy for me. I never use any preset modes or dummy (auto) mode. I always shoot in manual or shutter priority. If this is your style then you will love the D300. It has no preset modes and no auto mode so it is not for anyone looking to get their first DSLR.

Much has been made in these reviews about all the technical things this camera can do. While one cannot speak of this camera without mentioning them, I will do my best to explain briefly at least two of them and when to use them for those who may not be familiar with them.

1.Active D-Lighting (Adaptive Dynamic Range) is great for contrasting subjects or environments. It subtly brings up dark shadows to enhance detail while controlling the bright areas to preserve highlights. It should be turned off however if there is little contrast in the composition as it can sometimes cause focusing errors. For example, a brown bird on a brown background which is almost camouflaged. Active D Lighting in this situation may cause the camera to focus on the ground instead of the bird. There are four settings for it; low, normal, high and off. You will need to experiment to see which settings suit your taste.

2. You can get up to 51 points of focus including 51 point 3D tracking focus. The latter of these is useful when tracking a soccer player across a field with other players running in front and behind him/her constantly or tracking a bird moving through the branches of trees. Normal 51 point focus is good for wider shots and you will only see the focus points when they light up after pushing the shutter release half way. Lets say you're trying to get a flock of birds or something; then you might want to switch to the 11 points of focus as these are spaced wider in the frame allowing you to capture more widely scattered subjects. 9 focus points are good for close ups and portraits that you want centered in the frame. For wildlife photographers like myself, the 21 focus points are good as that allows you to fill most of the frame with the subject in focus. The final mode of focus is continuous which is selected by a switch on the left front of the camera and one which, if you're like me with a large hand and long fingers, may accidentally change your focus mode because it can get in the way when you have long fingers. This mode focuses continually, allowing you to track birds in flight. On the back is another focus related switch that selects the focus points used. At the top is a rectangle thats pretty much an automatic selection of the 51 focal points. Most of the time it selects the right ones but not if you're doing wildlife shoots. As any wildlife shooter knows, cameras can have the tendency to focus on the wrong thing. This mode is best not used for wildlife. In the middle is another selection that shows a small square with with small dots on all four sides of it encompassed by brackets. This will use either the focus points you preselect in the menus (9, 11,21 or 51).If this is used with the S on the front switch it will actually move the center point anywhere around the frame as the subject moves. This it will do only if you've selected the S (for single) on that switch in the front..The selection on the bottom looks like the previous one without the small dots. That selects a single focus point. That S tells the camera to only use one focus point. That switch can also be set to M for full manual focus. This Explanation of focus is somewhat oversimplified but it will give you a good starting point when dealing with the focusing of this great camera.

I could go on about the technical aspects of this camera but that would indeed take a few days to write! I will tell you that once you have this camera in your hands, you will never want to put it down, seriously. I love my D40, I haven't used it though since I got my D300. If you have the money to get one, don't wait for a better deal, just go out and buy one and start shooting with it today. I got mine in advance of the fall and winter migrant birds I like to shoot arriving in Southern California. I wanted to get a good feel for this camera. Everything on this camera works beautifully.

I never even went into the color and white balance selections as other reviewers have done a great job of that already.

I will be updating this review as time passes. Any questions feel free to contact me. I hope this helped at least some of you.

here are a few photos taken with my D300:

http://www.pbase.com/shonn/image/102090599

http://www.pbase.com/shonn/image/101522663

http://www.pbase.com/shonn/image/101319666

http://www.pbase.com/shonn/image/102090431

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12.3-megapixel effective recording * APS-C-size CMOS image sensor (23.6 x 15.8 mm) * 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6G ED-IF AF-S VR DX Zoom-Nikkor lens (35mm equivalent focal length: 27-300mm) * 3" high-resolution (307,000 pixel) LCD screen with brightness adjustment * two Live View modes for handheld or tripod-based shooting using the LCD screen * Dynamic Integrated Dust Reduction System to keep image sensor clean * 51-area autofocus with 15 cross-type sensors and 3D Focus Tracking for accurate, high-speed focusing * 14-bit A/D conversion for outstanding color tones and gradations * built-in i-TTL flash * continuous high-speed shooting at 6 frames per second for up to 100 frames in JPEG Basic/Large (up to 8 frames per second with the optional MB-D10 multi-power battery pack) *

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