Trying to do street photography with the D300 vs GRD2

[popum]

My first outing with the D300. Peace rally in Union Square, NYC, last Saturday. Used the 35/2.0 for all shots.

There were so many photographers I could have been shooting with an 8x10 and not be noticed.

Mike

 

[Christi Mac]

Tough Crowd indeed - luckily most of us understand the need to talk about our work on a regular basis especially when that work is ongoing and unified by a single thread. I have to say Mitch - I love the D300 shots, the 2nd and 3rd pictures are incredible in their depth of shadow. But I think the series you're working on just now "needs" the GRD2 to work and remain consistent. There is a dynamism and immediacy to them which I think will not be so forthcoming with a larger camera.

I got my GX100 just yesterday and while I've noticed - in my own shots - the clipping of highlights and shadows as mentioned in another post here I've also come to learn pretty quickly that these can be worked around fairly easily. This leads me to believe that your style for the street work is very much that, a style which you work to produce rather than simply a factor of the small sensor in the GRDII. As you imply - learning the intricacies of the D300 would allow you to place your light and shade pretty much wherever you want in the image - but I doubt it would ever give you the same freedom. For street-work I think a DSLR could literally be too "in your face".

That said - Popum - I have done 5x4 streetwork in my time ... close enough?

 

[Mitch Alland]

My first outing with the D300. Peace rally in Union Square, NYC, last Saturday. Used the 35/2.0 for all shots.

Mike, thanks for posting: I like the second one a lot, also the bokeh in the left upper corner.

—Mitch/Tsumeb, Namibia
http://www.flickr.com/photos/10268776@N00/

 

[Mitch Alland]

Tough Crowd indeed - luckily most of us understand the need to talk about our work on a regular basis especially when that work is ongoing and unified by a single thread. I have to say Mitch - I love the D300 shots, the 2nd and 3rd pictures are incredible in their depth of shadow. But I think the series you're working on just now "needs" the GRD2 to work and remain consistent. There is a dynamism and immediacy to them which I think will not be so forthcoming with a larger camera.

Christi Mac, Thanks. Yes, it's useful to be forced to say something about one's work when posting it, and therefore having to think about it and getting thoughtful reactions such as yours. You may be right about what you say about the GRD2, but I tend to think that it really depends with how you shoot and post-process: after all a style can have a lot of variation in it in terms of heavy grain and a finer look and still remain expressive and coherent. Some of the books of Moriyama Daido are a good example of this.

I got my GX100 just yesterday and while I've noticed - in my own shots - the clipping of highlights and shadows as mentioned in another post here I've also come to learn pretty quickly that these can be worked around fairly easily. This leads me to believe that your style for the street work is very much that, a style which you work to produce rather than simply a factor of the small sensor in the GRDII. As you imply - learning the intricacies of the D300 would allow you to place your light and shade pretty much wherever you want in the image - but I doubt it would ever give you the same freedom. For street-work I think a DSLR could literally be too "in your face"...

That is what I want to find out — and there could be room for both approaches to this type of photography; but you may be right.

I've posted three more D300 pictures in posting #25 in the other thread:

http://forum.getdpi.com/forum/showthread.php?t=1191&page=2

—Mitch/Tsumeb, Namibia
http://www.flickr.com/photos/10268776@N00/

 

[jonoslack]

That is what I want to find out — and there could be room for both approaches to this type of photography; but you may be right.

I've posted three more D300 pictures in posting #25 in the other thread:

http://forum.getdpi.com/forum/showthread.php?t=1191&page=2

—Mitch/Tsumeb, Namibia
http://www.flickr.com/photos/10268776@N00/

HI Mitch
I'm intrigued at you using a D300 for your stuff - I'd always felt that it relied mainly on there being nothing between you and your subject and the D300 with the 17-35 certainly isn't 'nothing at all'.
I don't do street (no streets here), but I do a lot of candid photography, and I hate it with a dSLR, the subjects behave quite differently, even compared with an M8 (perhaps especially compared with an M8).
I do understand why you bought the D300 (and I know it's an excellent camera), but I would have thought an M8 would serve your street art much better . . . (but then, what do I know?)!

 

[Mitch Alland]

...I do understand why you bought the D300 (and I know it's an excellent camera), but I would have thought an M8 would serve your street art much better . . . (but then, what do I know?)!

Jono, of course I don't yet know whether I'll end up using the D300 for street photography at all, or end up using it for other types of photography; but that is what 'm shooting here in Tsumeb, a small mining town in Namibia, because there is nothing else here that interests me in shooting, while I try to familiarise myself with the camera so that I can use it in the game parks that we'll be visiting for the next 8-9 days from Monday.

As I wrote earlier I was dazzled by many of the features of the D300 when I first saw it last Thursday, particularly the fast and accurate autofocus and the lack of shutter lag. I tried the M8 in Tokyo last August at the Ginza Leica salon, which must be the most elegant camera shop in the world, but did not take to it at all — shall we say I was not taken with the gestalt? — unlike my M6, one of which I sold last Fall but so far am keeping the other one (black), although I may soon sell that as well.

The funny thing — and I think I have referred to this twice in this thread akready — is that my experience with the D300 makes me realize that I really like the huge depth of field of the GRD2 for street photography and am therefore starting to shoot with the D300 at high ISO speeds to allow use of small apertures like f/8 that have a long DOF. That makes me think that I would not be at all eager to get a full-frame version of the D300 if it were to become available. I'm really interested in reading the thoughts of others on this issue.

—Mitch/Tsumeb, Namibia
http://www.flickr.com/photos/10268776@N00/

 

[jonoslack]

As I wrote earlier I was dazzled by many of the features of the D300 when I first saw it last Thursday, particularly the fast and accurate autofocus and the lack of shutter lag. I tried the M8 in Tokyo last August at the Ginza Leica salon, which must be the most elegant camera shop in the world, but did not take to it at all — shall we say I was not taken with the gestalt? — unlike my M6, one of which I sold last Fall but so far am keeping the other one (black), although I may soon sell that as well.

HI There
Of course, I really do understand about the 'gestalt' of a camera - I like my M8's much better know they look a little 'lived in', but what I really like is people's lack of response when shooting with it (the shutter noise resounds through one's skull, but doesn't seem to travel).

I used Nikon cameras for many years, ending up with a d2x, a d200 and a heavy bag of lenses - in the end though I didn't like the way Nikon handled greens for landscape work (and there isn't much else around here). I still use a dSLR for around 30% of my work, but it's exclusively Olympus nowadays (love the colour, the lenses, live view with moveable LCD and the weather-resistance, put up with the slightly lower resolution). 4/3 also has the advantage of slightly more depth of field . ..

The funny thing — and I think I have referred to this twice in this thread akready — is that my experience with the D300 makes me realize that I really like the huge depth of field of the GRD2 for street photography and am therefore starting to shoot with the D300 at high ISO speeds to allow use of small apertures like f/8 that have a long DOF. That makes me think that I would not be at all eager to get a full-frame version of the D300 if it were to become available. I'm really interested in reading the thoughts of others on this issue.

—Mitch/Tsumeb, Namibia

I couldn't agree more - I've been using (and loving) the GX100 for macro work. Sometimes it's good to have less depth of field, but usually more is better.
Whatever, good luck with your D300, but from my experience I suspect that when you stop being dazzled by the facilities you'll start to be irritated by the bulk, and by people's response to it.

 

[nostatic]

I was stunned by how fast and accurate the AF is with the D300. It truly is a technological marvel and is about the most advanced performer you can get for under $2K. I had trouble with the interface though, and found the Pentax to be more intuitive. But that is totally personal opinion. I really liked the E3, appreciate the "middle ground" of the 4/3 system, and the 12-60 lens is probably the best I've ever played with. But again it was a personal thing with the interface (the E3 has really small buttons and I have big hands).

With the Pentax I have ended up running auto ISO and stopping down (as you've done). The good news is that iso1600 looks pretty darn clean and I can go to 3200 if need be. The Nikon is an even better performer at high ISO, but the files look different than the small sensor ones. I've come to like the noise at 800 on the DLux3.

wrt full frame, odds are you'll be able to shoot like ISO 128000 or some ridiculous number, so you should be able to stop down under most any conditions. What I'm wondering is whether or not you'll be able to "shrink" the sensor size to match lenses that were designed for APS sensors (ie DX series stuff for Nikon).

 

[jonoslack]

I was stunned by how fast and accurate the AF is with the D300. It truly is a technological marvel and is about the most advanced performer you can get for under $2K. I had trouble with the interface though, and found the Pentax to be more intuitive. But that is totally personal opinion. I really liked the E3, appreciate the "middle ground" of the 4/3 system, and the 12-60 lens is probably the best I've ever played with. But again it was a personal thing with the interface (the E3 has really small buttons and I have big hands).

I think the E3 has some irritating default settings - for instance, setting the buttons to 'sticky' suddenly makes them quite useable (they stay pressed for a set amount of time, or until you tap the shutter or press another button).
Mind you, I have small hands.
I was very taken with the K20D when I fiddled with one at focus; so much so that I very nearly bought one, but with the 4/3 system it's the lenses one keeps going back to, and as you say, that 12-60 is such a great lens.

With the Pentax I have ended up running auto ISO and stopping down (as you've done). The good news is that iso1600 looks pretty darn clean and I can go to 3200 if need be. The Nikon is an even better performer at high ISO, but the files look different than the small sensor ones. I've come to like the noise at 800 on the DLux3.

I assume you have the K20D? Are you pleased with it? not trouble with the lenses?

 

[nostatic]

I am very happy with the K20d. It has a few quirks, but you learn to work with them. I can be lazy and just shoot program mode with auto iso and the images are stunning. Or I can tweak to my heart's content. The 16-50* lens has had qc issues with a lot of bad copies so I avoided that. But luckily the mid-grade 16-45 performs way better than it should for the price. The 50-135* lens is great, with incredible contrast. And I have the FA77ltd which is sublime art. All of these are well behaved. I'm waiting for the 35mm ltd macro to come out then I'm set. I did have an FA31ltd that had AF issues. I sent the lens back and figure the 35 will cover that region. Plus there is a 15mm ltd on the roadmap. Gotta love their primes...

The Oly 12-60 though...I still salivate when I think of that lens. Damn near perfect.