Nikon D300 arrives

My 'new' Nikon D300 arrived last week and I had a chance this week to try it out. It was a mixed bag to be honest. Some good, some not so good, and some horrendous! Let me explain...

Coast Road King Tide. Nikon D300 with Nikkor 18-70mm f3.5-4.5. f8 @ 1/640th - ISO 200.

First, the good. I really do love the weight, the feel, the ergonomics - and even the shutter sound - of a Nikon D300. It's an amazing tool, and a real photographer's camera. It took me a couple of days to set up - creating four different custom settings for all types of photography I might find myself shooting. Generally I will have it on Group A: Landscape/Travel. But I've also set up groups for Sports, Portraits/Wedding and finally Point & Shoot. The Point & Shoot setting is really only for times when I might hand the camera to somebody else to take a photo, since all the other groups are set up for back button focusing - removing the focus control away from the shutter button. Point & Shoot is, instead, a fairly standard configuration.

I had to travel to Westport for work soon after the D300 arrived, and decided to take it with me for a couple of shots on the way up and way back, just to give it a quick test. I'm so glad I did.

Only 10 minutes down the road, I stopped to take a photo along the coast because the tide was high (it was a king tide) and the light was wonderful.

Coast Road King Tide 2. Nikon D300 with Nikkor 18-70mm f3.5-4.5. f8 @ 1/400th - ISO 200

I jumped out of the car, attached the Tokina 11-16mm f2.8 that had also arrived for the camera, and set myself up to take my first image with the D300. Pushed the AF-On button on the back to engage focus and; whirr-click-whirr-click-whirr-click - the Tokina went ballistic! Confused, I focused about one-third into the frame, and the lens locked on focus. I then recomposed and focused on the hills at infinity - and the lens went ballistic again! Bugger! No matter what I did, when I tried to focus on infinity, the lens shuddered, clicked and whirred uncontrollably. Not the way I had hoped my first shot with a new camera system would go!

Was it the camera, or was it the lens? I turned the camera off, then on again - still no joy. I took the lens off and then back on again. Still no luck focusing at infinity. So I took the lens off, replaced it with the Nikkor 18-70mm, and crossed my fingers. Prefect focus at infinity. No clicks or whirrs - just beautiful silent focus. Damn. The Tokina 11-16mm has a focusing problem.

Coastal Sea Spray. Nikon D300 with Nikkor 18-70mm f3.5-4.5. f8 @ 1/400th - ISO 200

For the rest of the day, I stuck to the Nikkor 18-70mm f3.5-4.5, which is no bad thing. It's a truly cracking lens. I have no idea why Nikon stopped making it. I guess they have a plethora of 18 to 120 or 140ish focal length lenses that kind of make the 18-70 somewhat redundant. But for me, the 18-70mm is almost the ideal walk-around lens that will stay on my D300 90% of the time. As already stated it has near silent and super quick focusing. It also has a fairly solid construction (with a metal lens barrel), and a reasonably fast aperture (1 stop faster than the other Nikkor consumer grade zooms). The 28 to 105mm equivalent focal range is a classic range - bigger than the 28-80mm range, but not as excessive as the 28-200mm super zooms that create a few more image quality compromises.

No, it's not all perfect - there's some vignetting wide open at the 18mm end, and barrel distortion as well. But nothing that can't be fixed either immediately in-camera, or later on in post. The images I get from this lens are gorgeous. Sharp even wide-open, but even sharper when stopped down a stop or two. For the price (around $120 - $150NZ) it's an absolute no-brainer of a walk-around/travel lens.

Great Coast Road View. Nikon D300 with Nikkor 18-70mm f3.5-4.5. f8 @ 1/160th - ISO 200

But I purchased the Tokina 11-16mm f2.8 as my 'main' landscape lens, so I was a bit bummed that I couldn't use it. Further investigation as to the cause of the focusing issue is required, and I will follow up in another post and let you know how I get on.

I also noticed another 'quirk' with the D300 - battery indication. It seems to be having an issue with showing a full charge of the Nikon batteries (and they are Nikon original batteries, not cheap Chinese knock-offs). I know the batteries have a full charge (I've charged them myself), and that they should last upwards of 1000 shots. But I can take a few images with the indicator at full charge, then turn the camera off, only to have the level read '0%' when you turn the camera on again 5 minutes later! Taking the battery out of the camera and popping it back in resets the level to 100% again and your good to go. But I'm never sure whether it's going to show me full power, or no power, whenever I turn the camera back on. Annoying....

I've Googled the issue and it seems that updating the firmware to the latest (1.11) can sometimes fix the problem. Also, cleaning contacts for the camera and battery is a good idea. I've done both last night, so I'll see how that works going forward.

Coast Road View 2. Nikon D300 with Nikkor 18-70mm f3.5-4.5. f8 @ 1/100th - ISO 200

The camera arrived in good condition cosmetically, except for one small thing - the rubber around the hand grip was coming away at the side (by the CF card door). This is also a common issue. Both D200's I've had have suffered from the grip coming loose - around the thumb area at the back of the camera. On the D300 I could pull the hand grip rubber back quite a way to expose the bare plastic underneath. Not ideal, and something that will drive me crazy. So I decided that was my first 'fix'. Initially I tried some double sided tape to see if that would hold it down enough? No joy there. So, in the end, I resorted to a couple of dabs of industrial strength super glue (being careful not to use too much) and it worked a treat. Don't think the rubber grip is going anywhere in a hurry, and it now feels very secure and comfortable in the hand. Job done!

Coastal views. Nikon D300 with Nikkor 18-70mm f3.5-4.5. f8 @ 1/100th - ISO 200

So yes, It's a mixed bag really. A few cosmetic issues that are being dealt with (if a battery issue could be called cosmetic), a major lens disaster that I'm following up on presently, and a few images in the bag that I'm happy with.

I didn't expect it to be perfect (hoped, but didn't expect), since it is an 11 year old camera. But then again, it has only done 30,000 clicks, so it's got plenty of life left. The peeling rubber was an easy fix. And I'm hoping that the battery issues also turn out to be sorted with a contact clean and firmware update? Time will tell on that score.

The Tokina lens focusing issue... well, that's going to take a little more sorting out I'm afraid. It may even get to the lens dismantling stage? But that's another post for another time...