Lake Mahinapua with the Nikon D300

I've been using the Fuji X-E2 (and  X-E1) a lot lately (see the last few posts) and really enjoying it. Much to my surprise, it's fast becoming my camera of choice for all my photography. So where does that leave my Nikon D300 DSLR?

White Heron at Mahinapua. Nikon D300 with Nikkor 17-80mm f3.5/4.5. f/8 @ 1/10th, ISO 800

I'm not sure, to be honest. I've talked many times on this blog about my love for DSLR's, even though I've tried my best to switch completely to mirrorless. I managed it for a while when I was using all Olympus micro four thirds gear, but the pull of a solid DLSR has always been to hard for me to resist. The Olympus gear gave way to a Canon 50D recently, which then quickly changed to the Nikon D300. I have always enjoyed using the Nikon D300, and still do. It's a beautifully designed camera that always inspires confidence whenever I use it. But since I've 'discovered' the Fujifilm X-series cameras, it's sat in a camera bag unloved, and I've almost literally had to force myself to shoot with it.

Lake Mahinapua with a D300. f/11 @ 6 secs, ISO 200. ND64 Filter + Cokin ND Soft Grad

This weekend past (as I write this), I decided to give the D300 some 'love', and take it out on a sunrise landscape shoot. Even then, with the decision made and my camera bag packed the night before, I almost changed my mind in the morning.

I know many people harp on about this, and I hate to be one of them, but the main reason I almost changed my mind was because of the weight. With the camera body, lens, vertical grip and various accessories (tripod, filters, spare batteries etc), I definitely need a reasonable sized backpack to carry it all around in. Because of this, I find myself justifying what I do and don't bring along with me. I decided, for example, to leave my 70-210mm home rather than carry it around all morning and not use it. It was going to be a landscape shoot after all. Big mistake!

The first image of this blog - White Heron at Mahinapua - was the scene that greeted me as I arrived, pre-sunrise, at Lake Mahinapua. Boy, could I have used that 70-210mm lens that I decided not to carry with me!

I'm not a 10 pound weakling whose incapable of carrying around hefty camera gear, but I am 51 and not 21 anymore. So the less weight I have to carry with me, the better. And that's just all there is to it. The Fujifilm X-E2, with 16-50mm lens (and 50-230mm that I will probably get eventually) is much smaller and lighter, and fits in a much smaller bag, so I'll be more likely to carry it all with me on every shoot. And just as importantly, I won't be sacrificing anything in terms of image quality.

Mahinapua Jetty Monochrome. Nikon D300 with Nikkor 16-50mm f3.5/4.5. f/11 @ 4 secs, ISO 200. ND64 filter + ND Grad

But I digress (slightly). This post isn't about the X-E2, it's about the Nikon D300. And as I've already mentioned, it's a lovely camera to use and a joy to shoot with. So back to the landscape shoot...

Unfortunately, sunrise on this particular morning was very disappointing, since it was hidden behind cloud cover. So it was on to plan 'B'. And on a dull, grey morning with a large body of water and no colour, what's a landscape photographer's plan 'B' mostly consist of? That's right people - long exposure monochrome images!

I screwed on a 64ND filter to the front of the lens - blocking 6 stops of light from entering the camera - giving me an exposure range of around 3 to 6 seconds at f11. Surprisingly, I could still make out an image through the optical viewfinder, and as long as I manually placed the focus point of the camera over an area of high contrast, it had no trouble auto focusing.

Mahinapua Jetty among the Reeds. Nikon D300 with Nikkor 17-80mm f3.5/4.5. f/11 @ 4 secs, ISO 200

Because I had already decided that the images would translate well into black and white, I decided to shoot RAW + Jpeg, and set the camera to monochrome. This way, I could see the final monochrome jpeg when I reviewed the image on the lcd screen, but still had the RAW file if I changed my mind and actually wanted them in colour. As you can see from the image above, I did decide that the colour version also worked.

Since the exposures were so long, I also set the camera to shoot with a 2 second delay. This is very easy to do on the D300 - just a flick of the drive mode switch on the top of the camera. I could have used a remote release cable instead, but I find that the 2 second timer delay is just as effective, and you don't need to set up any extra cables.

Moody Mahinapua monochrome. Nikon D300 with Nikkor 18-70mm f3.5/4.5. f/11 @ 1/6th sec, ISO 200

Despite the lack-luster sunrise, I came away from Lake Mahinapua with a few images that I was happy with. The D300 performed flawlessly - no complaints whatsoever. We are spoiled for choice when it comes to cameras, for all levels and budgets. Now that digital has been 'mainstream' for over 15 years, there are a plethora of great cameras to choose from. And since digital technology devalues so quickly (unfortunately), cameras that were expensive 'state-of-the-art' cameras only five or six years ago, can now be had very cheaply. That's a huge 'win' for anyone getting into photography who doesn't have a lot of money to spend - or even for someone like me who is a very seasoned photographer who doesn't want to (or need to) spend big dollars on the latest and greatest.

Will I keep the D300 and continue to use it? Considering how little I paid for it, then yes, I may very well keep it so that I can scratch that DLSR itch every now and then? But I already know that it's not going to be my 'main' shooter. That honor (is it really an honor?) now belongs to the Fujifilm X-E2.