Street Gaming - Nikon D810, 50mm f/1.4G Nikkor
Introduction
I have shot with the D800/D800E/D810 since their release (D810 now exclusively from this series and you will see why later), and have extensive experience out in the wild with these bodies (also with the D850 which you can read about here). Let us consider pure image quality. The D810 came out a decade ago in 2014. And you would think that things have moved on in a big way since that time with regards to sensor technology, and the resulting image quality one could get? Sorry to disappoint you, however if you shoot still scenes (or scenes that aren’t sports or very heavy action - and yes I include weddings as being absolutely fine with this body), don’t care about video and value great image quality, these bodies are still cutting edge, even today. Dynamic range has not improved, because with current tech there aren’t any improvements to be made here. We have had a little improvement at high ISO with regards to shadow noise in the latest sensors such as the Z8, but that’s it. Not a huge amount has changed. This isn’t really a disappointing revelation, because we know of course that the D800 and D810 can produce fabulous pictures from the great sensors they have hidden away inside them. In some genres that involve shooting in LED lit areas, it could be argued that the slower readout speed of these DSLRs is advantageous as these bodies do not cause banding in resulting images in those conditions that can occur compared with bodies without shutters, such as the Z8 and Z9. This is the case because sensors had gotten so efficient by 2012, that only tiny gains have been made since. In fact, with the D810’s ISO 64, base image quality at the bottom of the range remains class leading and ultimately the same with the D850 and Z7ii / Z8 camera bodies. I am still regularly using the D810, and I know of many superb shooters doing the same, because they understand these basic facts. Of course other things have improved, autofocus technology, liveview tech at night, frames per second etc. If these things don’t matter to you much, or you can shoot around these, then these bodies are still absolutely relevant in today’s camera world. I say this because there are so many out there in the wild, that can be had in great condition second hand for very reasonable prices compared to new tech, which along with learning how to shoot will do much more for a shooter than buying the latest mirrorless camera and fancy lens. The truth hurts; but if you cannot make a good picture with the D810, something’s up, and it ain’t the camera…
Nikon D810 with Sigma 14mm 1.8 Art and Comet A3 in 2024 over Scotland
Nikon D810: Key Specifications
36.3MP Full-frame CMOS sensor (no AA filter)
ISO 64-12,800 (expands to ISO 32-51,200)
Electronic first-curtain shutter and redesigned mirror mechanism
New 'RAW Size S' 9MP Raw mode
Expeed 4 engine
Max 5fps shooting in FX mode, 7fps in DX (with battery grip + EN-EL18 / AA batteries)
3.2in 1,229k-dot RGBW LCD screen with customizable color
OLED viewfinder information display
91,000-pixel RGB metering sensor for advanced subject tracking and metering
Improved Scene Recognition System allows face detection in OVF mode
'Split screen zoom' display in live view allows horizons/lines to be leveled precisely
51-point AF system with new 'Group Area AF' mode (inherited from D4S)
New 'Flat' Picture Control mode for massive dynamic range capture (video-focused)
Auto ISO available in manual exposure movie mode
Zebra stripes for exposure checking in video mode
Uncompressed HDMI output with simultaneous recording to memory card
Built-in stereo microphone
Of all the specifications, most don’t matter in the real world. The D800 had it down. The D810 is more refined though, and benefitted from a correction of a major design flaw which I will discuss later in this article. There is another major point to make though:
ISO 64
ISO 64 is a magic ISO where one can feel free of dynamic range problems or constraints. Unfortunately was not available on the D800, only the D810 and D850, so it lost out on a tiny extra bit of dynamic range at base ISO compared to these two. Let me explain something about ISO 64 to the uninitiated. If you shoot Sony, Canon or Fuji, you are simply missing out. It’s ironic for the Sony shooters. Nikon sensors are made by Sony; however Nikon tune them and get more out of them than Sony do (and a lot better colour). ISO 64 is a landscape photographers dream with so much latitude that exposure brackets are needed less and less. NB: Of course, still needed in certain situations. Note that the D800 only natively goes to ISO 6400, although this really doesn’t have any bearing on good photography as you will see.
Access to a Vast Lens Catalogue
All f mount bodies have access to an expansive lens collection from Nikon and other third parties such as the wonderful Sigma, Zeiss, Tamron, to name a few. There is simply no way that you won’t find peace in the vast amount of options out there. Special mentions go to the Sigma 40mm f/1.4 Art - a very special astro / landscape lens which is still class leading to this day. The 28mm 1.4E Nikkor on f mount, which again is utterly superb still. The 24mm f/1,4G dual personality lens which gives a beautiful softer wide open rendering and an ultra sharp stopped down landscape scene. There are so many options to choose from that you simply cannot go wrong.
Dynamic Range
Dynamic range is the single biggest marker of where a camera is at with respect to full frame bodies. It is also one of the single biggest reasons I am still using the D810 even today. Let’s take a look at the data from photonstophotos.net:
D810 vs Z7ii Photographic Dynamic Range
(Tip: If you have trouble seeing these graphs on mobile, just pinch zoom into them). Well this is embarrassing. It appears that, aside from a megre bump above ISO 400 in dynamic range terms, it is a draw here. (99% of the time, you would never see this difference anyway). I choose the Z7ii and not the newer Z8 as it technically has the highest dynamic range in Nikon’s current lineup of 11.59EV). Now let’s look at the D800 vs the Z7ii:
D800 vs Z7ii Photographic Dynamic Range
See what I mean here? There is no difference at all here in reality. They are essentially, completely the same! More fool us for pouring more money into the coffers of the camera companies.
Now I want you to think for a moment, consider that many will be saying:
‘Oh well, but the newer camera has X or Y feature that makes this or that easier and the like’.
That might very well be true, however if we are really honest, at the end of the day, when it comes down to it: the most important thing about a camera for these purposes is how true to life it can be, and how eager it can be to capture a great range at the scene, and more so, have a huge RAW file malleability built into the files for post processing. I cannot stress this enough. You could completely ruin an exposure by taking it -5 stops underexposed and still make a perfectly usable image: such is the RAW file malleability in these cameras. I’m serious: if you have never shot at ISO 64 on a D810 then you need to experience it. I see no real difference between the D810 and the D850 in this regard, of which I wrote recently about in the Nikon D850 article I wrote:
Not only this, the RAW files are so malleable (which these charts don’t necessarily tell us) in post processing. You can pull a file any which way and it holds up. It saves you if you screw up when taking the image. The shadow latitude is absolutely insane. One can expose for the highlights, and drag the shadows up to get a realistic image, without horrendous noise or banding like with other brands. It is simply ridiculous how good this sensor is.
It is of course best to have good shot discipline, however the fact that we can do this is extremely advantageous to a photographer working in contrasty light.
A demonstration of Raw file Malleability at Gourock, Scotland. D800, 24mm. This is a singular exposure, no bracketing was required luckily, since this is over 6 minutes of exposure.
ISO Invariance
The D810 is essentially ISO invariant. Shooting at higher ISO in camera, is the same as shooting at lower ISO’s at the scene and raising the exposure in post by the same amount. (Above shot was taken at ISO 400, f/1.4 and 1/60). The shot came out ultra dark - essentially ‘underexposed’ in the classic sense. I then processed it to how my eyes saw the scene. Invariance is generally a great feature of a sensor and it if course helps to save you in times if you ever screw up. It means you can shoot at much lower ISO’s where high dynamic range and image quality exists - less noise, better colour, and in post brighten intelligently whilst retaining all the benefits and none of the drawbacks. Well, except the images might look a little dark on the in camera monitor, but no matter. There are some caveats to this method however. Extreme pulls, such as the above shot, need some consideration. I shot this at ISO 400, following the ISO invariance method. I ended up with a clear purple band down the right which I removed in post. I wouldn’t have gotten this if I had shot above 3200, where the deep black noise reduces:
Shoot above 3200 if you know you are gonna need to boost an ultra dark scene 5 stops. You’ll get less magenta and amp glow.
Sensor Resolution
The D800/D800E and the D810 all share similar 36 megapixel sensors. The D800 is the only one of the three that includes an anti-aliasing filter sitting atop of the sensor to reduce possible problems with moire and false colour. This approach has sort of gone by the way side in modern times, with most cameras now not requiring to have said filter. It really only requires a little more sharpening than a camera without an AA filter, such as the D810 and D850. I tend to keep files pretty under sharpened as I find that these days in the photography world most are overdoing this; which creates ‘thin’ digital looking results. 36 Megapixels is in my opinion, the right balance of resolution vs good colour and noise reproduction. These cameras produce noise as close to film grain as I have seen from any camera. The D810 is especially good in this regard. The D810 has improved shadow noise from ISO 400 upwards over the older D800, which is actually more beneficial. The truth is though, these three are all excellent across the native ISO range.
Autofocus and FPS
The autofocus in the D810 is what I would term ‘more than capable’. The D810 can’t match the D850 in sports, but this was never really my area of shooting interest. I have shot some equestrian events, and some motor racing and have always been able to nail it on the D810 and make pictures with fast lenses, the same goes for weddings, which I have shot extensively, again no problems there for that genre. I am a bit of an ‘artistic’ shooter when it comes to that, and have long since got over the pixel sharpness thing I used to obsess over and I now look at the whole image. This doesn’t mean I accept constantly blurry pictures, but I do sometimes still use a beautiful picture that is a mild focus miss. I also slow down the shutter to create blur for weddings at times. (The same way the Cinematographer uses shutter speed creatively - this should never be discouraged). That said, close fast moving subjects on the D850 have a higher hit rate with these cameras. When it comes to speed, these camera’s are a little pedestrian compared to the modern spray and pray offerings, however I find 4FPS and 5FPS fine (mainly because I actually don’t use these modes except on the rarest of occasions). I find it tiring enough to cull and edit only the best of shots without trawling through thousands of pictures captured in this manner. Leave that for the sports guys!
Optical View Finder Advantage
Mirrorless tech now is a ways away from the first major iterations: for example the Z7, in that camera’s like the Z8 have hardly any or no perceptible lag when shooting. Despite this, there is still a case to be made for a large and bright optical viewfinder found in Nikon’s D8xx bodies. There are several things I would touch on here. The D8xx series features 100% frame coverage for composing. Also, there is absolutely zero lag with these designs; light comes in at the speed of light through optical finders. Secondly, in genres such as wedding / portrait and others that involve long staring contests of the photographer looking through the finder, optical finders are still relevant. Think about this for a second. DSLRs do not need to power an electronic feed for you to see and compose your image. You can have your settings down and simply wait for the decisive moment. Doing this with mirrorless involves chewing through batteries simply waiting on the picture. This may or may not affect a shooter; however it is important to consider. The last advantage can also for some be seen as a disadvantage by some. For me, it is nice to observe subjects without any electronic representation. As long as one knows how to meter and understands exposure, this is generally not an issue. Shooters now are growing up in a world of smartphones, where they need to see what they are going to get on the mirrorless screen in order to make a picture. However, even things like brightness can throw people shooting like this off, so it is best for them to go back to basics and learn how to meter and use histograms. Of course, the other side of this coin is that in low light, mirrorless cameras can have the advantage in that they can electronically boost the signal. When you think about it, since DSLRs have liveview, this should have been technically possible with DSLRs too, just not via the optical finder. Lastly, I love the built in viewfinder blind in the D8xx cameras; perfect for long exposure work.
Electronic Front Curtain Shutter
EFCS is designed to help reduce vibrations from the shutter. With the electronic front-curtain shutter, exposure is started electronically after the front curtain opens; exposure ends when the rear curtain closes. Only the D810 and D850 has this, however I had no issues with the D800, which doesn’t offer this function. The D850 went further to create a completely electronic way of shooting, allowing less wear on the shutter compared to the D800 and D810. Obviously this does put less wear on the shutter at night. Astro often involves many, many exposures, particularly if doing time lapse photography. Using this mode means the shutter stays open and the shutter actuations count will not rise with exposures. The electronic shutter is a huge boon for this type of shooting because of this, potentially prolonging the shutter life of the camera as well as dealing with any vibrations, unfortunately it is only available in the D850 though. It is definitely not something to loose much sleep over, however.
LCD monitor
The LCD monitor is extremely high resolution and adjusts to a level that it can be used in bright sunlight. A special mention goes to the D800, which has auto brightness, like all phones do. It seems Nikon considers it’s user base confuses brightness with actual image exposure perhaps and removed this function? I dare say many do, but it should still be an option in the D810, D850 and all the mirrorless bodies but it is gone. I on the other hand love this function from the D800 days. My only complaint is that I would prefer a dual axis tilt screen, like the Z8 and Z9 now have. (This becomes really useful when doing low lying vertical orientated shots, especially at night). The D800 and D810 LCD panels are fixed flat to the body. Arguably this does increase resistance to breakage though.
Pop-Up Flash and Hotshoe Flash Functions
Pop-up flash is extremely useful as fill-flash at times. Used properly, it can negate the need for a larger speedlight. It can also be used to control off camera speedlight flashes. The hot shoe on the D8xx series of cameras works perfectly with Nikon flashes, or my preference, the Godox range which I personally use. Having a good speedlight or two is really essential for any type of portrait work; and although I do not use them for every genre of photography, or every portrait type shoot, understanding how light works on a deeper level is always going to elevate your work. The fact that the D8xx series integrates so well with these, is a huge boon to the shooter. I was sad to see the D850 loose the pop up flash, by the way.
Mode Dial, Top LCD and other Buttons
The Nikon D8xx range has the best implementation of this in DSLR land. Special mention to the D800 which also places a nice metering dial on the back of the camera, right where it should be, with the ability to switch between matrix, spot and evaluative metering easily. The D810 and D850 has this moved to the flash hump, and I don’t like it as much. This was in part I expect, due to the fact the D810 inherited a new metering mode - ‘highlight’ metering. It can be customized in menu, which I did as I find it cared too much about specular highlights too much. I tuned it so that it would expose bright white clouds as far right as possible on my histogram. The top LCD screen may look like an 80s Casio watch, however I would not be without them. In fact, they are kind of cool, and better yet, they can tell you a ton of information about your settings from a quick top down glance. As mentioned, the D810 has a larger thumb support and I personally find it more comfortable in the hands; however I find the button layout slightly better on the D800. So it’s horses for courses, one wins a little in one area over the other, however they are both really good in most respects. As mentioned also, I do wish Nikon kept the ‘auto brightness’ feature on the D800. You can see the sensor for it on the back above the liveview mode switch. I wish the D810 I use had this now.
Nikon D810 Build Quality
D800 Chassis - A great deal of magneium alloy, however looks can deceive. It had a fatal design flaw
Call me old fashioned, however I like to buy products that have been solidly built and can if required endure the rigors of modern life. The D810 certainly qualifies in this regard. Yes, it is not small, and are quite ‘brick-like’ however overall I have never had one skip a beat in use. Just look at the D810. It’s full magnesium alloy chassis is extensive and is a massive superstructure that all the main parts are attached to. This gives it a great longevity, as it benefited from a design flaw correction in the D800. Yes eventually the shutter may give out, but there are still places that will repair them (and Nikon), and there is a plentiful second hand market. The D810 feels great in larger hands, and feels much more comfortable because of the deeper grip compared to the D800. (Note that the D800’s evolution was perfected at the time of the D810-D850. The D800’s shallow thumb rest and shallow grip for the right hand and fingers makes it less ergonomic over prolonged periods of use).
The Build Quality of the D800 Let it Down
The D800 really pushed the envelope when released. It was the first true high megapixel sensor in a 35mm body ever. Like so many things that push boundaries; mistakes were made, and sadly some of them, were serious.
The D800 should have had seriously good build quality, but there were engineering problems with the way it was built, despite the amount of metal used in it’s construction. The D800 has had major issues with cracked subframes (a metal structure which runs around the LCD monitor on the back and extends down above the tripod plate which keeps the sensor and AF system - mirrorbox in alignment - a serious part) due to a design flaw. This means using the tripod socket could cause a fulcrum effect to occur when using heavier lenses like the 24-70/2.8, because the tripod socket was not directly connected into the chassis. If it were, it would be a better design. This caused users to experience cracked subframes from the tension this caused internally. On examination it was found to be too thin a structure and had sharp corners (the cracks nearly always occured at these areas too). This combined with the one’s examined by a metallurgist, which were thought to have a poor pour, these were always destined to fail in this area. The problem is, D800’s can have this broken frame internally with no visible damage externally.
Not only this, early D800 batches suffered from broken 10 pin remote terminals, whereby the socket would fall into the body and Nikon was still initially expecting the customer to pay for this (it happened to me, but I forced them to cover the cost). I actually had mine do this and nikon rectified it under warranty when I sent it in (this only seemed to affect early built models, but they never really admitted this either). There was also the left autofocus issue, which plagued early bodies, causing mis-focus when using the far left AF sensors in the viewfinder. Eventually they did acknowledge this issue after the internet blew up about the issue; they really had no choice. The frame issue and the socket problem flew under the radar for a long time because the nature of it was more obscure and it took time to reveal itself. Make no mistake though, Nikon knew, and fixed this silently in the D810…
The problems really mounted up for Nikon with the D800 (which still seemed to be an excellent seller for them - because there was nothing else like it at the time), and they failed to acknowledge this broken frame thing they kept seeing in service centres, wrongly claiming user error and ‘impact damage’ as the cause. It should not be possible that a light knock externally could have caused this to break internally, especially when all the marketing stated how rugged and secure the build of the camera actually was. From examination of many broken frames it was thought to be tensile forces that were the cause of the breakages. Many camera’s examined by Nikon had zero external damage. No chips, no marks, camera’s in mint condition; yet this frame was broken and was potentially, sometimes the cause of autofocus problems.
You can see why my recommendation has to be the D810, or of course the fantastic D850 because of these problems. Even if you find what seems like a good D800, and yes it is a great camera when it is working, however it can be difficult to know what you will get when buying second hand, and external examination will not reveal the issues mentioned here. I have tried two second hand mint condition D800’s and both had the left autofocus issue to varying degrees; or just general screwy autofocus precision compared to my D810: they might even have this coming from the cracked subframe which could have drifted the left side out of alignment. D’oh Nikon! This should never have happened with a camera maker this experienced, and it is worse they never properly admitted it, I assume due to embarrassment / financial repercussions it would cause them.
This is why I recommend the D810 or D850 only now. The D810 was redesigned to have a stronger subframe, and a plastic mirror box so that if anything breaks from a large impact (which by the way would be externally visible), the part will shear away and have a much greater chance of being repairable because it will have much less chance of screwing up the internal alignment of crucial parts. Initially the internet experts thought this was a bad move before they fully understood the problem, with the ‘metal is better’ thing coming out. For more issue on this cracking subframe problem, and pictures which show the issue, (which most of the time makes the camera irreparable), click here to read the in depth discussion which eventually reaches conclusion. The word is out, the D810 is solidly built and is absolutely and unequivocally proven in the field; whereas the D800 is best avoided now, unless you already have one that you are happy with and is working, and you have checked for these issues.
D810 for Weddings. Shot with D810 and 135 f/2 DC Nikkor
Use Cases:
Landscape Photography
An obvious genre for the D810 - and tried and tested by many for years. You are in good company if you participate in this genre. For 99% of shooting, you will be at ISO 64. As I have shown, with good lenses you aren’t missing anything from the modern technology. This means you can do exactly the same thing as the modern cameras for a quarter of the price or less.
Astrophotography (Landscape / Deep Sky)
I have a tutorial on this here with the D850 used for years to photograph the deep night sky. I wouldn’t say I don’t recommend the D810 for night sky work. I can’t, because I am still using the D810 regularly for this purpose in astro landscape style shooting. The caveat is, that the D810 camera is a little ‘night-blind’ - a trait shared by most DSLR cameras that only got fixed in mirrorless (it took til the Z8 for Nikon to work this out also, talk about slow!). This only affects composing and framing up the shot / focus, in the sense that it makes these things a bit more difficult than with a modern camera. It doesn’t affect the great pictures I see from many great astro and landscape photographers though. It absolutely has no bearing on the end pictures (unless you screw those parts up). The D810 therefore doesn’t see the night sky like modern mirrorless cameras or phones do. You will be picking out a few bright stars to focus on and taking test shots for composing. This isn’t as bad as it sounds - it’s the way we always used to work at night. It’s only the modern technology that came along and spoiled us. That said, you should be aware of it, and camera’s like the Z8 are much better in this aspect. The D810 like the D800 does not have a full electronic shutter mode, so timelapse shooters etc will add to their shutter count on long sessions, which is another thing to be aware of, at least compared to the D850.
Portraiture / Weddings
Another obvious win for the D810. Yes it may lack eye AF, but you really don’t need this, not really. Image quality for portraits is excellent, skin tones are sublime and the files are so malleable as with the other genres, this camera is tried and tested. You also get to look at your subject in real time without an electronic veil applied. Less tiring on the eyes, no?
Macro / Copy work
I am not a macro shooter per se, however I can see no reason why the D810 would not be perfect in such disciplines. The high quality, high megapixel sensor will take care of all needs in these situations.
Final Thoughts
The D810 was around £3K on release in the UK / Europe. Now one can be picked up from around £500-£700 depending on condition. I recommend the D810 if you are a deliberate shooter and aren’t worried so much about tracking or fast sports, and especially if you want a pop up flash which is very useful even to control speedlights etc. The D850 is better suited to sports of course. What’s shiny and new one day becomes old as this camera has, however it functions just the same. D810’s still work great, despite their previous owners feeling they needed the latest and greatest. How many of us have been guilty of falling for the marketing? Spend less time on chasing the latest equipment; especially when it comes to tech such as the D810, because as I have shown, it is just as good (with some caveats) to the newest mirrorless tech. Be free of the current trend in mirrorless, in that to get better readout speed for things like the EVF and autofocus system, that they have actually worsened image quality, by simply shooting a DSLR! I am not a shooter who has to come down on one side or the other. I don’t love DSLRs and hate Mirrorless tech. This would be a naive view to take, and besides, I use a Z8 for astrophotography. I select the camera to use out of a ‘Tool to Task’ approach, and sometimes, just for the fun of showing others that newer is not always better,* and that these cameras never stopped taking great images.
*Definitely not better for the wallet.
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Steve
