A sad day in a darkroom

It was about a year ago that I happened upon a Nikon D70. As the moderator of the photography club at my school, the principal asked me to go into the darkroom and figure out if any of the gear in there should be saved, sold, or tossed as it was going to be converted into an office. I went in there and found some expired Tri-X, some checmicals, a gorgeous Leica enlarger, photo paper, and exactly one camera, the D70. Odd that a digital camera would be in there, without a battery or lens. But it was dusty as hell. I presented my findings and was told to keep what I wanted except for the enlarger (dammit!).

I bought a Pre-AI Nikkkor S 50mm f/1.4 to have my photography students have a lens to use with the D70 as all our gear is Pentax, and left the camera in our gear locker. It sat untouched for the rest of the year, so I brought it home with me last summer to put that Nikkor glass to use.

Baseball player focusing intently while batting during a professional game in black and white photography.

I found that I liked the lens and the camera...a lot. But I wasn't crazy about the tiny viewfinder. Around this time I also got myself a Pentax K-3 and was really getting into DSLR cameras. I had skipped over this period in photography as I went straight from film to mirrorless. So shooting digital photos with an optical viewfinder...what a dream!

I had bought an AF Nikkor 28mm f/2.8D to use with the D70 and thought, maybe it's time to really give Nikon DSLRs a shot, and started researching Nikon full frame DSLRs. I knew I wanted something with no more than 24 megapixels at a maximum, and something that would allow me to get beautiful colors straight out of the camera as this would be for personal use and didn't want to spend time editing all day on vacation. I got myself a D700, and a few more AF-D lenses (now a set of 20, 28, 50, and 85), and that was how my Nikonmania was born.

Panoramic view of a tropical waterway with palm trees and boats along a residential waterfront under sunny blue skies.

Picture Controls

One of the big reasons I settled on a Nikon DSLR was Picture Controls. PCs work.a lot like Fuji X film recipes. Because of the ancient tech in the D700, the process of getting PCs on the camera is somewhat involved, but once done, it makes shooting with them a breeze. I tweaked a few to give me my own style, namely Kodak UltraMax and Tri-X inspired styles, and have pretty much shot exclusively in JPEG mode with these PCs activated since.

I remapped the AE-L/AF-L button to take me to the PC menu and it is now the only menu I ever access. It makes shooting the D700 feel a lot like shooting a film SLR. I treat choosing a PC like choosing a roll of film, and then I shoot. Most times I simply set my ISO to 400 to mimic how I'd shoot film, but I've found that right around ISO 1600, the sensor reaches a point where it's pushing so hard that you get some stellar bloom to the highlights and the noise begins to look just right. The files look much more organic than anything I've ever gotten out of my mirrorless cameras and while they don't satisfy quite as much as film shots, they do satisfy a hell of a lot.

A black and white panoramic shot shows someone floating in dark rippling water while wearing a baseball cap.

A collection of five black and white portrait photos showing a young child wearing a wide-brimmed hat outdoors.

A person's face can be seen peacefully floating in dark reflective water with artistic black and white lighting.

I put this into practice on Christmas Day. Last year I decided on Portra 800 in my M3 for Christmas pictures. But this year I went with the D700 and AF Nikkor 50mm f/1.8D. I found the Tri-X PC to be just the right touch to help create timeless looking photos of my family on Christmas. Oh! And another thing about the D700...while it's 12 megapixel sensor doesn't allow for too much cropping, these square crops made on Christmas show that if you are careful with composition, a little cropping won't harm the image quality. Frankly, I've never understood the complaint that a photographer can't crop with low megapixel cameras. Why not be more intentional and simply get the shot you want (or as close as possible, anyway) in-camera? Regardless, I have found these PCs, which are easy to find and tweak on www.nikonpc.com, to be just the thing to keep me coming back to the D700 consistently over the last two months.

Somewhere over the rainbow

Something I kept reading over and over about this camera was that it had some legendary colors. It shares a sensor with the Nikon D3, which is pretty well known for its colors, but again and again I kept reading that the D700 colors were even better. I can't compare the two, but I can say that the colors straight out of camera are jaw dropping.

Using my favorite color PC, I find that these colors, specifically the blues and greens, just hit right for me. Being able to shoot in JPEG and have the camera do all the post processing for me has made me want to shoot more outside of work. I love editing my wedding photos, but photos of us hanging at home or out to dinner? No thank you.

Many will say that RAW files give you more flexibility and control, to never use JPEG. While this is correct, if you get the exposure right in camera, what do you need to tweak aside from colors?

Rear view mirror of a car reflects bright lights from a vehicle behind at night on a dark road.

Sequential photos show facial expressions transitioning from neutral to smiling in an indoor setting with warm lighting.

Pink flowering blossom tree provides colorful backdrop for red vintage scooter parked by curb.

While I love its BW tones, I was never able to get my K-3 to give me colors that satisfied straight out of the camera. I always needed to post process the RAW files (which are gorgeous, by the way). This has been a revelation for me. Anywhere we go, I can take this D700, shoot color, and JUST HAVE THE PHOTOS LOOK RIGHT! And it doesn't matter the situation. It just works.

So often when we left the house I'd grab a digital camera, make some photos, and then be too tired or busy to edit them after. So they'd live on this memory card as a vestige of the outing that was. But no more! Now, I take the D700 with me, make however many photos I want, and BAM! There are all the pictures just ready for me. Using my custom PCs and shooting JPEG is like getting my film photos back from the lab, scanned and corrected the way I want them from my lab!

Even in very low light, the D700 delivers some impressive colors. Up to ISO 3200, the colors are very nice. Of course, all photography rewards finding good light, but I've had to push the ISO a few times and it has been great to see results that I'm happy with every time.

And, one of the amazing things about lowlight with the D700, is that it is fully equipped with an on-board flash unit. That's right, the pop up flash is quite handy in dimly lit situations one might find themselves in. This exact situation happened at a Miami pizza joint in which I wanted to make some photos of the family out to dinner. It was very dark and I hadn't brought my tiny and mighty Godox IM30 with me. But feat not, for D700 pop-up flash is here!

I personally love the look of hard direct flash on subjects. It's timeless, editorial style has never been out-of-vogue, even if bouncing light has become increasingly popular. So bring it on!

Travel Companion

Because it does everything well, this makes a perfect travel camera. At least in my opinion it does. It's built like a tank, could be utilized as a bludgeon in cases of self-defense, AND it takes some pretty amazing pictures. What's not to love about it for travel?

Ok, so maybe it's on the bigger size for what most consider "travel size," but so often these small mirrorless cameras take lenses that are many times the size of these little AF-D Nikkor lenses. So, is it really a con?

I did just that when Steph and I found ourselves without the kids with a few days to spare. My in-laws had taken the kids to visit their cousins out of state for over a week. We didn't have that amount of time as we both had weddings and shoots, so we took off for Savannah for just a few days.

Black and white urban nighttime scene with blurred bokeh lights and silhouettes creating a moody atmosphere.

Black and white photo series showing a woman with wavy hair and dark lipstick posing in different angles.

A black and white photo series showing the silhouette of a domed building against a moody sky with bare tree branches.

No matter what we did or where we went, I took the D700 with me. I packed one lens, the 50mm f/1.8, and decided I wanted to shoot only black and white. Here's the crazy thing: I took my M3 and some Kodak Tri-X (because I always do) and I DID NOT TAKE IT OUT OF THE BAG! There's no need to adjust your screen. You read that correctly. I used the D700 instead of my beloved M3 for the entirety of our stay in Savannah.

It was refreshing, actually. I wouldn't look at the photos until we got back into our hotel for the evening and then I just got the photos off the CF card and had them ready to go. I spent no time editing pictures. Only enjoying my time traveling. And if THAT is not the definition of how one should interact with a travel camera, I don't know what is.

A black and white photograph shows a row of people sitting at a bar counter in a dimly lit establishment.

Final Focus

For the first time since I started thinking of myself as a photographer, I regretted a decision. My journey from film to digital photography saw me skipping over the DSLR era of photography and that means that I am only now discovering how amazing this is.

Had I taken a different path, I might not be shooting Leica mirrorless cameras for weddings and simply be shooting Nikon DSLRs. And, being perfectly honest, I have already considered that. In the end, I know I'll stay where I am for my work in weddings. The many benefits to shooting mirrorless as just too many to ignore. But for fun? For myself?

I don't see myself picking a digital mirrorless camera to make any other kind of photos except for work. And now the D700 is in my camera bag as a back up body in case of emergencies. I tested it out a few weeks ago at a wedding rehearsal just to see how it would do. Spoiler alert: it did very well. I'm writing this now from a hotel in Orlando where I again used the D700 for a wedding welcome party and the photos are golden.

Landscaped pedestrian walkway lined with lush palm trees under bright blue sky at a tropical resort.

Will the D700 be the last camera I ever buy? That is extremely unlikely. For starters GAS is a real thing. And beyond that, I've already purchased an even older Canon 5D Classic. I'm sure I'll be writing another entry in this blog about those gorgeous colors soon enough.

So what is this? It's nothing more than one photographer saying "get back to basics." When I shoot film, I never use film faster than ISO 800. I occasionally push that film to 1600 and on exceptionally rare occasions to 3200. I control my aperture and my shutter speed and I make some fabulous photos. The Nikon D700 does exactly that and no more. It is an amazing tool that allows for a photographer to move obstacles out of their way and simply shoot. It is, the purest form of photography I've felt in the digital realm since I started taking this seriously all those years ago.

Baseball field batting cage with chain link fencing stands on green grass under blue sky and white clouds.

Should you have one? Undoubtably. My D700 ran me $275. Every one of my Nikkor AF-D lenses has been priced under that number as well. And I can tell you as a working wedding photographer that I would use this kit for mission critical work in a heartbeat...because I am willingly doing so now.

So, if you've moved on from DSLRs and are firmly entrenched in some mirrorless mount feeling uninspired, maybe you might consider a small investment in a Nikon DSLR. Maybe you might fall in love with shooting again. And maybe you'll join me in my Nikonmania. Because it's not lonely here, but we certainly welcome newcomers. Come to the mirror-side...we have cookies.