Nikon D100

...cost.

The Nikon D100 has a whopping 6.1 Megapixel CCD and every manual control you could dream of. The image quality from the CCD is such that may pro photographers are now ditchingtheir film cameras altogether in favour of digital.

Like other SLR cameras, the D100 is sold without a lens. Those with an investment in Nikon lenses will be all set, because you can use Nikon standard lenses with this camera. Newcomers, however, ...
.../> The 6.1 (effective) Mpixel Nikon D100 camera body
EN-EL3 rechargeable Li-ion battery
Battery charger
Neck strap
Body cap
Eyepiece cap
LCD cover
USB cable
Video cable
Lens cap w/strap
CD-ROM featuring NikonView 5
199 page manual (printed)
I already mentioned that the D100 does not include a lens. Another important item not included is a memory card. ... more

OK, first things first, if your not a serious photographer and you just want a point and click digital camera - let me save you some time - rate this opinion as very helpful and leave - this bit of kit costs in the region of £1700 (body only). A little pricey if you're only going to use it for holiday snaps!

As a keen amateur photographer, Ive always been impressed by digital in may ways - the savings on film and processing, the ability to immediately see your results & the benefits of applying effects and manipulation with graphis software. But as any serious photographer will tell you control is the key and for control you need an SLR (single lens reflex) camera, the ability to select your own apature and shutter speed etc.

Well now the digital revolution is truly coming of age with the availability of digital SLRs at an affordable (ish!!) cost.

The Nikon D100 has a whopping 6.1 Megapixel CCD and every manual control you could dream of. The image quality from the CCD is such that may pro photographers are now ditchingtheir film cameras altogether in favour of digital.

Like other SLR cameras, the D100 is sold without a lens. Those with an investment in Nikon lenses will be all set, because you can use Nikon standard lenses with this camera. Newcomers, however, will have to fork out the cash for a lens. Perhaps the most versatile would be the 24 - 85 mm (F3.5-4.5G) lens. view unit.

~~What's in the Box?~~

The D100 has a very good bundle (for an SLR). Inside the box, you'll find:

The 6.1 (effective) Mpixel Nikon D100 camera body
EN-EL3 rechargeable Li-ion battery
Battery charger
Neck strap
Body cap
Eyepiece cap
LCD cover
USB cable
Video cable
Lens cap w/strap
CD-ROM featuring NikonView 5
199 page manual (printed)
I already mentioned that the D100 does not include a lens. Another important item not included is a memory card. It's up to you to pick up a CompactFlash card (Type II / Microdrives supported). Since this camera takes such huge images, a large card is recommended.

The D100 uses the EN-EL3 Li-ion rechargeable battery. This one looks an awful lot like the BP-511 used by Canon, but I don't believe that they are compatible. The EN-EL3 has a whopping 10.4 Watt/hours of power, unmatched by nearly all other digicam batteries. Nikon estimates that you can take about 370 photos per charge, based on 50% flash use (among other things).

~~Charger and battery~~

When it's time to charge the EN-EL3, you can use the included external charger. It takes about two hours to charge the battery.

Other power options include an AC adapter (model EH-5) and battery pack (MB-D100) which attaches to the bottom of the D100.

The D100 has a myriad of accessories available. They includes flashes, filters, remote shutter releases, connecting cords, and more. You name it, the D100 probably supports it.

Nikon includes NikonView 5.1, as well as a demo copy of Nikon Capture with the D100. NikonView is a general photo downloading/organizing tool included with all of Nikon's cameras. Nikon Capture, which will cost you $100 after the demo expires, gives you control of the D100 from your computer as well as batch processing capability.

The manual included with the camera is pretty good, especially considering the complexity of this camera. It's not going to win any awards, but it will get you started in using the D100.

~~Look and Feel~~

The D100 has as traditionally-styled SLR body, just like your 35mm film camera. It's exceptionally easy to hold, with plenty of room for both hands. It's built very well -- maybe not as well as Nikon's D1X, but it's still very solid. It's not the lightest camera around, and it won't fit in any pockets -- but you already knew that.

The official dimensions of the D100 (sans lens) are 5.7 x 4.6 x 3.2 inches (W x H x D), and it weighs 700 grams (25 ounces) without memory card, battery, or lens.

The D100 is compatible with nearly all AF Nikkor lenses. Nikon has a list in the manual of non-compatible lenses. They encourage you to use D or G-series CPU lenses. If you have a non-CPU lens, you can only use it in manual exposure mode.

The little button to the left of the lens mount is the depth-of-field preview. On the opposite side, you can see the lens release as well as the focus dial (manual, single, continuous focus).

Straight above the lens mount is the D100's pop-up flash. Flash distance depends on ISO and aperture. At ISO 200, the working range is 2.0 - 8.5 m. You can also use an external flash -- more on that in a second.

Below and left of the flash is the autofocus illuminator, which doubles as the redeye reduction and self-timer lamps.

To the left of that, you can catch a glimpse of the sub-command dial (as Nikon calls it), which is used for adjusting settings in manual mode.

The back of the camera is totally covered in buttons and switches.

The D100 has a 1.8" LCD display, which is (sadly) larger than on most of Nikon's other cameras. In case you're new to digital SLRs, you can not preview images on the LCD before they are taken, like on a regular digicam. It's only for reviewing photos and using the menus. The LCD is bright and easy to see, and Nikon includes a plastic cover to protect it from the elements.

Straight above the LCD is the huge optical viewfinder. It covers 95% of the frame. A diopter correction slider will help bring things into focus if your vision isn't perfect. Just below the window in the viewfinder is a line of exposure data, like shutter speed, aperture, exposure compensation, shots remaining, etc.

Now it's time to cover all those buttons. I will start with the five buttons directly to the left of the LCD:

Playback mode
Menu
Thumbnail mode (in playback)
Protect image
Enter (for menus) / Zoom (in playback)
There are two buttons above those:

Bracketing (exposure + flash, exposure, flash, or white balance)
Flash exposure compensation (-3.0EV to +1.0EV in 1/3EV increments)
On the other side of the LCD are more buttons. They include the four-way switch (for menus and focus-area selection), a lock to disable the four-way switch, and the delete photo button.

Above that is the metering dial, with the AE/AF lock button in the middle. Your metering choices are ten-segment matrix, center-weighted, and spot. You can customize the AE/AF lock button as well (more on that later).

To the right of that is the main command dial. LIke the sub-command dial, it's used for changing things like aperture and shutter speed.

Finally, below that is the CompactFlash slot. This is a Type II slot, so a Microdrive will work just fine (IBM Microdrives allow an amazing 1 GB storage).

At the top of the camera - more buttons, the mode wheel, hot shoe, and LCD info display.

The mode wheel includes four shooting modes as well as four important settings. It's nice because it means less "hold down the button and turn a dial" like on the D1X.

The choices on the mode wheel include:

Program Mode - camera picks best exposure settings. There is also a flexible program mode which lets you pick from a few other combinations of shutter speed and aperture.

Shutter Priority Mode - you choose shutter speed, camera picks appropriate aperture. Shutter speed range is 30 sec - 1/4000 sec.

Aperture Priority Mode - you choose aperture, camera picks shutter speed. The aperture values will depend on what lens you are using.

Manual Mode - you choose aperture and shutter speed. This enables bulb mode, which will keep the shutter open for as long as the shutter release button is pressed, for up to 5 minutes (!). This pretty much requires a remote shutter release cable and a tripod.

ISO (200 - 1600 in 1/3EV increments; HI-1 and HI-2 are equivalent to 3200 and 6400, respectively).

White Balance (Auto, incandescent, fluorescent, direct sunlight, flash, cloudy, shade, preset) - not surprisingly, lots of white balance modes, including full manual mode. You can also fine tune white balance ±3 in all WB modes except auto and preset.

Quality (NEF RAW, TIFF-RGB, JPEG Fine, JPEG Normal, JPEG Basic) - more on these later

AF-Area Mode (Single, dynamic area)
Below the mode wheel is the "drive" switch. The choices are single-shot, continuous shooting, or self-timer. In continuous shooting mode, you can take up to 6 shots (4 in RAW mode) at 3 frames/second.

To the right of the mode wheel is the D100's hot shoe. The D100 supports most Nikon Speedlights, and if you have an 80DX, 50DX, or 28X, you can use D-TTL flash control as well. Non-Nikon flashes will work, though the manual tries to discourage you from trying. Unlike the high end Coolpixes, the D100 supports all of the features of the Speedlight, such as the zoom head.

~~Using the Nikon D100~~

Record Mode

The D100 starts up about as close to instant as possible. Since there's no lens to extend, the camera just needs to read the CF card and it's ready to go. When you depress the shutter release button halfway, the D100 locks the focus very quickly. This will depend on what lens you're using, by the way. As you might expect, fully pressing the shutter release results in a picture without delay.

Also not surprising is the shot-to-shot speed on the D100. You can shoot as fast as you can compose. Even in RAW or TIFF mode, the camera is ready to take another shot before you know it. The one exception to this is compressed NEF mode, which will take forever to write (nearly 40 seconds!), but you can still take pictures while you are waiting.

The D100 has a number of image quality choices. Here's what they are, and how many you can fit on an average sized (96MB) memory card.

--- NEF(RAW) - 9 shots

---RGB-TIFF - between 5 (large) and 20 (small) shots

---JPEG-fine - between 20 and 108 shots

---JPEG-normal - between 55 and 198 shots

---JPEG-basic - between 156 and 349 shots

In short, there are many, many choices for image size and quality! The RAW (NEF) format contains RAW, unprocessed data from the CCD that take up even less space than TIFFs. You must use NikonView or Nikon Capture to process this data into a more common image format.

The D100's menus are very similar to those found on the D1X. They aren't as complex as you'd think, considering the camera. There are menus for playback, shooting, and setup. There is also a custom settings menu.

One thing that really impressed me was the D100's ability to take shots at high ISO, with very little noise (pixellation)

The D100 produces images with stunning resolution and very accurate color. It's one of the best out there, without a doubt.

Playback Mode

The D100's playback mode is pretty good. The usual features such as slide shows, image protection, DPOF print marking, and thumbnail mode are all here.

The zoom and scroll feature is activated by the Enter button. You can scroll around the image to check focus.

The camera moves very quickly through the images on the LCD, which is impressive considering their size. You use the up and down parts of the 4-way switch to navigate through the photos on the memory card.

Another nice feature is the ability to delete a group of photos -- instead of just one or all of them.

How Does it Compare?

Like all of the D-SLR's the Nikon D100 is a superb camera that does whatever you ask of it. Resolution and color is excellent, performance is amazing, and it has nearly every manual control you could dream of. If you're hung up between the D100, Canon D60, and Fuji S2 Pro, the first thing to consider is which lenses you already own. The S2 Pro is a Nikon body and therefore takes Nikon lenses. If you're new, I really suggest trying them in person, as they all offer excellent performance. Pick the one that you like best -- you really can't go wrong.

What I liked:

SLR-style camera body
Very good photo quality
Great shot-to-shot, focus, shutter lag speeds
Very low noise, even at high ISOs
Every manual control ever conceived
CompactFlash Type II slot -- Microdrive works great
Handy backlit LCD info display
Can use existing Nikon lenses and Speedlights
Cheapest D-SLR at the moment

What I didn't care for:

It's still expensive, especially once you start buying lenses
Not easy to learn (but easier than D1X)
USB rather than FireWire
 

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