St. Louis Wedding Photography and Event Photography

I received my D300 yesterday and broke it out immediately. I ordered the MB-D10 vertical grip with it so that it would feel like the D2x as much as possible.  I figured I’d do a Nikon D300 vs D2x comparison.  I have taken a handful of shots and have some initial thoughts. The D300 live view is going to be a valuable asset. There are many times when I try to catch a shot at an obscure angle such as shooting from the ground or against a wall. I’ve never had much luck with the angles and have to take a bunch of shots to get it right. The D300’s vertical grip is solid - you wouldn’t know that there is a difference between it and the D2x except for the thumb selector. The screen on the D300 is bright and sharp. It is much better than the D2x and you can really see the difference in the quality. The D200 shoots about as fast as the D2x and the on board flash is a nice feature even though I normally use the SB-800 speedlights. One of the most noticeable differences between the D2x and the D200 is the white balance and ISO settings. The D300 gets about one to two stops better than the D2x on ISO. The white balance is very accurate on the D300. I find that I frequently have to make minor tweaks to the photos I shoot with the D2x and I think that the D300 does a much better job. The only feature that I cannot really see much of a difference on is the auto focus motor. The D300 should be faster than the D2x with auto focus but I cannot see much of a difference at all. For all my testing I used a 17-55mm f/2.8 and 70-200mm f/2.8. When I get time I’ll set up some lights and do a side by side comparison of both cameras.

Update
3-1-08

I found time to shoot a bunch of photos last night and Thursday with the D300.  So far it really performs well - much better than the D2x.  The autofocus is noticeably faster.  I did notice that when using the SB-800 with Nikon diffuser tilted at 45 degrees, the camera tended to overexpose by about 1/3rd to 2/3rds of a stop. As previously mentioned, the white balance is very good.  I shot a couple hundred photos with some 300 watt second strobes last night and I’ll post the photos later this weekend.