Reset ISO and WB after night shooting... This is a classic.. happened to me many times, however when I start taking pictures I usually review the image after taking it for the first few shots I take in that setting (place, time, subject) Until I get the perfect settings for the situation.

"Yeah, Gentoo, I think I meant DLighting, not Active DLighting. But there is a DLighting option on the retouch menu right? I never said it was anything close to the recent cameras' DLighting though."

That retouch D-Lighting feature is very crude and even the D300 has that same retouch option. It's crappy though and I wouldn't recommend using it much.

Yeah, Gentoo, I think I meant DLighting, not Active DLighting. But there is a DLighting option on the retouch menu right? I never said it was anything close to the recent cameras' DLighting though.

And yeah, Willis, I totally get your point now. I take my point and shoot everywhere with me- I took it when I went to Quebec, in -20 F, worked fine. Think about it this way- I had shinguards made of refrozen snow on my legs. Coldest place I've probably ever been to. I never would have dreamed of taking my D40 there, just because I think I would have needed an extra hand free- with a DSLR ,it's always a 2 handed thing. Plus, there's video on my point and shoot. Perfectly understandable- my 6 year old point and shoot's most valuable part is probably the memory card. :D

I love it for what it is, but I would perfectly understand if it decided to crap out on me anytime now.

Willis, I see what you're saying now :)

You guys are misunderstanding me... The D40's results are crap compared to the D90. What I said is that I (ME THE PHOTOGRAPHER) if I'm taking the same shots. My point is that I'm willing to subject my D40 to a lot more abuse than my D90. I'll take my D40 to the beach, or a bad part of town. Replacing my D40 is a matter of loading up the old credit limit. Replacing my D90 with a four figure lens on it means eating canned beans for the next three months and neglecting my stool at the bar.

When your free to be a little reckless then you are going to get better results.

Disclaimer: Yes I realize that the expensive cameras are better suited to this sort of thing. But I spend way to high of a %of my income on gear to really believe in all that.

"Willis, about your D40 taking better pictures than your D90- I don't really agree there. I've noticed that the autofocus has let me down in the past- they couldn't determine an in between focus point between one of the three sensors- which really annoyed me, because I had to recompose the whole photo"

While I would agree with you here, only willis knows why he's able to use the inferior AF system better. That sounds worse than I meant it.

"Active DLighting is actually available on the D40, but only applicable to the image in the retouch menu"

This is incorrect. The D-Lighting feature in the retouch menu is a completely different, and rather crude version of in camera post processing. Active D-Lighting on the other hand works on the fly with your cameras metering. It's better than the retouch menu option but worse than the Capture NX version.

Also the D60 and D3000's version of Active D Lighting is rather rudimentary and simple compared to the somewhat more advanced version found in the D3 and D300, the tweaked advanced version found in the D700 and the so far, best versions found in the D90 and D300s.

Yeah, good points guys. Active DLighting is actually available on the D40, but only applicable to the image in the retouch menu, and it's probably a way antiquated version of the DLighting on the D60, D90 and D3000.

That's the thing- I want to have a larger selection of lenses but can't for obvious reasons. There's another issue there- should I spend money on G lenses, or should I buy a new body? I really like the 105 macro- it's about the same price as a D90, no? Then yeah, I really should get that lens. It's about $860 at J and R. Not to mention, the G lenses are usually cheaper by far anyway.

Willis, about your D40 taking better pictures than your D90- I don't really agree there. I've noticed that the autofocus has let me down in the past- they couldn't determine an in between focus point between one of the three sensors- which really annoyed me, because I had to recompose the whole photo.

"I'm curious to see how well the other Gen 2 features work on the D3000's CCD chip. I'm not sure how much of it is software vs. hardware"

I think it's a little of both. Active D-Lighting for example is like it is on the D60. It only has on and off. You cannot select the amount of it and it certainly has no auto mode. I speculate this COULD have something to do with the chip and the D3000 and D60 are the only two cameras with such a crippled version of it.

@NSX - I'd never buy a D3000 if I didn't also own a D90. My Tokina 11-16 and my 50mm prime won't auto-focus on my D40. That said, if I could get the better AF, and larger LCD (Why oh why didn't they give us the 900k verson... Darn you Nikon!) in the same size package, then its a no brainier.

I'm curious to see how well the other Gen 2 features work on the D3000's CCD chip. I'm not sure how much of it is software vs. hardware.

I actually feel like I take better pictures with my D40 and a $200 lens than with my D90 and a $2000 lens. There's something about having $3K hanging from your neck that limits what you are willing to do artistically. I was speechless when my girlfriend used that rig for an underwater portrait shoot with what effectively was a glorified zip-lock bag as the only protection. I wouldn't have thought twice about doing it with my D40 though.

"Don't believe everything you read in a photography advice thread" ;^)

"Yes, the camera is probably just as good, but not having AF-D lenses are a disadvantage- they're equally good quality lenses, and cheaper than G lenses. I wanted a wider selection of lenses, so I probably should have gone with the D80 when I was thinking about a DSLR. A D90 isn't that much larger than a D40. And with the D90, you probably won't have to upgrade anytime soon. Obviously, I can't say that you can not buy the D3000, but as much as I love my D40, I kinda hate it too for being so empty (relatively speaking) on the features list. I mean, I fire up NikonDTown and all the camera tips pretty much cover everything above the D5000... I feel left out. :D"

NSXType-R, Good points here too. The AF-D lenses in some cases have the same glass as their newer G version. That's the case with my 300F4. The IQ between these two is the same. The only difference is, if you have a D40,D3000 or D5000, you want the G version for AF. The entry level cameras are somewhat left out, they're not designed for constant rigorous use although I know they can be up to it. I've owned the D40 and I have a D90 and I can say that you can control all the things willis said above. In fact feature wise, the D90 is much closer to the D300 than to the D40. In fact Active D-Lighting is better implemented in the D90 than the D300.

"when I look at my photos shot at base ISO at 100%, they are all about as sharp as each-other"

I've addressed this base ISO comparison thing so many times that I will no longer entertain this. If you wanna know my opinion on this, go re read some of my many past post on this subject.

"What makes the D90 such a better camera for me is that it gives me a higher % of keepers. It does things like correcting chromatic aberration. Active D lighting, It's clean enough to shoot at higher ISO's, which means I have less motion blur. The AF system is far, far more accurate. I can use picture controls to get the colors I want."

But you seem to get what I'm saying better than most others ;)

Willis, personally, as another D40 owner, I have to agree and disagree to getting the D3000. Yes, the camera is probably just as good, but not having AF-D lenses are a disadvantage- they're equally good quality lenses, and cheaper than G lenses. I wanted a wider selection of lenses, so I probably should have gone with the D80 when I was thinking about a DSLR. A D90 isn't that much larger than a D40. And with the D90, you probably won't have to upgrade anytime soon. Obviously, I can't say that you can not buy the D3000, but as much as I love my D40, I kinda hate it too for being so empty (relatively speaking) on the features list. I mean, I fire up NikonDTown and all the camera tips pretty much cover everything above the D5000... I feel left out. :D

LOL Gentoo, let me say it another way.... when I look at my photos shot at base ISO at 100%, they are all about as sharp as each-other. Doesn't matter what camera I shoot them on. What makes the D90 such a better camera for me is that it gives me a higher % of keepers. It does things like correcting chromatic aberration. Active D lighting, It's clean enough to shoot at higher ISO's, which means I have less motion blur. The AF system is far, far more accurate. I can use picture controls to get the colors I want.

All of these factors let me get more keepers per shoot. But when I compare a good shot that I took with my D40, to a good shot I took with my D90, I can't tell you which is which. Viewed on my computer monitor, both cameras are thowing away most of their pixels. I want a CMOS D40, because I love the size, but miss the features of my D90. I don't care about the pixels.

Print is a little different. Photo printers can print north of 300 DPI. A photo that fills up my 24 inch (1920 X 1200) iMac screen would print out as a 6.4 X 4.0 inches at 300 DPI. Some printers can go well north of 300 (good luck being able to tell the difference, but the dots are in there). For Print, MP's matter. At 300 DPI, the D90 would print at 100% as a 14.2 X 9.5 inch... about as big as I'd ever print something. If I had a D3X, than my 5690 X 3964 image would print 19 X 12.3 inch print at 100%. That's about twice as large as my D40's 10 X 6 prints. But I needed 4x the pixels.

If I need to print any larger than 19 X 12, then I'm going to have to get back a little ways in order to look at the whole image. The further away I stand, the harder it is for my eye to detect differences at the pixel level. 6 feet away, I'd be hard pressed to tell any difference in sharpness between a 24 inch image printed at 300dpi and the same image on my monitor at 70dpi (I didn't do the math on the monitor, but I think most of them are right around 70 these days).

I am amazed at some of the logic I'm reading here right now lol

I've got both. The D90 has better image quality without question. While I don't really care about the 25% increase in resolution from 12mp to 18mp, the 50% increase from 6mp to 12mp makes a pretty big difference. My D40 is all I need if I get the shot right in camera, but once I start cropping those pixels can get spread pretty thin. Of course, you will be doing plenty of cropping because the 95% finder is to small for precise framing (Question: Is live view always 100%?... seems like it would be).

That said, I almost always pick my D40 over the D90 because 1. My girlfriend always has the D90 :), and 2. I don't usually care about IQ all that much. My photo's are pretty much just for me. I'm seriously considering the D3000 as an upgrade. It doesn't appear to be any bigger, and I'd love to have a better AF.

I'd also love to see Nikon release a 6MP CMOS sensor. It would have the low light performance of a D700!.

I like them both. But, since I bought the D90, I clearly feel it a better camera too. On the other hand, many would think the D3 an upgrade to the D90, but for my use it wouldn't be. (I'm not arguing image quality here.)

I had the D40 and I can tell you first hand that it doesn't hardly compare to the D90. If his argument is size, then my counter is that the D40 is so small and light that it feels cheap and poorly made.

For all those really serious about back-up, remember, the back-ups should be in a separate physical location.

An upgrade for the D40? Aren't all the others bigger, heavier, more expensive and not necessarily better in low light. A friend of mine is so passionate about his D40, that he thinks it's an upgrade from my D90!

"(yet another reason to own a cheapo D40... if it gets stolen its not a bad thing, its an "upgrade opportunity")"

HAHA. Truer words have not been spoken.

I ditto whoever said backup your files. Not only does Lightroom backup all my files automatically, but I also have a clone of my harddrive that I update weekly. I highly recommend... I'd never want to lose the years of pictures that I've taken just because my drive gave up.

"The best camera is the one you have with you"... at least it was good advice until Chase Jarvis made an iPhone app out of it. Seriously though, some of my best shots I got just by virtue of having my camera in my truck all the time (yet another reason to own a cheapo D40... if it gets stolen its not a bad thing, its an "upgrade opportunity").

I miss out on all kinds of great shots during the summer because my car can reach temperatures upwards of 150, which I have to assume is bad for the camera and its batteries.

I think this is a big part of the reason that there is so much interest in the Micro 4/3 format.

"Having a catalog in Lightroom for the sets of pictures is great because it save me time from doing that folder cataloging (originals , pp and resized.

Ohh I don't remember when was the last time I did an actual back up of photos. I am too lazy for that. But I will soon. Crazy stuff I already lost couple of gigs of family photos. I have to create somekind of back up system. "

Yeah I have the original folder. Then I have one for edited birds. Inside that I may have subfolders for certain groups of birds if I have a lot of them. Then I have another folder for non bird edited folders. I'm about to create subfolders in that one as it's now getting large.

Then I have those folders backed up on my other hard drives. Yeah I can get obsessive with these folders sometimes lol

"Ohh I don't remember when was the last time I did an actual back up of photos. I am too lazy for that."

Did you just feel that poster? Because I just busted you up side yo head ! When will you learn son?!
When will you learn ..... :^(

At Gentoo

Having a catalog in Lightroom for the sets of pictures is great because it save me time from doing that folder cataloging (originals , pp and resized.

Ohh I don't remember when was the last time I did an actual back up of photos. I am too lazy for that. But I will soon. Crazy stuff I already lost couple of gigs of family photos. I have to create somekind of back up system.