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Nikon D2X By: Dave Etchells and Shawn Barnett Nikon introduces a 12.2 megapixel hybrid pro SLR that can be either high resolution or high speed as the job requires. Select a topic Reference: Datasheet D2X Test Images! In-depth Image Analysis D2X Photo Gallery! --------------------------------- 1. Intro and Highlights 2. User Report 3. Design 4. Viewfinder 5. Optics 6. Exposure & Flash 7. Shutter Lag & Cycle Time Tests 8. Operation & User Interface 9. Camera Modes & Menus 10. Image Storage & Interface 11. WiFi Connection 12. Video, Power, Software 13. Test Results & Conclusion --------------------------------- Print-Friendly Review Version Additional Resources and Other Links Reader Comments on D2X Review --------------------------------- Digital Camera Comparometer (TM) --------------------------------- <-- Digital Cameras (Home) <-- Digital Camera Reviews Index <<Design :(Previous) | (Next): Optics>> Page 4:Viewfinder Review First Posted: 04/14/2005, Updated: 06/10/2005

Viewfinder

The Nikon D2X is equipped with an optical viewfinder that works through the lens (the LCD monitor is for image playback and accessing the menu system only, and as with other digital SLRs cannot be used for image preview / framing). The optical viewfinder eyepiece features a diopter adjustment knob on the side of the prism housing, and a sliding protective shutter than can be moved in and out of place manually via a small lever. The internal metal shutter helps avoid exposure errors due to light entering the rear element of the viewfinder during long exposures on a tripod. Nikon states that the optical viewfinder provides about 100 percent frame coverage, which agrees quite well with my own measurements. (I measured viewfinder coverage at almost exactly 100 percent.) The D2X's illuminated display inside the viewfinder provides a bit more information than the previous D1X, with a center-weighted metering circle, 11 sets of focus brackets, focus indicator, metering, bracketing indication, battery level, FV lock, sync indicator, AE lock, shutter speed, shutter speed lock, aperture, aperture lock, aperture stop indicator, exposure mode and compensation, frame counter, flash-ready indicator, electronic analog exposure display, voice memo status, white balance mode and bracketing, image size and quality, and ISO sensitivity.

While the 2.5-inch LCD panel on the Nikon D2X isn't usable as a viewfinder, it does provide a great deal of information about your pictures after you've shot them. A variety of playback options are available, ranging from a 9-image thumbnail display, through several full-sized image modes, to a zoomed playback option with variable magnification. The screen shot at right shows several of the information displays that are available.

Of the various screens, one of the more interesting options on the Nikon D2X is the histogram screen, shown at right. Histogram displays are common on professional digicams, regarded as almost mandatory by many pros for evaluating exposure levels. A histogram is simply a graph of how many pixels there are in the image at each brightness level. The brightness is the horizontal axis, running from black at the left to white at the right. The height of the graph shows the relative number of pixels having each brightness level. This sort of display is very handy for determining under- or overexposure. Ideally, the histogram would stretch across the entire width of the display, using the full range of brightness values available. An underexposed image will have a histogram with all the data lumped on the left-hand side, with nothing reaching all the way to the right. Likewise, an overexposed image will have all the data lumped on the right hand side.

New to the D2X is an RGB histogram mode, which shows four separate, smaller histograms, with separate plots for the Red, Green, and Blue color channels, as well as overall luminance, shown in yellow. When in this mode, the thumbnail image will blink wherever highlights are blown out, and you can select the color channel that the blink warning is associated with by holding down the Index button and pressing the left or right arrows on the multi-controller.

A histogram display is very helpful in telling whether you've got the exposure right, but to my mind isn't adequate by itself. With digital cameras, it's very important not to blow-out the highlights in a picture (they're similar to slide film in that respect), since once you hit the maximum brightness, the image just saturates, and any highlight detail will be lost. A histogram display does a pretty good job of telling you how the image as a whole is doing, but what if there are just a few critical areas that you're worried about for the highlights? If only a small percentage of the total frame is involved, it won't account for many pixels. That means any peak at the "white" end of the histogram graph would be pretty small, and easy to miss (or just plain invisible). What to do? The folks at Nikon recognized this problem, and provided another special display mode on the D2X that they simply call "highlights," accessible via the Playback settings menu, under "Display Mode." This mode blinks any highlights that are saturated in any of the color channels. It does this by taking the nearly-white areas on the LCD and toggling them between white and black.

 

Nikon took the blinking highlights display one big step further in the D2X though, by letting you examine the state of highlights in the individual Red, Green, and Blue color channels independently. Along the bottom of the Highlights display on the D2X are four indicators labeled RGB, R, G, and B. You can select between them with the left/right arrows on the Multi Controller, while holding down the Index button on the left side of the LCD display. When RGB is selected, the blinking highlights correspond to areas of the image that are approaching saturation in two or more color channels at once. When either R, G, or B is selected though, the highlights only blink where the corresponding color channel is blown out. This is an important addition, because highly saturated colors can often blow out a single color channel without triggering a conventional luminance-only highlight warning display. Saturating a single color channel results in loss of shape and detail in brightly colored objects, so it's important to know when it might be happening. (I've often seen this happen on brightly colored fabrics, where the texture of the fabric can be lost in brightly lit areas.) The group of screen shots above shows the behavior of the separate color channels on an overexposed shot of three colored pens. Pretty slick!

In addition to the histogram, highlights, and information screens, the D2X also features a focus information screen, which highlights in red the AF area used for the shot. This can be helpful for checking to see that the camera's AF system locked onto the portion of the subject you were most interested in.

Like the D2H before it, the D2X offers a good playback zoom feature. Pressing the Enter button while an image is displayed enters Playback Zoom mode. To control zoom, you then hold down the Index button while turning the Command dial. As you do this, a red rectangle with blue corners appears on the screen to mark the area of the subject to be viewed. You can move this box around the screen with the Multi Controller's arrows. When you release the Index button, the selected portion of the image appears full-screen. The ability to magnify an image lets you see critical details that are indiscernible in the basic LCD image. Also in Playback mode, the D2X's LCD monitor can display as many as four or nine thumbnail-sized images at once, when the Index button is held down while rotating the Sub-Command dial.

 
Image Overlay
One of the more unique features of the Nikon D2X is its "Image Overlay" mode. This mode lets you overlay two NEF (RAW-format) images in the camera, creating a composite image from the two. My initial reaction to this was "so what?" But once I thought just a little, I realized it could be incredibly useful to commercial shooters.

How often have you needed to shoot a photo for use on a magazine cover, or the title page of an article, and needed to leave space around the subject for overlaid text or graphics? This is a very common requirement, and one that can be difficult to deal with. More often than not, you end up leaving much more space around the subject than you need to, wasting pixels and producing a poor composition. Alternately, you may not leave enough space, leading to a chewing-out by the art director and costly retouching work to extend the background. And what do you do if you're faced with an "almost" situation, one in which you're not sure whether there's enough space in the needed areas? Do you take the shot and hope for the best, or keep looking for something else that fits better?

The Image Overlay function in the Nikon D2X neatly addresses this problem. You can shoot a template of the desired layout, showing areas that need to be reserved for text and graphics, and then overlay it with shots you take in the field, to see if the subject is positioned properly, and whether you've intruded on any of the "forbidden" areas with critical subject detail or distracting elements.

To illustrate this, I made a simple template for the fictitious publication "Pets of the Rich and Famous," and captured a series of screen shots that step through the process.