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I'm still using a Nikon D3100. I don't do action sports or low light at night. I'm 69 and have been taking photos for 61 years so may not have many years left. I'm tempted to buy a Nikon D780 with a 28-300mm lens. To put photos on Alamy, not to make 2 metre wide prints. Do bigger images get better sales? I see the real professionals here often downsizing images to 17.5 MB. I would welcome your advice and experiences before I spend £2,300. 

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Actually I think you're asking two slightly different questions here. The Nikon D780 that you are considering purchasing is 'only' a 24.5MP sensor camera with 6048 x 4024 pixels, but it is of course Full Frame FX. There is no doubt that it is an excellent camera, and that Nikon make excellent cameras, but at the end of the day no buyer is ever going to know if those 24.5 Megapixels have come from a full-frame FX, APS-C/DX or even the 1" sensor on a tiny Sony RX100. All things being equal in challenging circumstances the larger sensor will have a higher dynamic range and less noise at higher ISO but before you upload to Alamy you will have made sure that none of that is an issue. In terms of your analogy of print size they will all produce prints, or reproduce in publications, at the same size.

 

The other question that you could ask is if pictures with more Megapixels sell better on Alamy, so in terms of Nikon that could be anything from 36MP up to 46MP. Others can answer that one, I doubt it but there are probably specialist high-end uses where more Megapixels matter. Certainly there is an argument to say that more megapixels give you the ability to crop, say for wildlife, birds in flight etc.

 

Personally I think that now the main question to ask when intending to invest a large amount of money in a new camera is whether to go to mirrorless or perhaps whether you really want to carry round the larger, heavier lenses that full-frame requires. I have Canon full-frame but have also moved to Fuji (APS-C of course) and I'm amazed at the quality and range I can get out of a small light camera bag.

 

Edit:

I was really answering the question posed in your title (FX v DX) but I think that your 2010 14MP D3100 is looking a bit long in the tooth now but you probably don't need to spend many thousands of pounds to reap the benefits of the last 10 years of technological improvements, particularly if you don't mind buying s/h from a reputable dealer.

Edited by Harry Harrison
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No!

 

In any business controlling/reducing costs is paramount. Alamy are cutting our commission and license fees across the industry are under continued pressure. Investing in gear to produce stock (unless perhaps very specialised) is not a sensible decision. 

 

Resist gear lust! Or from your current position you could tickle the urge with a lot less expense....

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Unless your port well outperforms the average it would take a good few of your "not many years left" to pay back £2300. I would still be using a camera released in 2008 if I hadn't broken it- I've only ever replaced out of necessity. There just isn't enough money in this business.

 

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1 hour ago, zxzoomy said:

I'm still using a Nikon D3100. I don't do action sports or low light at night. I'm 69 and have been taking photos for 61 years so may not have many years left. I'm tempted to buy a Nikon D780 with a 28-300mm lens. To put photos on Alamy, not to make 2 metre wide prints. Do bigger images get better sales? I see the real professionals here often downsizing images to 17.5 MB. I would welcome your advice and experiences before I spend £2,300. 

 

I have been using high MP Nikon cameras for years since the D800s were released in 2012 and I see no evidence of an advantage as far as sales on Alamy are concerned. There are other big advantages to high MP cameras but for general stock I would say no.

 

As far as a D780 with 28-300 lens is concerned, as far as I can see that would set you back more than £2300 unless you are talking secondhand. My question looking at your port is do you really need a lens with such vast reach. It looks to me like you could live with a 24-70 for most of your stuff. If that is the case, the best deal in FF Nikon at the moment would have to be the Z 6 + NIKKOR Z 24-70mm f/4 S + Mount Adapter Kit + 64GB XQD CARD from Grays of Westminster for £2145. The lens is amazing as is the camera and they are incredibly light (about 1.1kg) which may be a big advantage for a 69 year old. The Z6 sensor is very similar to that of the D780 - both absolutely excellent.

Edited by MDM
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Have to agree with MDM here, that would be my choice if I were to be in the market for a new camera.

Only you can decide whether spending over £2000 pound on a camera is a good idea, I would say for Alamy contributions only, not so, but you may do photography for personal pleasure as well.

As for being 69, I'm 71 and intend to be doing photography for many years yet.

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14 minutes ago, BobD said:

Have to agree with MDM here, that would be my choice if I were to be in the market for a new camera.

Only you can decide whether spending over £2000 pound on a camera is a good idea, I would say for Alamy contributions only, not so, but you may do photography for personal pleasure as well.

As for being 69, I'm 71 and intend to be doing photography for many years yet.

Cheers Bob. 😀

 

I notice that Grays have a D780 with 24-120 for £2499 but are offering a trade-in bonus of £180 before July 30th bringing the price to just over £2300. That is a decent deal. I also notice that the venerable D750 is still available new with the same 24-120 f4 for £1599. Again going by the OP's port on Alamy, that could be a great deal as the differences between the D750 and D780 may be negligible for his type of photography.

 

I am pointing to Grays by the way as they tend to have the best prices in the UK for Nikon kit and have great customer service.

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2 minutes ago, MDM said:

Cheers Bob. 😀

 

I notice that Grays have a D780 with 24-120 for £2499 but are offering a trade-in bonus of £180 before July 30th bringing the price to just over £2300. That is a decent deal. I also notice that the venerable D750 is still available new with the same 24-120 f4 for £1599. Again going by the OP's port on Alamy, that could be a great deal as the differences between the D750 and D780 may be negligible for his type of photography.

 

I am pointing to Grays by the way as they tend to have the best prices in the UK for Nikon kit and have great customer service.

 

I have a 750 and 850, have to say that the 750 rarely gets used nowadays. I would love to get a Z7 but honestly cannot warrant the outlay especially as the OP says, may not have long left.🤢 

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Thank you for all these comments and advice. Much appreciated. You have given me a lot to think about and explore. With all the light we have at the moment I'm giving my Tamron 70 - 300mm a go for a change so I might be open to longer than 120mm. When Manchester is gloomy I never bother with it. 

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Hi, lots of useful info on here as always.  I also have Nikon FX and also the 28/300mm.  This is an excellent lens for the money and I take it with when I go travelling - oh when was that.  It's also a very useful around town lens and not as obtrusive as say a 70/200mm.  If wildlife is your thing it's been more than acceptable and in my opinion quite an underrated lens.  Mostly around my local town I use the 24/70mm.  You say you never bother with your Tampon 70/300mm when the weather is gloomy, however, I think you'll find on an FX camera you will be able to push the ISO up much higher than maybe you do now?  

 

Good luck with whatever choice you make and have fun using it for many years to come😄

 

Carol

 

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I was very glad when I upgraded to FX - I really noticed a difference. 

I use secondhand D600s I got on MPB for about £400 and they are brilliant cameras.

https://www.mpb.com/en-uk/used-equipment/used-photo-and-video/used-digital-slr-cameras/used-nikon-digital-slr-cameras/nikon-d600/

The D780 may well be better, but not six times better.
I think the D600 is the best value for money Nikon available.

Edited by Phil Robinson
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7 hours ago, zxzoomy said:

I'm still using a Nikon D3100. I don't do action sports or low light at night. I'm 69 and have been taking photos for 61 years so may not have many years left. I'm tempted to buy a Nikon D780 with a 28-300mm lens. To put photos on Alamy, not to make 2 metre wide prints. Do bigger images get better sales? I see the real professionals here often downsizing images to 17.5 MB. I would welcome your advice and experiences before I spend £2,300. 

If you have a bunch of DX lenses already maybe get the D7500 or a secondhand D500. If you go FX the 28-300mm lens is a great all round lens. Not the the lightest lens but certainly saves weight by not having to carry too much else with you. I'd agree with others here, the D600 /610 is a great camera. There are also some quite good deals on secondhand D800 /810s too.

I don't think bigger images make better sales on Alamy (well, certainly not for me) .. my photos sell just as well that were taken with a D200 sixteen years ago as some of my current photos taken with a 50mpx camera.

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50 minutes ago, Phil Robinson said:

 

I use secondhand D600s I got on MPB for about £400 and they are brilliant cameras.

The D780 may well be better, but not six times better.


It depends on requirements. For example, the D780 is infinitely better if you want to shoot 4K video or 10-bit N-log video, as the D600 only does 1920x1080 @ 30fps tops. I know the OP did not mention video but just using that as an example to illustrate a point. 
 

That said, given the OP’s stated requirements a D600 or D610 might be ideal. 

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23 minutes ago, John Morrison said:

I have the D610. Very happy with it. It may be the last camera I ever own...  😎


This thread is beginning to sound like people are preparing for the end. Is the pandemic making us all more aware of our mortality? 💀

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1 hour ago, Phil Robinson said:

I was very glad when I upgraded to FX - I really noticed a difference. 

I use secondhand D600s I got on MPB for about £400 and they are brilliant cameras.

https://www.mpb.com/en-uk/used-equipment/used-photo-and-video/used-digital-slr-cameras/used-nikon-digital-slr-cameras/nikon-d600/

The D780 may well be better, but not six times better.
I think the D600 is the best value for money Nikon available.

I hadn't thought about the D600 series. I will look closer. I read that the D610 had less of the oil on sensor problem that some D600 had. And I hadn't heard of MPB before. Thank you to everyone who has commented. Much appreciated.

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Most of my portfolio is shot with the D300 then the D750. I see no preference at all for the D750(24MP) over the older D300 (12MP) files. If you do want to upgrade, the D750 is a fantastic camera. Sure, its older technology now and the Nikon D850 is better, but for value for money you get a lot. I bought mine new in 2014 and its still going strong, I see no reason to change it.

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11 hours ago, zxzoomy said:

I'm still using a Nikon D3100. I don't do action sports or low light at night. I'm 69 and have been taking photos for 61 years so may not have many years left. I'm tempted to buy a Nikon D780 with a 28-300mm lens. To put photos on Alamy, not to make 2 metre wide prints. Do bigger images get better sales? I see the real professionals here often downsizing images to 17.5 MB. I would welcome your advice and experiences before I spend £2,300. 

I would agree with most of what has been written so far.  I would suggest buying used, while I have never worked with the 600, been using the 800's and my ancient 700 for years.  My most licensed images are either scans from old 35mm chromes or shot with 12MP DSLR's.  I bought my 800's used, one was NIKON reconditioned, and the only problem I've ever had was after I sent a body to a local shop for a sensor cleaning.  They messed up the AF and they sent it to NIKON for work.

 

Chuck

Edited by Chuck Nacke
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I went FX in 2017 to improve my photography overall, but as far as Alamy goes I sell just as many DX and even early steam Pentax as I do high MP images. One of the things I've learned since starting stock photography is that an acceptable quality image of the thing they've searched is what brings sales rather that having the Wow! image, though of course there is a market for Wow! if you take such images, but perhaps not so much on Alamy. Does that make sense?

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I don't think a good FX image is really any better than a good DX image. Any modern DSLR can produce excellent files - the difference is that good files are easier to produce with an FX camera. More potential quality, more room for error, basically a higher success rate.

Edited by Phil Robinson
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5 hours ago, John Morrison said:

I have the D610. Very happy with it. It may be the last camera I ever own...  😎

I looked at the 610 but there seems to be very little difference - half a frame per second speed. I've used two D600s for ages and have never had any problems with oil on the sensor or anything else.

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8 minutes ago, Phil Robinson said:

I looked at the 610 but there seems to be very little difference - half a frame per second speed. I've used two D600s for ages and have never had any problems with oil on the sensor or anything else.

If I recall correctly, the 610 was designed to put right the deficiences that affected (some) 600 cameras...

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11 hours ago, BobD said:

As for being 69, I'm 71 and intend to be doing photography for many years yet.

 

I was 70 a few weeks back, and also intend to continue shooting stock and reportage.

 

I currently use 2 D750's, with 17-35, 24-70 and 70-300mm lenses. If I did add any other kit it would be the Tamron G2 2.8 70-200, but currently can't cost justify it. They cover all I need. I still have my earlier DX camera's, a D7100 and D7200, with 10-24, 16-85, 70-210, 70-300 and 8mm fisheye DX lenses, for backup. They get very little use now, but occasionally as a light option I'll carry just the D7200 with the 16-85 lens. The D750's weren't too expensive for what they are capable of. My reason for buying full frame was mainly for lower digital noise at higher iso's, and faster and better lenses. The one Nikon DX body I sometimes long for is the D500.

 

As others have said, images shot on DX sold no problem.

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I own a Nikon FX 800, DX 3200 and Sony Rx100.

 

For selling on Alamy its mostly Rx100 and DX. Years back I got the Nikkor 18-300mm and that stays on the DX body and covers pretty much everything for stock. I rarely use the Fx for stock but a lot of personal projects and commercial shoots.

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