I Need New Nikon for Photographing Oil Paintings

Two_In

Two_In

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I need a new Nikon for photographing oil paintings on a daily basis. I currently use a D200, 18-55mm lens, Manfrotto tripod and have LED lighting. My setup is rudimentary but adequate, and have a designated area in my studio for photographing paintings. I need a camera that has more megapixels than the D200 for printed products in my Printify shop. I'd like to buy 2nd hand to make my money go further. And would prefer Nikon so that I can use my existing lens.

Thanks
 
The D200 was my first ever Nikon, great camera at the time but pales in comparison to even the most basic modern dslr today. What is your budget? do you tend to shoot at base or higher ISO [one of the main issues with the D200, higher ISO performance]
 
Two_In said:
I need a new Nikon for photographing oil paintings on a daily basis. I currently use a D200, 18-55mm lens, Manfrotto tripod and have LED lighting. My setup is rudimentary but adequate, and have a designated area in my studio for photographing paintings. I need a camera that has more megapixels than the D200 for printed products in my Printify shop. I'd like to buy 2nd hand to make my money go further. And would prefer Nikon so that I can use my existing lens.

Thanks
Click to expand...

Best bang for buck in terms of megapixels for Nikon is the d800.
 
twist said:
Best bang for buck in terms of megapixels for Nikon is the d800.
Click to expand...

Very true, don't think anyone can argue against this, very good ISO performance too. But OP needs to state their budget, for a decent used D800 you are still looking at about £600 lowest. You can get a D3300 for about £150 which would probably do the job and enough over for a couple decent primes for the same money.
 
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A d3400 or similar and a 60mm macro would be great.

Budget dependant, the Canon EF-s 35mm macro looks fantastic for repro work, but switching systems always costs more than you'd like...

If you are really patient and value money more than time, you could get closer to the paintings with your current D200 but with a prime lens (like 35mm 1.8g), stop down to f/5.6 and shoot it in sections before stitching in photoshop. It's a lot of work though!!
 
I have a Nikon D7100 with 3 lenses (10-24, 16-55, 70-300), battery and charger, USB cable, original box, L bracket, 2 x speedlight with remote modules if you are interested.
 
Some really goos suggestions here already. The issue I see with going full frame is the 18-55 lens you have for your D200 is DX, so you'd likely have to buy a new lens as well. Having said that, there are plenty of good old FX lenses out there at £50-75 so that might not be such an issue?

Bang for buck I'd go for the D800 (£500 from MPB) or the D600/610 (£460 from MPB). All three have pretty good high ISO performance and plenty of pixels to play with.
 
More megapixels on a budget - the obvious answer is a used D3200/3300/3400 with a 24MP sensor. As suggested already, should be available used from about £140 for the D3200, £170 for the D3300 & will take your existing lens:
https://www.lcegroup.co.uk/Used/Nikon-D3200-Body-(ONLY-2531-ACTUATIONS!)_260851.html
https://www.lcegroup.co.uk/Used/Nikon-D3200-BODY-*7K-SHOTS*_261353.html
https://www.lcegroup.co.uk/Used/Nikon-D3200-BODY-ONLY_259136.html
https://www.lcegroup.co.uk/Used/Nikon-D3200-Body-/-982011_254572.html

A D800/810 is a tool for a photographer, rather than a simple device for copying artwork. While it would certainly be capable of more highly detailed images, I doubt that's needed.
 
Cagey75 said:
The D200 was my first ever Nikon, great camera at the time but pales in comparison to even the most basic modern dslr today. What is your budget? do you tend to shoot at base or higher ISO [one of the main issues with the D200, higher ISO performance]
Click to expand...
I'm a bit confused by your question about ISO? I've currently got the D200 set to 100 - I thought that would give sharpest image? Was brought up on b&w/transparency films and a K1000 (the classic art student camera...).

Thanks everyone else for advice. Taking time to digest....
 
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FYI I'm mostly interested in increased Mega Pixels for printing - I've started a Printify account and currently with the D200 struggle to get large enough images for the smallest prints...
 
After a quick look. The D3200 has 24MP and the D800 does 36MP.

How does this affect the production of prints? Is 24MP enough for an A1 poster for instance?
 
Remember you're coming from 10MP.

I can print large at 16MP from my M43 kit but you need to stand back a bit.

A d800 will be overkill and you'll need an FX lens to go with it to maximise the MP count
 
What is your budget?

You can print A1 from your D200 too. As mentioned above depends on the view distance and hence DPI requirements.

For instance for a 300dpi image at A1 size you'll need roughly 70mp!!
But unless someone is going to have their nose against the print you don't need 300dpi on an A1 print.

Also staying with Nikon is a moot point since you only have the kit lens and if you move to FF you can't use it any way. The kit lens is not worth much in grand scheme of things, don't be penny wise pound foolish.

If you work on a tripod 100% then look at something like Olympus E-M1/5ii or something with pixel shift technology. That feature is practically made for you!
 
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Two_In said:
I'm a bit confused by your question about ISO? I've currently got the D200 set to 100 - I thought that would give sharpest image? Was brought up on b&w/transparency films and a K1000 (the classic art student camera...).

Thanks everyone else for advice. Taking time to digest....
Click to expand...

Well that's what I was asking pretty much, do you have a need for better high ISO performance? If you're shooting at 100 then that's not much of a factor more overall IQ. It was just trying to guage how you shoot, newer sensors will handle higher ISO levels a lot better.
 
Two_In said:
Is 24MP enough for an A1 poster for instance?
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Yes.

However it may be advantageous to upscale the images IF you want to look very closely at them. I have been very happy with 20" X 30" prints made from a 20MP camera, using upscaling to increase the number of pixels (but not the amount of detail - that's fixed at the time of taking the picture).

If you plan to print large then lens quality will make a much bigger difference than moving from 24 to 36MP. The kit zoom you have is not a bad lens, but is also far from excellent, and it is unlikely you would see any change in image quality between the D200 and a higher resolution camera, simply because the lens is limiting the amount of detail that can be recorded. Ideally you would instead use a lens of high sharpness if the amount of detail in the images was as important as the resolution of the camera.
 
Two_In said:
After a quick look. The D3200 has 24MP and the D800 does 36MP.

How does this affect the production of prints? Is 24MP enough for an A1 poster for instance?
Click to expand...


Thr D7100 also has 24.1mp ;)
 
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