Nikon D100 6MP Digital SLR Camera

Styled around the more traditional N80, the D100 has a full-featured body, is nicely weighted and considerably lighter than you might expect, given the amount of technology that's packed into it. The controls are nicely situated, and navigating through the settings using the provided four-way movement pad becomes second nature very quickly. Picture preview comes courtesy of the built-in 1.8-inch LCD screen, which allows for a cursory check of any pictures taken. Unlike earlier Nikon products, it's not possible to use the screen on the D100 as an alternate viewfinder, restricting its use in tight situations, but the results through the "traditional" viewfinder are perfectly adequate.

As you would expect from a 6-megapixel camera, the image quality is superb at all levels, from the highest resolution (a mighty 3,008 x 2,000 pixels) down to a less intense 1,504 x 1,000 pixels. At any resolution, the output images are really very good, color saturation is well up to par, and overall the results stand up well. On the downside, perfectionists may well find there's a tiny amount less definition, but there's nothing here to raise anything approaching serious issues.

Power is provided from a supplied rechargeable battery pack, which is both light and long lasting--up to a maximum of two hours, depending on flash usage. To recharge from empty takes around two hours, so it would be worth investing in a second pack. The D100 takes Type I and II CompactFlash as well as Microdrive units, which are invaluable for users looking to take any more than a handful of pictures in a single session. Our tests showed a 256 MB CF card could handle around 40 high-resolution uncompressed TIFF images, suddenly making a 1 GB Microdrive look extremely attractive.

The built-in flash unit, which pops up above the lens, is powerful and efficient, proving effective in a variety of conditions. Unlike many digital cameras, it only fires a single flash, effectively reducing red-eye without sacrificing performance.

It's difficult not to be impressed by the D100. It's a stylish and good-looking camera that proves that beauty isn't just skin deep by providing results well above expectation. The inclusion of the fast-charge battery pack means downtime is kept to a minimum, and the software packages provided by Nikon (including NikonView 5) make it easy to manipulate your images and save them out to hard drive, CD, or DVD. This is not a cheap buy, especially when you consider the base price excludes any form of lens, but for those with deep pockets the D100 is a force to be reckoned with. --Elly Russell

Pros:

• Superb image quality--up to 3,008 x 2,000 pixels
• Nicely weighted, full-featured body
• Compatible with Microdrives

Cons:

• Noticed a bit less definition to images

The D100 can use Nikon's entire line of autofocus lenses and many of the older manual focus lenses, allowing the photographer to easily migrate from film to digital. The camera has spot, matrix, and center-weighted exposure options, a programmed mode, apature priority or speed priority, as well as all of the manual options. Autofocus is crisp, fast, and works very well in low light. This camera is nearly as powerful in terms of its focusing and exposure options as the Nikon F5, which is the film camera I used for years before replacing my F5 with the D100.

Perhaps the greatest testimonial for the D100 is that it is notorious that the vast majority of photographers who I know who have bought a D100 never (or at least rarely) shoot film ever again.

The D100 takes OK shots right out of the camera, but to get best results most photographers will want to "process" the pictures through either Nikon's own program "Capture 3" or an aftermarket program like Adobe Photoshop or Photoshop Elements. I and probably most others have found that some of the post-processing settings on these programs really improve the images produced by the D100. This is a deliberate design "feature" of the D100 in that the D100 anticipates that serious photographers wish to retain a certain amount of control over their images. Accordingly, rather than making all of the decisions for you, the D100 produces images for which final exposure and contrast decisions can and should be made in a post-processing program such as Adobe Photoshop Elements or Capture 3. That having been said, the D100 can and does produce fine images without using a post-processing program. But almost all users have probably found that the best results are achieved by using such a program. In my opinion this is true of pretty much all of the high-end digital cameras out there, and is not confined to the D100. This is the power of digital photography--the photographer, at little cost (a low-end PC and $100-200 program are all that are required) can have a powerful "digital darkroom" which yields tremendous control over how the images turn out.

Physically, the D100 is ruggedly built. The rear LCD is bright and clear. The menu systems on the D100 are very well designed and quite intuitive--after familiarizing myself with the manual for several hours, I now find that I do not need to refer to the manual at all even for very complex "custom" situations. The menus are not overly "layered" as is the case with some digital cameras. The on-board flash is fine for snapshot portraits and the like, but most serious users will want to spring for either the SB-50DX or the SB-80DX flash, both of which are more or less designed for the D100.

Negatives on the camera are few. I mentioned above the post-processing issue, which in my mind is not a negative, but instead is just Nikon giving the photographer as much power and flexibility as possible. The matrix metering is not as powerful on the D100 as on the top-of-the-line F5, inasmuch as in tricky lighting situations the D100s center-weighted or spot metering will sometimes yield better results. Having said that, after several hours of experimenting I can now confidently take consistently good pictures with the D100 in fill-flash conditions. In common with the exposure issues, the D100 more or less requires photographers who want very "sharp" images to apply "sharpness" post-processing. Most of us have probably found that this produces better results than setting the sharpening in-camera, for reasons that exceed the scope of this review.

By the way, the battery life in the D100 is phenomenal. The on-board proprietary Nikon battery lets you take many hundreds of pictures, and serious shooters can buy at modest cost the MD-100 accessory which lets you shoot with either 2 Nikon batteries or a bunch of AAs. Either way this allows you to literally shoot all weekend likely without needing to recharge. The Nikon batteries recharge in a bit over an hour.

For good reason the D100, retailing now (October 2003) below $1,500, has put powerful digital photography in the hands of serious amateurs. It is a well-designed and sturdy camera that is a delight to own and use.

Naturally, the D100's image quality is astounding. Mated with quality lenses and proper technique you are left with no excuse for not producing the best photos you've ever taken. Friends and onlookers will drool with envy where ever you go, because you just can't hide a D100 with an MB-D100 grip and a fast AF 80-200mm f/2.8 ED IF zoom in your shirt pocket--forget about candids.

It's big, it's heavy, and it's all Nikon--and everyone will know that you're serious about your picture taking.

I now have the Nikon D100 with a variety of lenses and I can enthusiastically say that it is the best camera I have ever used -- digital or film. In program mode, it is nearly impossible to take a bad photo with it. It does an amazing job of focusing - fast and accurately. (In order to get full autofocus capabilities, you can use any Nikon "D" or "G" type lenses) And it feels and works just like a film SLR camera. No shutter lag at all.

Also, the user interface is sensible and easy to use. This is especially important for this camera since there are so many customizable features.

My only disappointment with this camera is that in order to get the 10-pin connector (which allows the use of remote controls, for example), you have to pay (Money) for the battery pack. That is a lot of money to spend and a lot of size and weight to add to the camera in order to get access to a tiny but useful connector.

This camera and the Canon D60 seem to be the begining of a whole wave of amazing digital SLRs, as I see that Kodak, Canon and others have new ones coming out with even higher resolutions. But I think that my D100 will keep me happy for several years.

There are only two REAL digital interchangable SLR to choose from. Nikon D1H or D100. If you are not a photojournalist, needing to carry your gear to desert war zone, and extreme environments. You don't need the ruggedness of D1H, which is based on the F5 body. If you don't need the insanely large memory buffer of D1H, D100 will satisfy all your need.

D100 has higher resolution than both the extremely fast D1H and the higher resolution cousin D1X (but slower), at half their price. The only thing that's lacking is a smaller memory buffer, hence slower, and a slower flash sync at 1/180. Unless you're doing a lot of daylight fill-flash, I wouldn't worry about this limitation.

Since the D100 is based on the N80, it's comfortable to hold and use. The user interface is so much better than Canon's. It's more ergonomic and comfortable than the more expensive Canon too. Not to mention that Canon's is lacking a playback zoom feature which I find it very important in Digital. You don't want to download your photo to your notebook computer every dozen shots to examine the details and sharpness, do you?

Of course, it can use all your Nikkor lens. (That's the main reason I'd never buy Contax, Pentax or Minota's digital camera. Their lens selection is just too limited.)

Just buy it and you'd be happy.