Menus (continued)
Key Menu Items (Setup & Other)
Setup
| Menu Item | Menu Display | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Image Sensor Cleaning |
   
|
A first on a Nikon FX DSLR (also present on the D300) is the D700’s ultrasonic image sensor cleaning (see The FX Sensor).
This menu allows the user to specify when the sensor should be cleaned, or to activate cleaning immediately. Cleaning takes just a second or so. |
| World Time |
 
|
Invaluable for the travelling photographer, the D700 retains Nikon’s usual World Time feature, which makes changing time zones (and maintining proper EXIF information) easy. |
| Virtual Horizon |
 
|
Nikon’s now-famous virtual horizon - good-bye bubble-level. Dismissed as a gimmick by some, however it’s a useful feature for landscape and architecture photographers.
(Quite honestly, I’m keeping my bubble level. I think it’s more accurate - there are a few degrees leeway in the “green line” horizontal position.) |
| Battery Info |
|
Displaying both the internal battery, and the one in the MB-D10. The currently-used battery is highlighted with a yellow rectangle.
(Ignore the fact that I’ve only taken 2 shots on a half-charged battery - I had left the camera on live view for a long, long time before I grabbed this.) |
Retouch
Nikon’s “Retouch” menu lists the built-in image editing facilities that the camera now offers. The options here will never rival photoshop, but do have their occasional uses.
My Menus
The “My Menu” tab allows you to create a custom menu of frequently used items, and to change the order in which those items are displayed. This is probably my most-used menu; once set up how I like it, it allows quick access to settings that would otherwise take me more time to find in the various nested menus.
However, not everyone likes the “My Menu” - I admit I didn’t at first - and Nikon seem to have realised this. With the D700, they’ve also allowed you to optionally reinstate the old “Recent Settings” menu as used on the D200 etc. I’m on the fence as to which I prefer; the “My Menu” (horrible name) keeps everything in the same place so I know where it is, but the “Recent Settings” menu automatically adapts to my current shooting situation. Swings and roundabouts.
Info screen
One thing that has been improved quite substantially on the D700 over both the D300 and the D3 is the “info” display. Firstly, the D700 has a dedicated button (rather than overloading the help/protect button on the other cameras). Secondly, a second press of the info button will bring up a bubble; use that to select from the settings along the bottom of the screen, and press OK to change that setting. Very useful.
Note that the speech-bubble “screen tips” can be turned off by using custom function d3, if you prefer them to not get in the way of the info display. This is good attention to detail from Nikon.
Managing Feature Creep
Feature Creep: the tendency of a design project or product cycle to accumulate more and more features or details, rather than to be completed and released at a more basic level.
Okay, so perhaps I’m being unkind - but let’s look at the Custom Settings menu. We have 50+ options, each with multiple choices, spread over six sub-menus. Add to that everything in the Setup menu, the Shooting menu (all four banks), the Playback menu (again, with four banks), and you end up with more options that you can shake a very long stick at.
Now, this is all well and good - we like options, and if you try and take one away you’ll get so many complaints your head will spin - but that’s no excuse for managing options badly.
Other reviewer have raised this point, so I won’t flog the mortally wounded horse too much here, but quickly - where is the setting for the toggling the viewfinder grid display? Custom setting d2. Why is it there, and not in the Shooting menu along with Live View mode? Not to mention the fact that it’s missing entirely from the D3’s custom settings, where d2 is Shooting Speed. Why is there an arbitrary distinction between “Basic photo info” (1 item) and “Detailed photo info” (3 items) in the Display Mode item in the Playback menu (see screen above)?
Also, we can now change settings in too many differents ways (My Menu, Recent Settings, the usual menu route, the Info screen, and possibly hardware controls).
What Nikon have failed to do here is successfully manage the rapid feature expansion that’s occurred as digital SLRs have advanced and matured. What’s needed is not only a complete re-organisation of the menus (as nice as they look, they’re just not structured logically enough), but a way of keeping that consistent across all models in the range.
Maybe that’s easier said than done, but I can’t help but feel it’s time for the old drawing board to be dusted off in this area.
| <—— Menus | Sample Photos ——> |
