Today's iso performance

[Don Kuykendall_RIP]

Interesting... The D750 runs neck and neck with some pretty nice medium format bodies. It loses out to the $6,500 Fuji GFX 50s by less than a point and just beats the $7,000 Pentax 645Z by the same margin.

Of course if anyone want's to swap their lightly used '50s for my D750, please drop everything and call me; I'm confident we can work something out.
...

I am constantly amazed by the D750.

 

[spb_stan]

Also interesting that the D7200/D7100 have almost identical DR to the D500.

Both are not that far from the max theoretical with AP-C sensors. The visible difference in images from a D500 over a D7200 is only in JPG and it is significant in how high iso, low light images retain color information and color accuracy over all other crop cameras. The new image processor is almost magic in how it performs rendering JPGs. New models that get the Expeed 5 processor will probably do as well or better. The new D7500 has it, so I will expect a lot of the naysayers, who only went by spec sheets, will find image quality just being better and a lot of people will upgrade once they see the results of field tests. JPGs at 25k ISO will beat a D800. The D500 smoked my D800 with the same lenses in the same dark scenes I tested it on. Sure, in the studio where I have control of light, the D800 just records better images but in a dark venue, HS basketball for example, the D500 just captures better images with far better shadow color fidelity and saturation.

Bills test however does not compare JPG but raw data so his charts would say nothing about rendered files. I find the whole concept of Photographers DR matches real world results far better than the more common Engineering DR. One reason Nikon has such a loyal following is how they have consistently had the leader in DR throughout the product line on every camera since and including the D90. Canon is getting better in their higher end models but the bulk of sales are in the lower end where the difference in degree if superiority of Nikon models is most striking

 

[Vincent]

A D7000 is a very competent camera and I dare anyone to look at a decent sized print and pick an image shot with a D7000 from one shot with a D810 when viewing from normal distance.

I totally agree with this.
My current issue is, I want to sell the D7000, since I did decide to go to the D500. However you can take the same level of picture with a "gray market" D3300 at 285 EUR. At that price I do not want to sell the "very competent camera" so:

The most common excuse why people reject the suggestion to get into lighting is "I hate the flash look" or "I prefer natural light". Both only underscores the reason they need to learn about lighting. Every other image they see every day was done with lighting modification. That outdoor, sunny day beach photo on the magazine cover almost surely had lighting and modifiers used to create natural looking images. Snap shot without it, don't look "natural" at all, it is not how we see the same scene with our naked eyes. We use lighting and modifiers to trick the brain into seeing what would be natural for human vision but isn't what a camera natively puts out.
Another reason why upgrading all the time holds people back is because it consumes the budget that could be used for items that actually DO make a difference., such as workshops, lighting, modifiers, and even a lens of two. If you are not winning awards now, it is not because you don't have the latest camera. The reason the image that did get an award was honored depended not one bit on the camera model.

First of all, thanks for this. It confirms what I knew, but I needed a reminder, I should keep the D7000 and push it at special projects, challenge myself to use the "very competent camera" closer to its limits.

However I only partially agree:
1) Clearly great pictures have been taken for 100s of year, clearly without new tech. However new tech does help, taking birds in flight is so much easier with the D500, that for that photography topic it is a game changer. Since I have the D500, why go back to the D7000? The D500 has a different performance level.
2) What seems to hold me back at the moment (I could be wrong) is work or to be more precise "time". As many others do I try to compensate by buying material.
However material does not give me pictures, nor experience.
I do spend money on going to photography opportunities and my goal is to save up to stop my "day job" early in my life, to combine some of my passions and become more active in them.

So again thanks for the input, I might not be able to sell my D7000, but I might be able to push myself with the D7000 to award winning pictures and hold off buying something else I do not need.

 

[mikew_RIP]

Its an unfortunate or fortunate fact of life Nikon and Canon ect have not built their empires just on the improvements in technology, they have to thank the users desire not always need to upgrade just as much.You could argue no one needs more than they have at this moment,that would kill the camera trade and make life very boring,