D90/D300 viewfinder size difference?

thedude · May 24, 2009

At first I thought this was pretty clear to me but now I've got some doubts. After some "research" I had concluded that the Nikon D90 and D300 pretty much share the same viewfinder. With one exception: the 94% coverage for the D90 vs a 100% coverage for the D300.

So that's good news in favour of the D300... but the guys over at Neocamera.com suggest that the effective size of the viewfinders of the D80/D200/D90/D300 are all the same (i.e.: 0.626).:scratch

So what does this mean: do the viewfinders of all of these models appear the same size to our eyes?

If so, this would contradict a lot of the claims that the D300's viewfinder is "bigger" and "brighter" (which is something I doubted as well at first, as the brightness strongly depends on whether you're peering through a fast or slow lens.

So for those of you who've had a chance to compare the D90 and D300 side-by-side: is there a noticeable difference in the viewfinder size/brightness using the same lens?

The Mack · May 24, 2009

Viewfinder. While the Nikon D300 has a new Live View mode, where you'll find the real speed of an SLR is through the optical viewfinder. And though the Nikon D200's viewfinder was big, bright, and beautiful, the Nikon D300's viewfinder delivers nearly 100 percent frame coverage, something we specifically wished for in our D200 review. It's here, and it's glorious. Magnification is still a very good 0.94x.

NikonsandVstroms · May 24, 2009

thedude wrote:

At first I thought this was pretty clear to me but now I've got some doubts. After some "research" I had concluded that the Nikon D90 and D300 pretty much share the same viewfinder. With one exception: the 94% coverage for the D90 vs a 100% coverage for the D300.

So that's good news in favour of the D300... but the guys over at Neocamera.com suggest that the effective size of the viewfinders of the D80/D200/D90/D300 are all the same (i.e.: 0.626).

So what does this mean: do the viewfinders of all of these models appear the same size to our eyes?

If so, this would contradict a lot of the claims that the D300's viewfinder is "bigger" and "brighter" (which is something I doubted as well at first, as the brightness strongly depends on whether you're peering through a fast or slow lens.

So for those of you who've had a chance to compare the D90 and D300 side-by-side: is there a noticeable difference in the viewfinder size/brightness using the same lens?

It's not the same size, it's the same magnification so the D90 is 4% smaller than the D300 since its 96% of the frame while the 300 is 100%

The Mack · May 25, 2009

NikonsandVstroms wrote:

It's not the same size, it's the same magnification so the D90 is 4% smaller than the D300 since its 96% of the frame while the 300 is 100%

You sure about that?

NikonsandVstroms · May 25, 2009

The Mack wrote:

You sure about that?

DP Review puts them both at .94x and so the elements in the frame will look the same size just the D300 will have more of an area visible.

D90/D300 viewfinder size difference?

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