No.
Maybe.
How's that for being definitive? I think I have pretty much covered all the bases there, don't you?
I recently purchased a Nikon D800. While I do make money from photography, I don't make a living with it so acquiring a 36 megapixel camera is a bit of a stretch for me. Certainly one does not need that much resolution to make a good photo. My Olympus PEN E-P3 does just fine in most situations, and it is a micro four-thirds format. It's only about 12 MP, so that would actually be a little small for making big prints, but otherwise it works fine, especially if you can control the lighting. It's easy to carry and you can attach high quality lenses to it.
My other cameras have always been APS-C sensors, with about 12 MP resolution. The larger pixels are better than the micro 4/3 sensor in the Olympus, but not as good as full frame, nor do they have the low noise/high ISO performance of the 16 MP Nikon D7000.
When I decided to move up, I had basically three choices, given that I have so much nice Nikon glass already: (1) used or new D700, (2) D800, and (3) D4. I never really considered a D3.
I like the D700, but it's getting a bit long in the tooth and I didn't want to remain behind the technology curve. The D800 is a bit pricey, but at $3k not totally out of reach for a serious semi-pro. All my research on image quality tells me that the D4 is the way to go, but at 2X the price of the D800, I just can't justify it.
So, I settled on the D800, even though I had some reservations about the file sizes: RAW files uncompressed on the D800 are about 77 MB. My aging iMac had to be taken into account.
Anyway, after searching to find a vendor who actually had a D800 to sell, I finally got it a few days ago and took a few random shots to see how it performed. I was not disappointed, and I'll show you why.
Here is a full frame jpg at 72 dpi converted from the original photo I took using the D800 with a Nikon 50mm f/1.4 @ f/2.5, 1/160 sec, ISO 1250.
Here is a crop from the center of the frame, at 120 dpi.
And here is a further crop, still at 120 dpi. You can see a larger version on the flickr page, here.
So, what's the deal? Ok, here is what I have seen so far. The raw images are simply wonderful. I suspect the noise in the image, which can in fact be seen when you crop down this much, is not as good as a top of the line D4 or Canon 5D MkIII, although I can't really compare myself. But the noise is very tiny and adds a slight, fine-grain look so it's not objectionable at all. This photo was shot in relatively dim room light, and so I am very impressed.
Did I need a 36MP camera to make these photos? Maybe not. Probably the D7000 might have given the same low-light images in this instance. But there is something important that the high resolution sensor gives me, and that is....HIGH RESOLUTION.
See, I don't want to go out and buy another $5k of lenses, and this camera pretty much requires nice primes to fully appreciate the tiny pixels. So, I can, as in this instance, use a 50mm lens and crop down pretty much to my heart's desire and still get good images.
For those who like to display their work in large format, printing 400ppi or 500ppi with these large files is possible, when utilizing an APS-C sensor would probably not be.
The price point on the camera is really a huge selling point. Lots of D700s, hardly used, are showing up on eBay for about $1800 now, often with the battery grip and a lens, as D700 users upgrade to the D800. Once the D800s really start shipping, I suspect the D700s will be much easier to pick up. But it won't give you this resolution.
All in all, it's a spectacular opportunity.
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