V1.02
Thom Hogan’s Complete Guide to the Nikon D300
Page 556
Recommendations:
1. Nikon has made a change since the D2: the alternate
setting on the D2 series was triggered by pressing any
button on the camera (shutter release partway, and of the
control buttons), and was of limited duration (6 seconds).
Now, the system simply looks at if the camera is active
(metering) and backlights the LCD during the entire time
the camera is active. For some heavy-handed users (or if
you have #C3 set high), that can be very long periods of
time. The drawback is that battery consumption is
increased by this backlighting, and it is already high when
the camera is active. Thus, I say you should only set this
control for situational conditions (i.e. when you need it).
All other times it should be
Off
.
2. Most people don’t realize it, but this function is also
linked to external Speedlight LCDs, and it works both
ways. If you set backlighting to be
On
for the SB-800
using its setup options, that setting is applied to the
camera, too! Indeed, since I’m usually shooting with a
flash on the camera at night, I simply leave backlighting
set on my SB-800 and leave the camera’s #D8 option set
to
Off
. Just remember that you’ve done this.
Custom Setting #D9 One Second Shutter Delay
(Exposure delay mode)
Like the Mirror-up function (
M
UP
frame rate setting), this
option is used to reduce vibrations or camera shake caused by
the shutter press. When activated, the camera flips the mirror
up immediately upon shutter release, and then opens the
