I recently went on  a wedding photo shoot where I was the videographer. Previously to this wedding, I was renting the Panasonic GH4 to shoot video with. I must say, I really liked that camera, but I wanted to little bit of change and went for…you guessed it…the Nikon D750. It is a full frame camera and on the higher end of the Nikon DSLR line up. I got a refurbished kit with a 24-120mm zoom lens. With my GH4 I was typically shooting with a 50mm prime lens, but I opted for the zoom kit lens because I thought I would get more range and it would still be usable when I go on vacation and do some street tog or whatever else.

Weight and functionality:

So, going back to that wedding I just recently shot. The camera performed very well. It wasn’t as lightweight as the GH4 (body only is 560g + battery), but I pretty much keep it on my monopod all day long, D750’s weight (body only is 840g + battery) never really bothered me. With that zoom lens I was able to get more of a range and really stay out of the way during the actually ceremony, which I really liked. The button configuration are slightly different, but with the DSLR I felt that it was more easier to make adjustments because the button layout was more intuitive and I didn’t have to go into the menu setting to change things up, unlike the GH4. The flip screen on the GH4, however, was better because it was able to rotate off to the side for selfies and other things like that. Whereas the D750 on had a tilt screen to shoot high and low shots. Not a deal breaker at all, but would be nice to have on the D750 for those YouTube videos.

Lens (D750 only):

I really like the range of the 24-120mm lens. It gave me a ton of mobility. It was sharp, decent bokeh and the vibration reduction (VR) is very nice to have with my “run and gun” style shooting. This lens was an f4 straight, which is too good in low light, but I never really have issues during wedding shoots, even at night because of the lighting. Plus it give the feel of my videos ending and that the darker lighting at the end of the video also shows that the actual day was ending, just like the video will soon end. The only problem I would have in low light is for my own personal videos that I might want to shoot during night time on vacation or something. For Youtube,  not an issue, I usually shoot indoor and have a lighting system.

Video quality (short and sweet):

I shoot 1080p on both GH4 and D750 and quality wise they are on par, but keep in mind I have an “amateur’s eye.” For my video editing, I almost keep the video as is. I try to have the setting as close to what I already want. I do minor changes in post, so my comparison of quality of the video of the two cameras is, as is pretty much. GH4 does shoot 4K, but….

Price:

Not too much to say about this only because it varies. Everyone can find a deal on the internet nowadays. I bought a refurb and was renting the other. For the D750 + lens, you’ll be looking around $2k, above or below.

Final thoughts:

I really love this camera and lens. I’ve had it for a total of about 3 months now, as I write this. I shoot more generally and don’t really shoot specifically for one type of videography or photography. The flexibility/range of the lens and the quality of video this camera shoots is good and for stills…it’s a Nikon D750…with a good lens 😉