Nikon Customer Service

After 3 services (sensor clean) and 3 shutter replacements I had every good reason to believe the problem had gone. Not so……

The shots referenced here were taken in the last few days. I only got to see them last night after returning from 3 days away. It’s disheartening to say the least. In all instances UV filter and lens had been cleaned prior to shooting.

The shots below were references for me to see how the UV filter was affecting the colour balance. I’ve multiplied the layers in Photoshop to increase the visibility of the finer oil marks on the sensor.

Filter On

Filter Off

Subsequent shot samples showing further accumulation of marks.

The shot below has been processed to increase the visibility of some marks.

This one (below) from today (18th April) after cleaning lens, filter and running an in camera sensor clean.

Clearly this is a dust and oil issue.

Can’t get to Nikon until next week (after Easter). I’ll see how good the promise by Nikon is to replace faulty D600 cameras.

I guess that in the entire time I’ve had the D600 (just over a year) I’ve only had a few months of trouble free shooting. I can see why China banned the sale of this camera. Luckily I had my Canon G1X on hand, so whilst the shots on the Nikon D600 are useless I was able to salvage something from the time away.

As for the retailer I purchased the camera from (Harvey Norman @ Penrith), I can’t even see the point in trying to get any result from them: the 3 year replacement warranty to date hasn’t been worth the paper its written on.

D600 officially retired today.

Update on current status.

I dropped my D600 into Nikon Sydney today to get it checked out for the third time after a new round of contamination appeared on the sensor. I had pretty much given up on Harvey Norman doing the right thing in terms of replacing the camera or camera body point blank or if not in a way that required me turning myself into a human pretzel to meet the requirements and; I’m kinda tired of rolling that story out Ad nauseam. However, today the clouds rolled back, and it looks like there is a good possibility that Nikon Sydney will replace the camera body. I take the quality of service at Nikon Sydney as a given but this extra step took me by surprise and certainly cemented my belief that Nikon Sydney take the integrity of their customer service seriously.

If the worst of the waiting is over, then I’m a mightily relieved man and I can get back to the business of doing the work that the D600 was designed to do.

Upon reflection, it’s been a valuable learning experience. I realized that whilst my first post was a little acerbic and I was responding to a disagreeable sense of disappointment it’s been worth it to hold on and not abandon ship. My first shots with the D600 proved to me first up that it’s is a worthy contender. However further testing did two things, it opened me up to the full capability of the camera and it revealed my particular D600’s only flaw.

So now it’s just wait and see how NIkon call the next shot. I’ve grown to have a deep sense of appreciation for the D600’s capability and I’ll be more that happy to have a replacement back in my hands sooner than later.