When I picked up my D300 I also bought the battery grip, as I mentioned in a previous post my primary reason for buying it was the ability to be able to use AA batteries if need be. I also bought a spare battery for the camera which also fits into the grip so when it came in I of course tried it out.
When you buy the grip it comes with two battery holders, one for the same type of battery the D300 takes, and one that holds 8 AA batteries. Also of note is that the grip is able to boost the frame rate of the D300 from 6 frames per second to 8 frames per second but there is a catch. To get 8 fps you have to either use the AAs, which will work for a short time at that speed before slowing down to 6fps, or buy another, different, battery and battery cap for the grip. The battery is however the same as the battery for the D2 and D3 cameras so I’m sure some professionals will appreciate that. The problem though is that after buying the expensive grip for $250 you then have to buy that extra cap, for $40, and then get the new battery and charger. In total to get 8fps for about 1000 shots per charge, it will cost about $500 on top of the already expensive D300 body. If you make money with your camera you likely already have the batteries and chargers for this but for a normal guy such as myself, it’s not worth it. I’m happy with the 6fps the camera offers me out of the box and if need by some AAs will get me by.
So, what is the grip itself like? While it does add some more weight to the camera it also balances the device and make it seem, somehow, more manageable. The grip, while offering space for more batteries also adds in an additional shutter release button as well as shutter speed and aperture wheels and an AF button. In practice I don’t use the AF button that often, grip or not, but in Live View Tripod mode (I’ll post about that latter) the camera will not focus until you press the AF button so it’s nice to have, though not critical. I believe the AF button is programable though so you could also assign a different function to it.
The grip also has a control pad of sorts on it. It performs the same functions as the round pad on the main part of the camera but is designed not as a large round button but as a fat squat joystick. It clicks very solidly though, to me, it is less easy to use then the main camera’s control pad. It’s another nice tough but not that useful for me. When the grip is on and the camera is rotated 90 degress the LCD screen on the camera does not rotate the information on screen so when viewing images they are all sideways as are the menus. You could fix this with the images by telling the camera not to auto rotate them but I find I prefer them rotated more often then I prefer them not.. Your mileage may vary.
Mounting the grip is pretty simple, just remove a rubber cap from the bottom of the D300 and screw the grip into the 1/4-20 mount that you would normally use for a tripod. No more taking the battery door off like on the older D200s and even the D80. The trade off is that in order to get at the on camera battery you need to take off the grip. It’s trivial to do and I don’t mind. It makes it much easier for me to pop the grip on when needed and take it off when I don’t. I don’t have to worry about moving batteries around or latching and unlatching parts. Just screw it in place. The D300 will even let you choose which battery to use first, the on camera battery or the grip battery. A nice touch.
The grip in actual use is great. The balance it offers is good and the extra shutter release makes taking images in the portrait orientation much more comfortable. I’m happy with it’s overall size and am looking forward to having it bail me out on a long day of shooting. When I’m using the camera the shutter release seems a little sensitive, finding the happy spot where the camera focuses but doesn’t shoot takes some getting used to. It finally made me look through the menus for the setting that forces the camera to focus before it shoots and not shoot until it is focused. It was the default setting on the D40 and definitely the way I prefer to work. I’d rather wait a half-second than take a dozen blurry shots I’m going to throw away anyway.
Topslakr