Thanks for the lesson, I really didn't know the difference.

An affirmative pm was sent to you MT, thanks.

I do have the 10-24mm Nikor lens. It was bought for my Thailand where it was an absolute God send for getting in tight areas.

I’m still wondering if the #1 lens is REALLY worth the difference in cost over the #2 lens. Any thoughts anyone?

I am in a quandary and needing a bit of input from all you experts. I just ordered a refurbished D7000 body for $1095. I would like a general shooting lens for this body. My Nikon refurb choices are all FF-S, in wishing order:
1) 24-120mm f4 ED VR G $1170
2) 24-120mm f3.5-5.6 IF ED VR $602
3) 16-85mm f3.5-5.6 DX ED VR $629
4) 18-70mm f3.5-4.5 DX IF ED $414
5) 17-55mm f2.8 DX IF ED G 1$1385
I could “stretch” for any but have some Scotch in my ancestry. I do want quality and shoot a lot of raw. I'm not sure of the advantage of #1 over #2 so maybe #2 is my better choice.

My main camera is a D300s with 3 zooms (10-300mm range) and 3 primes. I have a big photo trip with my British friend to see Carlsbad Caverns, Las Vegas, Grand Canyon, Durango NG RR and the Indy 500. She has press passes for us at Indy and I presume we’ll be all over the place for several days. You have to admit that presents a huge variety of subjects!

I have a Nikon 10-24mm lens that was perfect in a FEW circumstances on my Thailand trip. On my two Danube River trips the kit lens (18-200mm) was more than adequate. In fact I zoomed more than wide angled. Taking the wide angle lens you mentioned would probably stay in the bag most of the time .

I am building a new PC identical to friends. It has an i7, 3.4GHZ processor, 16 GB ram, Gigabyte mother board GA-Z68a-D3H-B3. The boot drive is a RevoDrive – 120 GB SSM that is a PCIe express card. It transfers data at the processor’s data rate, not the drive bus. This is not inexpensive ~$300+but boy o boy is it fast. This drive will boot up Adobe CS 5.5 production premium in TWO seconds!
I will have to reconsider the video card. Mine drives two monitors. After what BuckeyeTom73 stated, I need to do some research. I just bought the Colormonki and x-rite color checker so that I will have control of my colors. Somehow I am just not sure that two cards are needed, but then….
Win 7 64 bit is the only way to go but I still bitch at it. It does take getting used too!

I took my film Leica on a raft trip on the Colorado river. At the bottom of the zip-lock I screwed the filter ring through the plastic. The sky filter was front exposed and my hands went through the back to operate the camera. When not shooting the back was ziped up. I got front splashed a couple times and had to clean the front of the filter. This was ~40 years ago.

Many, many moons ago I did photography of new model cars. To avoid reflections of the street markings we covered the chrome with a white film. I " think" we used milk. A google search might find a similar substance to spray on the chrome. Afterward it will have to be cleaned off, darn it.

In reality, "proper" reflections ought to add to the pix.

The D300S (I have one) is being replaced by the much updated D800. It was/is due out this year! You might want to wait.

I was in Antarctica in Jan '07 and there was very little snow. Just lots of rocks to crawl over. Of course there were ice burgs and when the sun shone on them just right there was a wonderful blue tint. If your cruse takes you ashore be prepared to have the penguins walk up to you. If Deception Island is on the journey, take a bathing suit! You can use it!

Copying of oil paintings is tricky because of specular reflections due to the uneven surface. An easy way is to do it out doors in a shaded area (no direct sunlight on the painting). The color temperature will be high so adjust the white balance. You can include a gray card and a color patch card in another exposure under that lighting condition for color matching in editing. A circular polarizer on the camera may help with reflections.
The very best way is to do a set up in your studio with no external light. Place two lights on either side of the picture at a 45 degree angle. They can be the old photoflood bulbs, fluorescent full spectrum bulbs or halogen bulbs. Again match the white balance. This will give useable results. To get the VERY best quality obtain sheet polarizer film from Edmund Optics, http://www.edmundoptics.com/products/displayproduct.cfm?productid=1912 or just Google polarizing film. Insert the polarizers in front of each lamp keeping the polarizing angle in the same direction. Try to minimize spill light on the painting. Place a circular polarizer on the camera lens and adjust for least reflections. You will be absolutely amazed at the color saturation and quality with no reflections.