Anyone else been treated rudely by B&H when trying to get information about selling them a camera and (say) bonuses offered by manufacturers?

I ended up on the phone with a guy who kept acting like I was an idiot because I didn't see what he was seeing on their web site. No "look here/click there" helpfulness; just pure rudeness. I was really surprised, given all the good things that are said about b&h here, but maybe I was talking to the wrong side of the organization.

Congratulations on your new Nikon. Does a filter on these new cameras restrict the zoom? I have a Coolpix 830 and I bought a filter attachment for it since you can't screw one on the lens. It does work but only to a point and then you are taking pictures though what looks like a porthole. As long as you don't mind the restriction in the zoom, it works fine. I like to use a Polaroid on my cameras. I looked at numerous webpages on the 900 and was unable to learn the mechanics of a filter on this new camera. Again, good luck.

I was excited to take a new friend to one of my favorite spots to shoot water fowl images. We had planned for some time to go and spend the day getting some great shots. We met early and headed out, having packed everything we could think of. When we arrived, we assembled our gear. The weather looked promising and the geese could be heard in the distance through the light fog.
We set about the mission of finding something to capture and shortly began shooting some nice subjects. I think by noon we had filled at least one card and part of another with some great shots of flying geese and ducks, a Glossy ibis and other misc. water birds. I couldn't wait to get home to download them and see what I had captured.
The next day I took a look at my work and was bummed. Almost none of my shots were tack sharp. I looked and looked and was just sickened by my results. I couldn't believe my eyes. I was so disheartened, I shut down the computer and didn't go back to it for several days. I thought maybe my eyes were deceiving me, until I took a second look. It was bad. All those great shots and none were worth keeping. I checked shutter speed, iso, f-stop and all were where I wanted them to be. I deleted every shot from that day.
All I could think was that the lens was not focusing right and I had to check it out. I set up the tripod and attached the remote shutter release. I set all the camera settings the same as before and took some test shots. All were tack sharp, what the heck?
I began to look at every setting on the camera until I discovered the problem.
I use BBF, back button focus, and almost never change my camera settings to anything but high speed servo = al-servo. The last time I had used my equipment, I was taking portraits of a large family and set focus mode to one shot. This meant that when I depressed the BBF it focused one time and by the time I hit the shutter button, my subject had moved and was now, not in focus. Not a good thing for flying birds or anything that moves much.
I learned a valuable lesson that day, always recheck everything you thought you checked already and then check it again. If I had taken a minute to look, it would have been obvious that I had a problem in the works. I wasted a day of my time, but my friend got some good images and will probably never let me forget my blunder.
Sometimes we think we know it all and then something like this happens to set us straight. I'm just glad it happened on a fun outing and not a paying one.

You know if you had written the above comments in the first place, that would have been helpful. With respect to your observation that another's camera settings serve only as a "rough starting point" I agree. However, as a DSLR novice I find having a rough starting point very helpful. I'd like to have more information on any given photography than just speed, F stop & ISO but I'd settle for those as a rough starting point.

Now as to your earlier comment that I should think for myself, maybe if you thought for yourself you'd refrain from offending another person. And I did find your "think for yourself" comment offensive. In fact, I thought it was downright nasty. But maybe you get some perverse pleasure out of belittling other people.

Have any of you used the Orbis ring flash as an amateur or prof?
Am considering purchasing one and am very interested in learning of the "lighting" characteristics of such. Is it to be used only for close-up portraits or could it possibly be used for a small group shot as well(tho I have my doubts on this latter thought due to uneven coverage towards the corner of the frame?).

Any thoughts, suggestions, pokes, ridicule, kudo's, etc., et al, would be appreciated before I spend money on this? I have an SB-800 that I could use with it as one power source and would probably use it primarily for single-subject portraits within the 6-ft range.

Thanks hoggers! -PB

Am I totally crazy to be newly obsessed with manual focus prime Zeiss lenses for my Canon 5DM3? I have sold several of my Canon L lenses in recent weeks and now have 5 of the Zeiss primes. Maybe I needed a new challenge but I am so impressed by the images I got with the 85mm that I "cleaned out" my lens case of those Canon L lenses I wasn't using and bought the 18, 35. 50 and 100 Makro. Don't worry, I would never part with my Canon 24-70 or 70-200 but these Zeiss things are addictive! :-).