Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion The Water Cooler Digital SLR users – input please.

I like the little point and shoot cameras for just dropping them on my pocket so that I have it when I don’t want to lug a bag around (which is more often than not). Well a couple weeks ago I was hanging out with a friend who had an SLR and I took a few shots with it. That was probably a mistake because now I want one. It felt good to hold a somewhat normal sized camera again. The one my buddy has was an older Canon Rebel.

The past few days I’ve been looking at camera reviews and asking other friends what they use and think, and then got to thinking…. there’s some real pro’s and excellent armature photographers that frequent this place so I figured I’d ask y’all for input too…

I never was very good and I’m pretty impatient, so I’m starting from ground zero here. In other words, I need to keep it simple. I also have somewhat normal to small hands for a guy, I think. That little Canon I was using the other day fit just fine.

I’m looking at the following cameras.

Canon Rebel XTi
Nikon D40x
Olympus Evolt 510
Olympus Evolt 410
Sony Alpha A100

From doing some quick reading, I’ve gathered some info on each camera worth thinking about, but I’m pretty clueless what else I should be interested in.

All are 10 mega pixel and under $1000 (which is about all I can afford). All but the Olympus 510 are smaller framed SLR’s and the 510 looks to be on the small size too.

The Olympus 510 and Sony have some sort of body image stabilization, and the others need lenses with IS if I want that option. The Olympus and Sony have unique dust control that the others don’t have.

The Nikon D40x required auto focus lenses if auto focus is desired.

The Olympus 510 is new and I can’t find any user reports so it’s hard to tell how it’ll shake out.

Do you camera buffs have any words of wisdom, suggestions, and recommendations?? What do you think about the cameras I have listed? Any I should drop off my shopping list and any I should add?

Rebel. Excellent selection of lenses, top quality.

Yep.
The Canon is the way to go.

Either the Canon or the Nikon will do you very well... giving pro's and con's of each system is nearly pointless, as it has to do with what works for YOU (kinda like the whole audio/speaker stuff - it needs to work with your ears).

Personally, I like the Canon system (samples of my work can be seen on my website Unit-One Studios, but I could get very similar results with a Nikon body... I just prefer the Canon.

I'd recommend that you go to a camera store and play with both systems... see how they feel in your hands. Go through the menus and see how they feel to you. Both systems are more than capable, but you need to get what works with you.

-Todd...

All my friends use either Canon or Nikon too.

I guess you’re right; I better just go hold a few of these things. The image stabilization in the body was appealing to me from a price standpoint. I’d pay for it once, and not every time I bought a new lens. There’s been too many times I want to take a scenery picture at dusk, or night, and screw it up because I can’t hold the camera still enough.

You have one heck of job there Todd. It must be hell having to go to the races all the time. ...Great stuff.

I love my Canon.

It's all about the lenses.

My father-in-law has a nice, new (more expensive) Nikon. It's a great camera, but it's unnecessarily "big" for me. Unless you have REALLY big hands and/or the Nikon UI makes more sense to you, I don't see any reason NOT to get the Canon.

The Nikon D40x is a small framed camera. But if one wants the auto focus feature, you need to buy the lenses with this built in to them. I’m sure I just screwed that description up, but hopefully you get the point.

Thanks for the IS points. Well taken. I’d love to use a tri-pod, but it’s sorta hard to carry around on the tubes in London, or down crowed streets in Munich or Prague.

The Rebel is looking better all the time.

Not positive, but I think Sony is using Karl Zies(sp?) lenses?

I think you might have a slight misconception about the Nikon and autofocus. The Canon is essentially the same - autofocus is lens-dependent. If the lens doesn't have it, that's it. That said, almost all consumer lenses in production today are autofocusing lenses. The camera bodies themselves vary as to how many autofocus points are in the viewfinder, the sensitivity of each of those points and how you can choose the points, but the lenses contain the motors that actually focus the glass. As such, autofocus speed can vary depending on the lens, but even the slower autofocus lenses generally focus faster than most point-and-shoot digicams. And Nikon also has IS (they call it VR) lenses, but Canon rules the roost when it comes to the number of IS lenses available, particularly on the telephoto/super-telephoto end.

Some of the Sony's lenses are Karl Zeiss, but not all. I'd say Sony probably has the best shot of actually becoming a contender in the DSLR field simply because of it's size, but Canon and Nikon built their name on photography and are by far the dominant forces in the field.

As for me, I love my Canon 20D. Definitely try out cameras in a shop before you buy, though. I found the Rebel to be too small for my big hands, and felt the general Nikon layout wasn't as intuitive to me as the Canon one (though admittedly I've used nothing but Canons since the film days so of course I'm more comfortable with them).