Canon 300d 6.3mp Digital SLR Camera

[mraudet]

digital rebel

i own the eos digital rebel slr & love it. i have not read or heard of a single bad review of this camera. the cmos sensor, the slr body, etc. are all first rate. cannon caught the industry by suprise with this.

i upgraded from a nikkon 885. you will do well to know how to use a camera, however, the rebel will help you learn too.

 

[Moxiemike]

Originally posted by zagato27
Moxie, great that you are lending some expertise and actual hands on experience to your review. Perhaps you can help me out. Just got into the Mac world (G5 1.6) and want to move from film to digital photography. Am looking for a realitively inexpensive camera ~$500 that is easy to use and is in the 3-5 mega pixel range. This camera hopefully would have USB 2.0 download capability or Firewire to take advantage of the G5's equipment. The camera would be for home use nothing professional. My wife would probably be the main user. Auto everything is probably the mode it would be used in. If this helps, our SLR is a Minolta with a couple of lens: standard 55, 70-210 zoom. Any suggestions???? Thks.

Under $500 is only gonna getcha USB 1.0 and maybe 4mp.

I'd recommend the Nikon Coolpix 4300 (4mp i believe)

You won't be able to use those Minolta lenses... as the cheapest SLR is a canon and minolta doesn't make a digital SLR.

http://www.dpreview.com is a great source for ya.

 

[jayb2000]

Thanks!

Nice to hear a review from someone who owns both. dpreview and similar are very detailed, but are so overly objective you can barely figure out if they think one camera is better than another.

I have always heard that Nikons are great cameras so I am holding out for a D100 after January.

I was leaning that way anyway, but this review confirmed what I had gleaned from many other sources.

If they or Nikon could build a $500 digital SLR with stripped down features and cheap body, BUT used the same lenses as 1500/5000 dollar models, that might a jump people could do.
Buy the $500 version and lenses, then upgrade to 1500, then 5000 when/if you get really good.

Thanks again.

 

[Counterfit]

The way I figure it, if buy a Nikon or a Canon, you can hardly go wrong. I wonder when Nikon is going to replace the F5 with a new Top o' The Line camera...

 

[sarge]

Canon S50

Zagato27

I bought the Canon S50 for $530 last spring when it first came out. I think its down around $430 now. The thing I love about it is that its loaded with all sorts of manual override goodies. It has every pro function you could want, but it also has about a half dozen dummy proof modes like night, portrait,landscape etc. (you don't have to browse through a menu to find them either, your wife won't have to read a manual to use it) Only compliaint is that the paint for the icons came off and now I have to look at the display to know what's what. Don't know if they've addressed that problem. Then again, I dropped the camera from eye level while trying to photograph kids during a bicycle race. It bounced as high as my knee and dented the body pretty bad. It still works like a charm. Build quality is excellent and canons interpolating software is the industry best ( according to the photojournalists i know)
hope this helps

 

[Moxiemike]

Re: Canon S50

Originally posted by sarge
Zagato27

I bought the Canon S50 for $530 last spring when it first came out. I think its down around $430 now. The thing I love about it is that its loaded with all sorts of manual override goodies. It has every pro function you could want, but it also has about a half dozen dummy proof modes like night, portrait,landscape etc. (you don't have to browse through a menu to find them either, your wife won't have to read a manual to use it) Only compliaint is that the paint for the icons came off and now I have to look at the display to know what's what. Don't know if they've addressed that problem. Then again, I dropped the camera from eye level while trying to photograph kids during a bicycle race. It bounced as high as my knee and dented the body pretty bad. It still works like a charm. Build quality is excellent and canons interpolating software is the industry best ( according to the photojournalists i know)
hope this helps

What kind of interpolating does the s50 do? I can't imagine interpolation on a P&S consumer camera being worth anything except headache. I know the Fuji 602 was plagued by the fake "6mp" files it made, but did ok in 3mp mode.

Interpolation from a CCD is bad.... I'd doubt the images could be anything to write home from this cam (though i'll say i haven't seen images)

If you want 5mp, get a "real" 5mp camera, not one that interpolates images up from a lower resolution

 

[sarge]

Moxiemike wrote:
What kind of interpolating does the s50 do? I can't imagine interpolation on a P&S consumer camera being worth anything except headache. I know the Fuji 602 was plagued by the fake "6mp" files it made, but did ok in 3mp mode.

Interpolation from a CCD is bad.... I'd doubt the images could be anything to write home from this cam (though i'll say i haven't seen images)

Sorry, I meant canons image processing software. It is a true 5mp camera, however it only has a 1/1.8 sensor-the s45 is 4mp on the same size sensor so they just cramed more pixels on the same size surface area which is why i hesitated getting it at first. The best thing about this p&s is it allows you to capture RAW files. I don't think many other P&s's offer that advantage.

we don't have photoshop on this PC-
BUT MY GIRLFRIEND JUST BOUGHT AN iBOOK,due next week, yea for ME!

 

[Moxiemike]

the only potential snag is that the smaller sensor ALWAYS equals more noise is ISOs above 200. So anything where you need a long exposure...thses cameras suffer

That and the shutter lag and slow as molasses AF systems. But for general snapshots, these P&S cameras do fine. Try to do sports or anything in low light? You're in trouble.

But the raw capturing thing is nice. Though I know canon's raw processing software is pokey. Grab PS CS and you'll be moving in light speed compared to the canon raw stuff.

 

[sarge]

Yea, I tried shooting the NYC Marathon on Sunday with it. What a pain! The af lag is pretty poor on all those p&s's. I brought my 7II along, but its a manual rf and the focus window is tiny. I didn't really have the right tool for the right job and I was trying to capture a specific person out of 40,000 runners. I preset the MF distance on the canon and that took care of the lag, plus it has a burst rate of 10 frames at 3 fps give or take. A couple shots were out of focus but i did get lucky on a few, which was all i needed.
A friend got that new rebel and it feels really cheap but it takes great pics + takes his old glass, which is nice.

Thanks for the PS CS tip MoxieMike. I've heard people use something call breezebrowser, but i think its only for windows, which after next week i won't be using anymore anyhow.