OK, perhaps that was an overly general statement I hear you on the kit lenses; the old Canon non-IS 18-55 springs to mind. That said, the Nikon 18-55VR kit lense has a good rep for sharpness and I was pretty impressed with my old housemate's shots from his D40X and kit lens. Granted the G10 is a nice piece of kit, and I don't doubt it's capable of giving many SLRs a run for their money under ideal lighting. As I'm sure you're aware though as soon as the light drops off and the ISO is wound up much past 400 the images start to get pretty noisey. I agree about choosing the right tool for the job - if you want convienience and shoot in decent light a compact is all good. Cheers for the link - I occasionally stumble across this site and always find something to entertain me on there What sort of stuff do you shoot out of interest? I assume you're Pro/Semi-Pro with a kit list like that The naming system for compact sensors is deceiving.. according to this the 1/2.33" sensor is 6.13x4.6mm, giving an area of 28.2mm^2, while Nikon APS-C is 23.7x15.7=372.1mm^2. The SLR has nearly 16 times the surface area of the compact. Ahh, OK. I didn't think you were arguing from that perspective Most SLRs will have auto and program modes, and the lower level ones such as the D40 also have all the other ones found on compact cameras such as portrait, landscape, low light etc, so you should be perfectly at home from this perspective. I don't see any reason why these functions on an SLR should be in any way inferior to those on a compact. And of course, as MK3 Valver says, the internet is a huge resource for photographers. I've learned pretty much everything I know about photography from forums, tutorials etc.. there's no reason why you can't start with the auto modes and work your way up as your knowledge grows.
Pro, I shoot Portraits and Design-related editorial. The thing that will teach you the most about taking pictures is... taking pictures. Not the internet! No two photographers see the same thing, or work in the same way, and this goes from the very beginning right to the top of the commercial market - it takes a very long time to find out who you are as a photographer.
A dslr is definately for you then! the best ones on a budget are the nikon d40 and the sony a200, I went for the nikon because I trust Nikon - i since found out that the sensor on the D40 is made by Sony!!! this guy is american and seems to be a bit marmitey, but read what he says, tis worthwile! http://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/recommended-cameras.htm
Obviously actually using the gear helps a bit too I stand by my point though that the internet is an excellent resource for learning about many things. Certainly practice is king for development of a photographic style, confidence, familiarity with the kit etc, but I've learned many technical aspects from the net that would have taken me a very long time to figure out through experimentation. I've also found it to be a good source of gear reviews and willing participants to critique your shots... Seems like it's taken you a while to get to where you are now; but you appear to have progressed well and not stagnated anywhere. From what I've heard from others in the industry it's extremely competitive and it looks like pretty much everyone has to start at the bottom. Kudos for getting where you are now - I envy your drive and perseverance... Anyway, enough of our thread Hijacking, back to the matter in hand
Don't take his word as gospel though; he's known throughout the interweb community for his "constructive" use of the truth For gear reviews, www.dpreview.com is hard to beat
Oops, just ordered a Nikon D40 (and Panasonic TZ5) on the strength of views in this thread, backed up by that link.
hehe, good choice, I have the tz1 and it's a great camera - not quite as good as the D40 but I love the 'reach' of the zoom. Doesn't that new one have hd video too?
Got my D40 I think it'll be some while before i get me head round all those SLR parameters, luckily it seems good in AUTO
nice one. Glad you got an SLR, even though it makes bugger all difference to me ha ha. Expect to see some entries into the monthly comps then
Thanks for all the help and support guys (and girls). Still baffled by it all tbh. For example: I started using the lens at 18 as it's doing less work therefor better, but the shots were too long/wide. The lens does 18 - 55 something, that is equivalent to about 27 - 85 in 35mm..... So does that mean i should start of with it at 30, equivalent to 45 in 35 mm i wonder? 45's what old non-zoom cameras had (only) IIRC. Therfore it must be good/average.
about 35mm on the 18-55 equates to 50mm, the standard lens on film. You probably already know, but to convert focal lengths from film to digital, multiply by 1.5.
you can always crop afterwards?? I used to select the focal length depending on what I wanted in the shot the whole time - but soon realised to get the subject the size etc the I wanted and crop the rest
The 18-55 numbers are the effective focal length in mm, the focal length being the distance between the plane of the sensor or film and (I think) the aperture. Because the sensor on most digi SLRs is 1.5 or 1.6 times smaller (known as the "crop factor") than a full frame / 35mm format, the field of view is 1.5 or 1.6 times narrower for a lens of given focal length. On full frame cameras 50mm is considered to be representative of the field of view of the human eye, and is considered "normal". Lenses become more "wide angle" as the focal length decreases from 50mm, and move towards "telephoto" as it increases. As stated above, because of the crop factor 35mm is considered near enough a normal focal length of crop bodies. I don't quite understand "doing less work" at 18mm.. use the focal length that's most appropriate for what you're shooting
Not your Field of View, but Perspective / your perception of Depth. It isn't exact either, and to this end (nearly ten years ago) Pentax produced the 43mm f1.9 FA Limited lens, supposedly reproducing the exact perspective of the human eye. As a focal length, it didn't catch on but the metal version of that lens is really rather lovely. I wish there were a few decent fast 40mm lenses for full-frame SLRs. I find 35mm a wee bit wide, and 50mm a wee bit long. This old Canon rangefinder of mine has a 40mm f1.7 lens, and its feel and perspective are perfect imo. Not the sharpest tool in the box, but a nice companion.
Already beating the AUTO setting on the d40 for likness to the real thing in terms of brightness and colours Only on the basic "program", setting where you vary exposure tho...
Not really understanding this Field of View/Perspective / perception of Depth. I took 3 photos with the lens on 18, 35 and 55 (in that order, then cropped them all to the same size) and i can't see the difference:
you won't do as its essentially the same thing. The 'perspective' you talk about, is what size lens gives the closest representation of what the eye see's. From above 43 uncropped is N/B's favorite. Depth of field is set by the aperture setting - the F number which is max size aperture will dictate how much of the shot is in focus. The lower the nunber the shallower the depth - so likely things at the front will be in sharp focus with the background blurred (which looks nice) but should you be shooting a landscape and want as much of the shot in focus then a larger f number gives a greater depth of field fairly extensive explaination
Ahh.. my mistake tbh I was totally unaware of the existance of 40 & 43mm lenses; can imagine 43mm is a nice mid point between 35 and 50mm. What do you use on your 5D out of interest? Im thinking one or two nice L primes Not had a lot of dealings with Canon rangefinders; looks like a nice piece of kit though. I've been tempted by an old FD mount 35mm SLR in the past simply because of their build quality and aesthetics. Do you use the rangefinder for anything in particular? I hear they're favoured by some for street photography on account of their size and lack of noise.. You won't see a difference if you shoot from the same distance and crop - it's only apparent if you shoot the same subject at different distances, but use appropriate focal lengths to keep the subject the same size in all the shots. Take the two shots below - the bottle is approximately the same size in both; the first was shot up close at at a focal length of 10mm, the second was shot from further away at 200mm. The perspective is purely a function of your distance from the subject. If I'd shot the bottle from the same distance at 10 and 200mm focal lengths then cropped the 10mm shot to make the bottle the same size in both images, the perspective would appear the same.
