ADVICE NEEDED For Digital Camera on European Trip

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On Nov 13, 11:58?pm, "J?rgen Exner" wrote:
wrote:
Opps! It's actually a Canon T70. Better chances,
eh? One lens is 50mm, and the other is a 70-210mm zoom. Will
these fit on the Canon EOS 400D body?

Nope. The T70 has an FD mount which is 100% incompatible to the EF (EOS)
mount that is used on Canon dSLRs.

Bad luck. If it were a Nikkor (Nikon) from that time period then chances
would be very good that you could use it on at least some Nikon dSLRs
(details depend on the individual camera and lens). Or in the worst case
you
could always modify a Nikkor lens to be IA-compatible and thus be able to
mount it officially on any Nikon dSLR.

No such luck with old Canon FD mount lenses.

jue

yep. Just checked the lenses and did a bit
of research.

No big deal. But i'm still waiting for
a camera recommendation.

The Canon 40d seems to be the hands-down
super camera. But it's a bit pricey.

I've been looking at the Canon EOS 400d....


Take a good look at the Nikon D40x 10MP, or the D40, 6MP. Just as small as a
better P&S, kitlens (18-55) is the best of all brands and the pictures are
just as good as from a D80 or even D200. Priced a lot less than $1000,- and
the build in flash is 1,5 times stronger than Canon´s 40D.
I´ve had both since 6 months and shot from dark churches to bright beaches.
With the SB800 flash you can get amazing results. If you want examples, let
me know.


--
"I don´t need a camera,
I have a photographic memory..."
Sosumi

On Tue, 13 Nov 2007 19:30:36 -0800, wrote:

Daniel Silevitch wrote:
On Tue, 13 Nov 2007 18:12:34 -0800, wrote:
I'll be going to Europe for 3 weeks, focusing on the temples of
Pompeii, Italy.

I'm aware of the DSLR and Point&Shoot debate, but it seems the
P&S might win for compactness on a trip. Also, I'm mainly going to
be photographing static architecture and temples....everything will
be standing still.

I feel i need at least 10Megs for each pic, because I'd like to blow
the images up to at least 11x17 (including some cropping).

Again, these will mainly be photographs of buildings and temples....

What sort of budget do you have in mind?

One bit of generic advice: For the sorts of things you're talking about
photographing, wide angle will be more important than telephoto. Look
for a camera that goes to 28mm, or preferably wider (though not too many
P&S models go much wider than 28, and most of them stop at 35 or
thereabouts).

Less than $1000.

That gives a fair amount of flexibility, then. If you really do want to
make 11x17s from 10 MP images, I would lean towards one of the smaller
DSLRs and one broad-range lens. The Nikon D40X with the kit lens, or
possibly with the 2-lens kit (though I think the latter might take you
a bit over that budget) would be a good possibility. Ditto the low-end
Pentax (K100D, I believe) or the Canon 400D.


I have an old Nikon film 35mm with something like a 55mm lens,
and a telephoto lens too. I assume these will not fit on something
like
a Canon EOS 400D body, right?

No, but depending on exactly what the lenses are, they might work on a
Nikon DSLR. Different bodies have different levels of compability with
older lenses, ranging from "mounts, but no auto focus or auto-metering"
to "fully compatible".

-dms

wrote:

snip

The Canon 40d seems to be the hands-down
super camera. But it's a bit pricey.

I've been looking at the Canon EOS 400d....

Probably the EOS 400D is your best bet if you want to stay under $1000.
You might squeak in under $1000 with the Nikon D80, but not with a good
lens. Avoid the Nikon D40 and D40x if possible.

Unfortunately, now you come to lenses. For the type of photos you're
taking, you'll want a relatively wide-angle lens, and these aren't
cheap. The EF-S 10-22 is an awesome lens, with L quality optics, but it
isn't cheap. The lowest I ever saw it was around $600 from Dell, using
some coupon codes, but normally you'll pay at least $600 for it (check
Buydig where it's $665 minus a $50 rebate). Less wide, but probably a
better choice, is the Canon EF-S 17-85mm F/4-5.6 IS USM which is about
$495 at Buydig. This is a more practical "walking around" lens.

One more piece of advice for walking around with a D-SLR around your
neck in Italy is to purchase a slash proof strap, see
"http://pacsafe.com/www/index.php?_room=3&_action=detail&id=16"

Pacsafe makes other items with slash proof straps and also makes slash
proof bags and packs. See "http://pacsafe.com/www/index.php?_room=3".

Italy is really bad for theft, and they are very clever at pickpocketing
and stealing bags, cameras, etc.

On Wed, 14 Nov 2007 06:50:09 -0800, SMS ???? ? wrote:
wrote:

snip

The Canon 40d seems to be the hands-down
super camera. But it's a bit pricey.

I've been looking at the Canon EOS 400d....

Probably the EOS 400D is your best bet if you want to stay under $1000.
You might squeak in under $1000 with the Nikon D80, but not with a good
lens. Avoid the Nikon D40 and D40x if possible.

The D80 with an 18-55 kit lens is (barely) under $1K at B&H. With the
more usual 18-135 kit, it's somewhat over the budget limit.

On the other hand, if he's starting fresh without any legacy lenses and
doesn't anticipate needing fast primes, the D40/D40X isn't all that
unreasonable.

For completeness, it's worth noting that if he is going to be taking
pictures in decent light, a P&S with a reasonably wide-angle lens would
be a substantially cheaper/smaller option. If he wants wider than 28 or
so mm, or if "in decent light" doesn't apply, the DSLR is the way to go.

-dms

Daniel Silevitch wrote:


For completeness, it's worth noting that if he is going to be taking
pictures in decent light, a P&S with a reasonably wide-angle lens would
be a substantially cheaper/smaller option. If he wants wider than 28 or
so mm, or if "in decent light" doesn't apply, the DSLR is the way to go.

-dms


Just curious, could you list some P&S like the ones you mention above?

thanks,
-HS

Daniel Silevitch wrote:

For completeness, it's worth noting that if he is going to be taking
pictures in decent light, a P&S with a reasonably wide-angle lens would
be a substantially cheaper/smaller option. If he wants wider than 28 or
so mm, or if "in decent light" doesn't apply, the DSLR is the way to go.

He wants at least 10 megapixels. A point and shoot with a WA lens and 10
megapixels is quite rare, and will be very noisy.

All I could find were the Panasoninc LX2 and FX100, neither of which is
suitable for the type of photos he plans to take.

On Wed, 14 Nov 2007 11:22:40 -0500, H.S. wrote:
Daniel Silevitch wrote:


For completeness, it's worth noting that if he is going to be taking
pictures in decent light, a P&S with a reasonably wide-angle lens would
be a substantially cheaper/smaller option. If he wants wider than 28 or
so mm, or if "in decent light" doesn't apply, the DSLR is the way to go.

Just curious, could you list some P&S like the ones you mention above?

There are a bunch. Off the top of my head, a couple of examples are the
Canon SD870 and the Panasonic TZ3. If you go to
http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/compare.asp and plug in '28 mm' for the
Zoom wide field, and then whatever other limits you are interested in
(pixel count, price, etc.), you'll get a nice list.

-dms

On Wed, 14 Nov 2007 08:37:10 -0800, SMS ???? ? wrote:
Daniel Silevitch wrote:

For completeness, it's worth noting that if he is going to be taking
pictures in decent light, a P&S with a reasonably wide-angle lens would
be a substantially cheaper/smaller option. If he wants wider than 28 or
so mm, or if "in decent light" doesn't apply, the DSLR is the way to go.

He wants at least 10 megapixels. A point and shoot with a WA lens and 10
megapixels is quite rare, and will be very noisy.

All I could find were the Panasoninc LX2 and FX100, neither of which is
suitable for the type of photos he plans to take.

DPReview coughs up a couple of other possibilities (the Sony R1, a
Ricoh, and the Leica rebadged versions of those Panasonics), but yeah,
it's a limited selection. The LX2 would probably do a decent job, as
long as you stay within its ISO100 comfort zone. With the lens
stabilizer and the reasonably wide max aperture, that's probably doable
for architectural scenery under most circumstances.

-dms

Daniel Silevitch wrote:

DPReview coughs up a couple of other possibilities (the Sony R1, a
Ricoh, and the Leica rebadged versions of those Panasonics), but yeah,
it's a limited selection. The LX2 would probably do a decent job, as
long as you stay within its ISO100 comfort zone.

If Panasonic could ever solve their noise problems at ISO 100, they'd
be a real player in the market.

The Sony R1 is getting close to a decent SLR in price, and it lacks
basic features like an optical viewfinder, so I'd not consider it.

The other option is to forget about the wide-angle lens, and get a Canon
G9. If wide-angle is needed, use a Canon or Lensmate 58mm lens adapter,
and a 0.75x wide angle converter.

The other compromise could be going down to 8 megapixels, where there
are several choices.

Daniel Silevitch wrote:
On Wed, 14 Nov 2007 06:50:09 -0800, SMS ???? ? wrote:
wrote:

snip

The Canon 40d seems to be the hands-down
super camera. But it's a bit pricey.

I've been looking at the Canon EOS 400d....

Probably the EOS 400D is your best bet if you want to stay under $1000.
You might squeak in under $1000 with the Nikon D80, but not with a good
lens. Avoid the Nikon D40 and D40x if possible.

The D80 with an 18-55 kit lens is (barely) under $1K at B&H. With the
more usual 18-135 kit, it's somewhat over the budget limit.

On the other hand, if he's starting fresh without any legacy lenses and
doesn't anticipate needing fast primes, the D40/D40X isn't all that
unreasonable.


Ok, I'm leaning towards the Canon EOS 400D:

http://www.digitalcamera-hq.com/digi...t-details.html


I know the stock lens is not the greatest glass, but maybe it
could be wide-angle
enough for temples? It's 18-55mm.