t1i

The camera industry and photographers, having just gotten accustomed to the arrival of video in point-and-shoot cameras, just now are beginning to grapple with its arrival in the more serious SLR realm.

Chuck Westfall, technical adviser for Canon's professional products marketing division and a 26-year veteran at the Japanese company, is in the thick of it. Nikon was the first to market with a single-lens reflex camera equipped with video, the D90, but Canon offers video in two SLRs: the high-end EOS 5D Mark II, with a large sensor the size of a full frame of 35mm film, and the Rebel T1i, a more affordable, mainstream model.

These cameras combine high-definition video--1900x1080 pixels at 30 frames per second in the case of the 5D Mark II--with SLRs' advantages when shooting in dim conditions and with a broad variety of lenses. But even though today's video SLR features offers hold some appeal to enthusiasts and professionals, they're something of an awkward afterthought. SLRs and those who use them that haven't yet had much time to adapt.

Welcome to the world of digital photography, where change is incessant. In an interview with CNET News, Westfall talked about not just video, but also OLED displays, the arrival of rival full-frame SLRs from Sony and Nikon, changing flash card and file format standards, wireless networking, and more.

Question: The age of the video SLR has begun. A lot of people in the high-end camera market are set in their ways, and video is a radical difference for a lot of them. How does that change the camera design, the marketing, and everything you have to do to sell a camera?… Read more

Eventually, it'll become old hat, but for now, the addition of video capture to dSLRs still merits some oohing and aahing. Especially as it comes down to the less expensive models--you know, the ones within reach of the rest of us. So let us buzz eagerly about Canon's latest consumer dSLR, the EOS Rebel T1i, which becomes the cheapest dSLR thus far to support video capture.

Slipping neatly into the company's dSLR product line between the XSi and 40D, the T1i pushes the XTi off the edge of the bed into discontinuity. When it ships in May, it will occupy the popular $800 price segment: $799.99 for the body and $899.99 for the kit with the veteran f3.5-5.6 18-55mm IS lens. … Read more