Professional cameras, made for amateurs

Canon and Nikon scored hits with SLR digital cameras in the $1,000 range. Now they are facing off with successor models.
Photos: Canon vs. Nikon

The story "Professional cameras, made for amateurs" published April 23, 2005 at 6:00 AM is no longer available on CNET News.

Content from The New York Times expires after 7 days.

[lavacentral]

Stil too expensive and too bulky!!

IF I would have to guess (or even allege), I would say this author is working for both companies. But I am sure thats not the case.

Some of the newer digital cameras under $400 have been greatly improved that they take remarkable pictures.
Improvements have come in shutter speed, lenses, and autofocus. Most of the digital camera's also allow users manual control.
Take a look at the canon sd400 & sd500. Both can be found under significantly under $500 and they offer the DigiII chip (same as digital rebel), eliminates shutter lag, increases photo processing and writting. USB 2.0 connection. and 5.0 and 7.1 mega pixels respectively.

My recent experiences: In the past 4 months I have gone hiking, skiing and a wedding. All three places I have brought along my digital camera (under $400) and taken great pictures. My friend who owns an SLR left his in the car.. It was too bulky to carry (while skiing and hiking or mingling at the wedding).
If you are a professional and go to such places for pictures sake, then you need an SLR.

IF you are an average joe and just feel good about having an SLR then you may feel good but dont expect to be taking alot of pictures. It may just be sitting your camera bag in your car or at home.

[Below Meigh]

An SLR has to be bigger than a compact!

You are comparing Point-shoot compact digital to a Full lense
SLR!Ofcourse its bulky. But if you have pro equipment or an
investment in 35mm lenses (most likely Nikon or Canon), then
you've gained use of your lenses. And not all features of the
Compacts meet the Full-mode (auto/man) of the SLR digitals.
I use a Kodak Pro 14n (nikon lenses) and with fixed, glass,
lenses, the images are far superior to any compact digital
(nikon, canon, or otherwise). Heavy, maybe. But its reliable and
sturdy. And fast enough (with upgrade from Kodak) for 2-4
frames/sec capture. Try that with a compact. And many
compacts have digital zoom or plastic lenses. Not exactly
superior at imaging. And I've not seen a fast on, fast focus
compact yet that can beat the SLR in ALL categories.
If you want a digital SLR for your older lenses, then it comes
down to these two for the money. Pro-level cameras will be in
the $3K+ range. Smaller, compact digitals (4-5MP) are in the
$400 range (Canon S400/S500 are good choice).
And (plug) steve's digi cam web site is bestt site for reviews of
digital cameras.

[aerobott]

And why was Nikon and Canon forced to do this

I see the camera snobs at the NYT can't even explain the rationale for the downsizing and up pixel-counting that Nikon and Canon had to do. In fact, given these two companies reputations, why the changes to supposedly stellar and market dominating products - so soon after their release?

Because these two companies don't have a reputation in the consumer end. But one company does. Olympus. And Olympus camera's in that market sell quite well. Nikon and Canon are considered professional cameras and therefore the mentality puts them out of reach for most consumers. So where are current owners of Olympus consumer camera's going to turn when they want to move up? The Olympus eVolt 300 if Olympus has it's wishes. For starters, the eVolt is ugly. But it's small, light, and has an 8 MP recording range, lots of great features (sound familiar Canon and Nikon?) and above all, it takes great pictures. Additionally the eVolt 300 uses a newer 4:3 aspect ratio (hey, I was skeptical too, but this format is a comer) for recording images on the CCD. And, the lenses are digital from the ground up. Another sublime but necessary feature (as users of Nikon and Canon are finding in the field) is the ultra-sonic CCD cleaner. It can't be found anywhere else and is a must.
So, next time camera snobs fail to provide a rationale for the changes that major manufactures make (for no apparent reason), look somewhere else for a rationale. You might find a better camera.

[ajbright]

Everyone who?

Yes, everyone has $1000 to throw at a camera, and I can't think of how I managed to live without one before now.

So let me see, only $1000 for a camera that has a high enough megapixel rating to takes pictures as good as a $200 SLR?

Sarcasm aside, what people often forget is there is actually a cost benefit to owning a digital camera, and it comes down to how often you buy film and have it developed - even if you have your own dark room it still costs a fair bit to develop 20 pictures, half of which you'll end up tossing.

Yes you do get a better picture quality with an "analogue" camera, but if your primary purpose for owning a camera is for any form of publishing, then you'll need to spend yet more money on a top quality scanner.

But that still doesn't explain why a camera with an average zoom lense and only just enough megapixels to take a decent quality photo costs five times as much as a regular camera.

Usually when we move into the digital age, things are expensive to start with, but after the number of years digital cameras have been about, this cost should have been driven down dramatically.

One for one is not realistic, but surely twice as much is a reasonable mark for something that's in all honesty not as good as it's "analogue" equivalent.

[My-Self]

Cannon E18 Error ...

I hope at least those models don't have the infamous E18 error that plagued Canon's consumer cameras for years, and that they still refuse to consider a design flaw (lens motors being incredibly sensitive to dust particles and blocking the whole camera) turning it into a useless piece of plastic.

Bottom line : Canon consumer cameras are all throw away (A70, A75, A80, A85, A95, S110/S400 Digital Elph, etc ...), the catch being, you never know when they'll let you down (24H to 2 years on average).

Learn more about it (google) :
http://tinyurl.com/cjzhe

My A80 recently had it after working flawlessly for 16 month. Canon repair service pretended I abused the camera, then telling me this was a very rare occurence and it was caused by normal wear ... still waiting to find out how much they want to charge me to fix the consequences of their own design flaw.

I can smell a class action coming ...

[gerardodada]

Not quite accurate

1. "By far the most important advantage of a digital SLR, though, is that it takes much, much better photographs. " - well, this is your opinion, a "professional amateur" digital camera, like the Powershot G6 or the Coolpix 8800, can take pictures just as good as some of the SLRs you mention in the article.

2. "You can take supersharp portraits..." Again, non-SLR cameras rival the quality of the N70 and 20D - the Coolpix 8800 also has an 8MP sensor which is as good as the one on the N70 for most purposes.

3. "...with softly blurred backgrounds" You can do this with virtually any camera that allos for aperture control including digicams in the $200 range.

4. "You get every manual control known to man (exposure, shutter speed and so on). " Allthese and many more also available on non-SLR digitals in the $500 range and lower.

5. "And you can extend your range with interchangeable lenses (telephoto, macro, fisheye, whatever)." New "super Zooms", like Panasonic Lumix, or the Sony H1, have a 12X optical zoom range which is the equivalent to 35-430. The equivalent in the SLR world would be two or three large and very expensive lenses. Some of the digitals even have stabilization - for about $500. And most digital cameras accept accesory lenses to provide wider angle or more powerful zooms.

My point: Yes, digital SLRs are wonderful for professionalphotographers who arer willing to spend a lot of money and carry a bulky bag. For the majority of professional amateurs, cameras like the forthcoming Canon S2 IS deliver almost the same results at a fraction of the cost, size and weight.