I've got a great Panasoniz FZ8 with a 12x zoom, but sometimes, especially in darker light (ex. at dusk or in the woods on a cloudy day) it just doesn't cut it. The shutter has to stay open longer to get the shot, and even with image stabilization, the shot gets blurred with a little movement. There's also that really annoying "half-press to focus, then full-press to take the shot" that results in many poorly composed action shots. So lately I've been researching SLRs, their features, my different buying options and here's what I've found. I've never spent extensive time with any of these cameras, just talked to a lot of people and combed several websites.
SLR stands for Single Lens Reflux. When the light comes into an digital SLR camera it is reflected from a mirror to the eye piece, this way you see exactly what's coming through the lens. In a point and shoot digital camera, what you see through the eyepiece or screen is light that has hit the sensor and is then been processed to display on the screen. When you press the shutter release in an SLR, that little mirror pops up so that the light is able to hit the light sensor behind the mirror.
There are a couple of main differences between DSLR and other digital cameras
First, the sensor is much bigger on a DSLR. In those little ultra compact cameras the light sensor is the size of a postage stamp, maybe even smaller depending on the model. In a DSLR the sensor can be as big as a small post card. What does this mean? The sensor can collect more light faster, has shorter shutter speeds and more detailed images. It also means that instead of all those light sensors being crammed into a tiny area; bigger, higher quality sensors can be spread over a bigger area. You can only get so small before the laws of physics catch up with you.
This is why SLRs have so much better ISO versitality than other digital cameras. ISO is essentially film speed (100, 200, 400, 800 etc), it's a measurement to how sensitive the sensor is to light. Smaller ISO (100) gives better resolution, but longer shutter speeds. Bigger ISO gives less resolution, but faster shutter speeds (better for indoor without a flash) and really vibrant colors. On almost all point and shoot cameras, the ISO setting is pretty much useless over ISO 200, and for some, even ISO 200 is pushing it. ISO 200 and 400 on a normal point-and shoot camera, even the nice ones, results in grainy, noisy, poor quality photos that are unfit for printing. However with an SLR, you can go all the way up to ISO 800 and even 1600 with little loss in quality.
Another great thing with SLRs is no shutter lag. When you press that button, the camera will immediately focus and snap the photo.
Another big difference is that you can switch the lenses on a DSLR. The obvious advantage of this is that you can switch in different lenses for different situations, and purchase lenses appropriate for your needs and budget. The main three types of lenses are wide-angle, macro (for extreme close-ups) and telephoto.
Some other advantages are:
- Longer battery life
- The ability to shoot in RAW format. Most cameras shoot in the compressed jpeg format. This is the photo equivalent of mp3s. RAW just stands for raw: it's the raw data without any processing done to it. With a RAW photograph you can really go to work on making adjustments on it in photoshop. This isn't a big deal for most people, but most professional photographers always shoot in raw to get maximum detail.
- Lots of other small features.
The other two major differences are drawbacks: price and size. An entry level SLR will set you back 300-800 dollars for the body, and decent quality lenses can cost 500-1000 dollars a piece. So let's say you want to get a decent SLR, maybe an extra lens and some essential accessories (bag, tripod, basic filters) for serious photography and you're looking at dropping 1,300 dollars to get set up. However you can buy some good kits that have the camera body and a decent kit lens for about 500 USD.
Also these suckers are big. I take way more photos than many of my friends that have SLR cameras. Why? Because lugging the camera around is a major task. It doesn't fit nicely into a backpack or jacket pocket. When going out with the camera and gear you need to be prepared to be out to take pictures. As a result, even though some of these friends have much better photos than I do, they don't have a lot of photos of their friends and daily life, simply because their camera isn't very portable. You also look like a tool with that hulking and expensive toy hanging around your neck.
Most DSLRs don't have live view, meaning you can only see the image on the screen after the shot. You have to compose the shot with the viewfinder.
Nikon and Canon are the top brands. Here's the price listing of entry-level cameras according to the B&H website as of June 2008.
Nikon D40 kit with lens 479.95
EOS Digital Rebel XTi (a.k.a. 400D) 569.95
Nikon D60 kit with lens 699.95
Canon EOS Digital Rebel XTi (a.k.a. 400D) with lens 674.95
Nikon D80 with just the body 729.95
Nikon D80 kit with lens 899.95 (after 50$ mail-in rebate)
Canon EOS Rebel XSi (a.k.a. 450D) 799.95
Canon EOS Rebel XSi (a.k.a. 450D) with lens 899.95
Canon EOS 40D (body only) 939.95 (after $200 rebate)
Nikon D200 (body) 1,259.95
Canon EOS 5D (body only) 1899.95 (after $300 rebate)
About the Rebel: Each model has two names. In some places the Rebel XSi is known as the EOS 450D and the Rebel XTi is called the EOS400 in some places. However there's no difference between them. The marketing genius at Canon that thought giving their product two names should be shot.
So the D40 is a really popular entry-level camera, the Rebel XTi and Nikon D60 are slightly better, then the Rebel 450 and NikonD80 start to get to serious prosumer level with EOS 40D and Nikon D200 for serious hobbyist and professionals. This list could keep going up to $4,000 cameras but who can be bothered?
The Nikon D60 is newer than the D40 and has some sort of live-viewesque function so you can line up shots with the view screen. The D40 and D60 don't have an auto-focus (AF) motor in the body. This means that you can't use lenses that don't include an AF motor, otherwise you're stuck manually focusing each shot. These two have the popular function of taking RAW and Jpeg at the same time, so you have the big RAW file, but you also have the little Jpeg file to share with friends. However, it only stores a basic Jpeg. The Nikon D80 let's you choose what level of compression you want in this RAW+jpeg mode (fine, normal, and basic or something) but on the D460 and D60 you only get the lowest (worst looking) compressed image. Anyways, the cameras have the options to use other, better jpeg compression modes when not shooting in RAW+jpeg, so it's only a big deal for the few that have the time to mess with RAW images.
The Nikon D80 has an AF motor and can auto bracket, which is a type of advanced feature that let's you take three pictures at once, each one with different settings. So for example if you want to take a pic of a tree with a really bright background, you can take one pic that has setting adjusted to get the tree detail, then another at a lower light level to get the sky detail, then one more somewhere in between. After you combine them in photoshop you can get one of those cool pics that has great contrast in it. Something like this (I think).
The Nikon D80 and Canon Rebel XTi are the most popular models for each brand on the Flickr photos sharing site. You can see the graphs here for Nikon, and here for Canon. Here you can see all camera's: http://www.flickr.com/cameras/. The Digital Rebel XTi is the most popular.
I think what it comes down to is, definitely keep a nice, compact point and shoot around to carry with you. Some of those can take great photos when it's bright out, and only consider buying an DSLR if you're really serious about taking on photography as a hobby and prepared to lug it around. If so, then it looks like the Nikon D80 or Rebel XSi are the winners if it's in your budget. Even though it came out in 2006, the Nikon D80 still regarded as a great camera, so that means it'll still be relevant come three or four years from now, which is very important. But if you just want to point and shoot and don't care about using a lot of lenses or the extra functionality of the Nikon D80, then the D40, D60 and Rebel Xti are great buys.
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