Foo - Early Birthday present? Kinda.

I guess it would be too far off for me to call it an early Birthday present, being my Birthday isn't until November 20th. But aside from that.

Yesterday I treated myself by ordering the new Nikon D80 Digital SLR camera with Nikon Nikkor 18-135mm ED-IF AS-F lens and a 4GB RiTek SDHC card. I'm really excited but I'm still in the dark as when I'm going to get it, Being how it just came out last week, it's flying off the shelfs and the warehouses of online stores. I ordered it from Ritz Camera which they say that they have the body in stock and will ship it today but the lens is unknown right now. I might have a camera body with no way to use it for a week I dunno.

I suppose I could just order the Nikon 50mm F1.8 lens I had planned on getting later just a little earlier if there seems to be some problems getting the zoom lens.

Anyway I'm really happy about the purchase I hope it lives up to my expectations, I'm a Canon guy turned Nikon, as I'm not impressed with any of the entry level DSLR's that Canon offers. Canon also has a new entry level DSLR that replaced the XT, called the XTi (400D) but personally I think it feels cheap very plasticy, plus it has a lot less features like no spot meter, but it isn't bad for $200 less for the body only.

GratZ. My next camera will be a DSLR.

I loved my camera....had the Olympus C720. Then a friend needed a good camera ASAP (without retail prices) so I sold it to her and upgraded to the C740. Loved that too. Then I had that stolen my first night in London when I went over to UK in 2004. I bought an Olympus C765.....it's an upgraded model but for some reason, I've really not liked this camera like I did the other two. I just want to get a DSLR now.

Nice camera, and happy birthday:rolleyes:.

So, where are our pictures??

Aside from the $5000+ models, I've tried out all the canons and they all seemed cheap and plasticky; nikons have always felt like a rock. But they do seem to offer sharper pictures. Nikon's hardware seems to put a slight veil around the pixels, its really odd. Between my D200 and D70S, I get better saturation and better flash sync with the D70S. But between a rebel XT and even the D200, the canon rebel gives slightly less noise, a hair sharper, and a tiny bit duller but more accurate color rendering. It's weird how it all works out.
BTW: absolutely get the SB600 flash. All the D cameras are able to remote flash the SB600/800 using the built in flash as a master. You can get a lot of kick ass shots that way, like hanging the flash from the branch of a tree while taking a pic of family standing underneath the tree on a sunny day. Everyone ends up being lit evenly from not just in front but also above, to match the sunlight.
Or putting the flash behind someone in an indoor environment while using the built in flash, so you get a nicely lit background w/o that awful shadow that forms around the person.

GratZ. My next camera will be a DSLR.

I loved my camera....had the Olympus C720. Then a friend needed a good camera ASAP (without retail prices) so I sold it to her and upgraded to the C740. Loved that too. Then I had that stolen my first night in London when I went over to UK in 2004. I bought an Olympus C765.....it's an upgraded model but for some reason, I've really not liked this camera like I did the other two. I just want to get a DSLR now.

I also have a mini canon digicam with a fixed lens for carrying around in my pocket. there are no ways around it, a SLR will make you look like a camera geek no matter what. Some days you just want to be the discrete tourist. A pocket sized camera with a nice fixed lens outshines a similar zoom lens any day. (Does this mean my canon's a fixie?)

My next camera is going to be a quaker oatmeal box...

Camera comes tomorrow, it appears they shipped the lens with it also, they got a big shipment on Monday. But I'm not too sure that I'm keeping the lens, it's not getting very good reviews. It produces pretty soft images with signs of CA which is the lenses fault not the camera.

I might sell it buy something from Tamron or Sigma.

I might sell it buy something from Tamron or Sigma.
Neither my brother or I have had luck with Tamron or Sigma lenses. They both tend to be soft, and not very saturated. I'm a Canon man, brother is a Nikon man. His problems with both Tamron and Sigma, have been with the lenses not "talking" with the camera body. His large Tamron will work perfectly sometimes, and be unresponsive at others.
The 50mm 1.8 is tack sharp and cheep. The 18-135 my brother has is his second. The first was soft, got returned, and the second is fine. Canon's 28-135 is the same way.
Prime lenses are still noticeably sharper than zooms, although zooms have improved by leaps and bounds in the last few years. The best thing that has come out recently is image stabilized lenses. Well worth the money. One can handhold shutter speeds as low as 1/30 and still have a sharp image.

--A