I have bought the Digital Rebel and a new flat bed scanner, the 4870 Pro. I also purchased the new Canon i9900 printer. I haven't set up the printer and scanner in my "office" yet, as I have to replace some fault furniture from the store, which probably won't happen until after Xmas. But I look forward to some good photographic times rail fanning and model RR photography.
Yo Rick, some heavy duty stuff there. We'll be looking forward to your photo contributions to the various forums. Let me know your feelings about the scanner, please.
You seem to have entered a new realm of photography with that rebel. Thats some serious pro gear there. Congrats! My wife has a rebel and she got the extended battery grip for hers. (I should say I got it since it came off my credit card, and was a gift from me.) She says it pretty much always has juice no matter what now that she has that. She also got a larger data card. Based on what I've seen done with that rebel, it's really an amazing tool.
Hey Rick, I too have taken the digital SLR plunge! On Friday I received my Canon 20D, 17-85 EF-S lense, and 2GB Lexar CF card. I fought hard to keep from buying the Rebel and saving some cash, but there were a few things about the 20D that met my requirements and I sprung for it.
The Canon Rebel (300D) is a very nice digital SLR entry model, and very keenly priced. Nice buy, Rick. Picked up a Panasonic NV-GS200 (US=PV-GS200) DV camcorder as 'our' Christmas present a week back and saw a swag of Nikon D-70's sitting on the top shelf.... I resisted.
I very seriously would love to step up to dSLR... I want a 300D, a 70-200/f2.8L IS USM, and a 1.4X or 2X cheater. That is good for some 448mm of focal length. If I cannot get a decent used copy of the L, I'll spring for a 75-400/f4-5.6 IS USM. That last combo alone equals 640MM of focal length.
After owning the DRebel now for a while, its hard not to lust after the 20D. I helped a fellow modeller here purchase the 20D (body only) by giving him my digital lens that came with the DRebel. I'm not a digital lens fan as I'm convinced that all SLR cameras will eventually be full sensor; the digital lens won't work with a full sensor camera. I also gave him by old 35 -135 Canon lens as I had just bought the 28 - 135 IS lens. So he is a happy camper and I suspect a future Railimages joiner. I'm happy with the DRebel, except focusing on auto isn't that hot in lower light conditions. What I find interesting and the DRebel is setting a new world historical first is this: the Rebel is now the most hacked camera in history. The camera has an "A" and "B" drive and is run under "DOS." Cannon first made the 10D and decided to market the DRebel as a dumbed down 10D. The insides are identical, so what Canon did was turn off some of the functions in the camera software rather than delete those functions out of the software. Some enterprising Russian discovered this and hacked solutions to turn functions back on - like mirror lock up. So his solution for the Rebel is called the "Russian hack." If you have the DRebel, you can get the Russian hack through the Rebel forum at www.dpreview.com Just ask how to get it and some one will provide you with a link. You need to know this however, installing the Russian hack voids your warranty. But after a year, you don't have a warranty anyways so that is when I will be installing the Russian hack in my camera.
SOunds like you're having a good time with that camera of yours. I've been field-testing the new Kodak 7000 series digital (replacement for that POS 6443 Kodak I mentioned earlier), and I'm impressed with it. With the extended memory card, plus some extra lithium batteries, I'm ready to go railfanning! I've even managed to shoot short videos with it, one of which I uploaded to RI. I just have a HewlettPackard v40 office-jet printer/scanner/fax machine at home, and I haven't tried to make any copies of pics yet. Don't know if I can ever go back to film cameras now!!
Rick, I too lust for digital SLR, but must wait till prices subside. Anything to report on your experiences with the scanner?
Sorry for the slow reply. I'm just setting the scanner up tonight, so I haven't used it yet. I know the quality will be good as in every mag it appeared, it received excellent reviews, including Shutterbug and Pop Photo, et al. I bought my son the Sony DSC - W1 camera with 5 megapixels and he seems happy with it. I do have some railfan pics to scan in and store at railimages so I look forward to working my new toy - scanner.
I too have the 300D, bought new from local Teds Camera House - with their "WE WILL BEAT ANY PRICE!" deals. They also give you 30 days 'warranty', so if your unhappy with it, you can swap for a different model! I was also lookin at the Nikon D70 I think it was. Fantastic Camera, Priced as entry for SLR, but not really a 'basic' camera - well not to me.. has a lot of features that would please a moderate cameraman, but I dont know, the sales dude said not really for the pro though... IMHO minimum it needs 1gig memory cards at least for a weekend away... 18meg for the works setting TIFF fotos!!! 5-8 meg for jpgs. Nicely balanced camera, lookin forward to figuring out how the hell to get the most out of it. Looking at a few photography courses through TAFE or similar, but most out of TAFE are $800au a week! Not bad coin eh! We have professional printers here at work, we print lots of our own advertising stuff, a few A3 photos I printed came out absolutely magnificent.. Threw them through the laminator, and daddy is happy! The Russian Hack sounds interesting, but I think I would be weary about bolloxing the whole thing up... [ 11. January 2005, 01:37: Message edited by: virtual-bird ]
A number of participants at www.dpreview.com have done the Russian hack. They seem quite happy with it. You can re-install the original Canon software (recommended if you are sending your camera to Canon for a fix of any type). What is a "pro" camera and what isn't has some stipulations; it can also be a snob thing. Generally a "pro" camera has less options (you'd think more) than the DRebel. A pro camera will be more ruggedly built, especially in the area of the shutter; remember pros will shot 30 rolls of film in the film days and the camera has to stand up to that. "Hobbyiests" camera's don't generally get that kind of abuse so they aren't quite as robust; kind of like the difference between a drill bought for the construction site versus a drill bought for home use. However, the camera is quite capable of taking "pro" shoots; the only exception is that it isn't a great "sports" camera. A good sports camera generally can fire off more shots per second than the DRebel. I will probably ugrade at some point to a "full sensor" camera, but not until the prices have come down substantially - which they will eventually do. I bought a portable CD burner that I take with me. I use two 512 cards, when one is full I burn it to cd while shooting with the other one. This way I can shoot all day as long as I don't run out of burnable CD's.
One main distinction for me for labelling something as "pro", keeping in mind I am old school 35mm Nikon guy, is what you are able to view in the finder. This applies to both digital and 35mm SLRs, are you actually seeing 100% of what the lens is going to capture in the viewer?
Most camera's don't capture 100% of the view finder, even Canon's upper end jobbies. Now with Digital, that's even less of a stipulation. Today's "pro" digitals are either full frame or almost, and are "fast."
Hi Rick; My 3 Nikon F2s and F3HP have full frame finders but I'm not sure what the Nikon digital line has to offer. Cheers, Lenny
Ok, has anyone tried the russian hack yet? Theres a few things you can do! http://www.bahneman.com/liem/photos/tricks/digital-rebel-tricks.php www.camerahacks.com/
I can't address the Canon Rebel, as I have a Nikon D100 and a D70. I can address Nikons back to 1968--when I bought a basic "F." I sometimes shoot professionally--perhaps 550 frames a day. So both cameras get a workout when I am in the field. To my knowledge, Nikon has never had a 100% viewfinder; it's always been at 97-98%. I've always liked this, especially when I frame a shot a bit too tightly. The D100 is more robust than the D70, but the D70 is sharper, with a better color balance--technology progresses, I assume. Neither is what I'd call a rugged camera; if I dropped one, I'd expect the lens mount to break somewhere. That probably would not happen with the professional series. I'm puzzled that the D70 stores "compressed" raw images of about 4.7MB, while the D100 stores 9.5MB raw images. You would think the same-sized card would store about twice as many images on the D70 compared to the D100. This is not the case--both will store 103 images on a 1GB card. What's up there? I assume software tricks to preserve marketing. It's my experience that either camera (and the Rebel) can produce truly professional results; you just have to be careful not to beat them around too much.
