Sunday, April 6, 2008

Switching to Nikon

In the world of professional cameras, Canon vs Nikon is like Ford vs Chevy, or whatever your favorite commercial rivalry is. But unlike driving cars, there is no viable VW waiting on the sidelines to save you from the shouting match. Nope, in digital SLR cameras only two brands really matter for any type of documentary work. Some will claim that Olympus or Sony is an option, but they don't have nearly the established systems to back them up... To my point: I had been a Canon shooter since elementary school. Then about a year ago, Canon starting slipping up. Their normally amazing customer service started doing some weird things, and then they turned out several products with annoying inherent design flaws--flaws, including a pseudo-recall, that have been so debated on the Internet that I dare not speak them here by name!



Then Nikon released what is currently the world's most advanced professional DSLR, at the same time as their best ever wide angle lens. Fed up with Canon's attitude, I bought into this new Nikon wave. This is really a great thing, because the industry needed competition. Prior to the new D3, Nikon had been struggling on sensor quality; and as a result Canon set the pace of the market as they pleased. No more! Among its strengths, the Nikon D3 is the best low-light camera ever, which is great for events and indoor action. That's why I bought 2 of them, with a D300, a semi-pro model, for backup. Contrasted with Canon's semi-pro model, the 40D, Nikon's D300 wins huge, by way of its full pro auto focus system and much tougher build quality... I still love Canon, but they must get back to the quality they represented when they released the 5D and 1D Mark II generations... Anyways, this is part of my commitment to serve my clients with only the very best in glass-addled handheld microcomputers.


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