It really bugs me to see people on this forum buying Eos-1D's and
then putting crappy glass on them.
If you going to buy a 1D for gods sake its a expensive camera so
give it the courtesy of putting nice glass on it.
I can see getting the camera you need and maybe having to use cheaper glass for a while, then selling it off on Ebay and replacing it with L glass later. Let's face it, the stuff ain't cheap.
Here's what bugs me, while we are on the subject. Someone buys a camera, a D60 or a 1D. They buy a couple of L lenses. They drop somewhere between 4-7 thousand dollars on their setup.
Then they do one of the following:
Post a message saying it's the first camera they have ever owned. Can somebody give them some pointers on how to take good photos?
Post a picture shot at F2.8 with shallow depth of field and a panicky message about how their new camera might have something wrong with it because it takes blurry photos. Someone will post a reply telling them to shoot with a smaller aperture to increase depth of field. They reply "does a smaller aperture make the focus look better?" or something else like that.
Post a message that they have had the camera for six months and have only shot in full auto mode because they are "just learning". You aren't learning anything in auto mode except maybe composition. Experiment a little. If not manual mode at least try AV or TV and see what you get. You don't even have to buy film for these cameras!
Now, I am aware that I will probably sound like a grumpy old man here. I learned to shoot with a film SLR a long time ago. I bought a used Pentax K-1000 body and a lousy Sigma lens. Full manual everything. I read every book I could lay my hands on to learn how to make my camera do what I wanted. Over the years I bought better bodies and better lenses and continued to learn. I took classes. I hung around with other photographers. I read. And I read. And I read. And I still read.
Going with Pentax was a dumb move in retrospect, at least from the standpoint of moving to digital. I have sold off all my Pentax gear on Ebay and have been shooting with a Canon G2 and 420EX for a while while waiting for the prices of digital SLRs to come down and the capabilities to go up. The D60 is in my near future as it meets most of my needs as a photographer. I'm waiting for better availabilty now, as well as seeing what the first month or two of widespread use reveals bug-wise. I'll have to buy all new Canon lenses along with the body. I'm not a poor guy, but the initial outlay for a D60 and a couple of lenses is pretty substantial.
So, back to my beef. I'm not jealous of people who have the money to plunk down without a second thought for a 1D or D60 and a couple of L lenses. I'm just astounded that anyone would buy such an expensive outfit and then not bother to learn the BASIC FUNDAMENTALS of photography in order to get some reasonable results with it.
More beefing. Whenever I get involved in a new hobby/area of interest the first thing I do is read up on it. I hit the library, the bookstore and the internet and learn all I can. Then I ask some questions in forums or newsgroups when I can't figure something out myself or by R-ing TFM. I have said this in other threads and will say it again here. One of the advantages of living in a civilization with a written language is that you don't have to do everything by trial and error, others have gone before you and some of them have written things down.
Gripe. Gripe. Gripe. Things were a lot different in my day and I'm only forty. Gripe. Gripe. Used to walk through snow drifts to school. Gripe. Kids these days don't know how good they've got it. Gripe. Used to spread emulsion on a flat rock and use an old windowpane out of the barn for a lens. Gripe. We were overjoyed to have a windowpane! Gripe, gripe. Had to have the subject sit perfectly still for an hour to make the exposure. Gripe.
-Kevin.
PS: Gripe.
I'd rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy.
-- http://www.flatarts.com/ 
