Guilherme Orcutt
Veteran Member
This is long text but can be interesting for those who are thinking in upgrade their Fuji to a DSLR.
When I was looking for a DLSR camera there were only three possible options, the D70, the Rebel and the 20D. First I started to look for full sized samples here and there, as picture quality, for me, was and still is the real important feature on a camera. Looking at Steve’s web site samples of the Rebel and the D70 I was convinced that a Canon would be my next camera. I hated the image quality of the D70 comparing it with the Rebel samples. So much noise and the full sized crops were so harsh, the Rebel samples were showing a so smoother image, almost no noise at all. So I narrowed my choices to the Rebel and the 20D. The 20D appeared to be the perfect choice, full featured camera, 8MP CMOS sensor, fast startup and focusing system, but at the end, very expensive. I knew that I would need an extra lens, not a high end Canon glass, but maybe a nice Sigma 70-300. Oh, an external flash also. Doing the math… out of my budget. It would be the camera or a happy marriage. My last choice, the Digital Rebel. So I started looking for nice samples of the 300D. There are tons of fantastic samples of that camera all around the Internet. Great pictures, buttery smooth images, and a camera that proved to be a great player, almost two years on the market and several happy owners. Oh, the Russian hack that adds some needed functionalities and the fantastic ISO 3200, the dream cam.
So I went to the shop to give it a nice look before buying it. I have to say that I got a little disappointed. Almost 2 seconds for the camera to startup, but a fast focus, at least compared with the S7000. A bit of hunting on moving subjects, but still a very fast and responsive focus system. But the absence of spot metering was making me think twice before buying the camera. The 20D suffers from this same problem. I can’t understand why Canon didn’t add spot metering to these cameras. And there was another little problem, the camera built quality. Our Fujis has a really better built quality, then a saw the D70 on the shelf. WOW, what a darn solid camera, plastic, but heavy, bulky, a very solid camera. It didn’t seem to be plastic really, maybe some other better material. The Rebel is like a toy side by side with the D70. So I decided to give another chance to the D70. Back home I started to look again for some samples of the D70. Please, don’t take me wrong, the Rebel doesn’t look and feel like a cheap camera, no way, it’s a nice camera but compared with the D70, it has a clear cheaper built quality.
Looking again for the D70 samples I found some unprocessed images showing that I was wrong about the D70 image quality. All that horrible images that I saw at Steve’s web site didn’t has anything to do with the new samples that I was looking at. The Rebel images were still smother then the D70 samples, but the colors were so nice, the pictures ware so sharp and detailed, even more detailed then the Rebel samples, it seems that the D70 sometimes can show more noise because it produces slight shaper images than the Rebel. The camera has so more features, a faster flash sync, a superb light metering system, instant startup, lighting fast focus, the kit lens seems to be also better then the lens that comes with the Rebel, a nice internal flash, a wonderful this and that, many bells and whistles, so I decided to stop that torture and buy the camera. There are also tons of happy D70 owners, I couldn’t go wrong. I knew that if I bought the Rebel sooner or later I would regret, I would miss a faster flash sync and also lots of the features present on the D70. Ken Rockwell that may not be the #1 photographer on earth, but a pro and a top of the list name likes the camera, so I really couldn’t go wrong. At the same time I sold three pictures, I never thought that I would sell pictures some day. That money helped me with the decision of getting the more expensive D70 in place of the Rebel. Now I still need to buy a 70-300 Sigma glass, 58mm IR, UV, ND, and polarizer filters, a nice flash gun, my Nikon SB22 needs to be retired, and a bag for the camera. For now my S7000 has been dislodged. Lots of money yet to be spent.
I hope I didn’t bore you too much. My first impressions of the camera are on the next post, reply of this one.
--
Best regards,
Guilherme
My photo album: http://www.maccocker.com.br/gallery
When I was looking for a DLSR camera there were only three possible options, the D70, the Rebel and the 20D. First I started to look for full sized samples here and there, as picture quality, for me, was and still is the real important feature on a camera. Looking at Steve’s web site samples of the Rebel and the D70 I was convinced that a Canon would be my next camera. I hated the image quality of the D70 comparing it with the Rebel samples. So much noise and the full sized crops were so harsh, the Rebel samples were showing a so smoother image, almost no noise at all. So I narrowed my choices to the Rebel and the 20D. The 20D appeared to be the perfect choice, full featured camera, 8MP CMOS sensor, fast startup and focusing system, but at the end, very expensive. I knew that I would need an extra lens, not a high end Canon glass, but maybe a nice Sigma 70-300. Oh, an external flash also. Doing the math… out of my budget. It would be the camera or a happy marriage. My last choice, the Digital Rebel. So I started looking for nice samples of the 300D. There are tons of fantastic samples of that camera all around the Internet. Great pictures, buttery smooth images, and a camera that proved to be a great player, almost two years on the market and several happy owners. Oh, the Russian hack that adds some needed functionalities and the fantastic ISO 3200, the dream cam.
So I went to the shop to give it a nice look before buying it. I have to say that I got a little disappointed. Almost 2 seconds for the camera to startup, but a fast focus, at least compared with the S7000. A bit of hunting on moving subjects, but still a very fast and responsive focus system. But the absence of spot metering was making me think twice before buying the camera. The 20D suffers from this same problem. I can’t understand why Canon didn’t add spot metering to these cameras. And there was another little problem, the camera built quality. Our Fujis has a really better built quality, then a saw the D70 on the shelf. WOW, what a darn solid camera, plastic, but heavy, bulky, a very solid camera. It didn’t seem to be plastic really, maybe some other better material. The Rebel is like a toy side by side with the D70. So I decided to give another chance to the D70. Back home I started to look again for some samples of the D70. Please, don’t take me wrong, the Rebel doesn’t look and feel like a cheap camera, no way, it’s a nice camera but compared with the D70, it has a clear cheaper built quality.
Looking again for the D70 samples I found some unprocessed images showing that I was wrong about the D70 image quality. All that horrible images that I saw at Steve’s web site didn’t has anything to do with the new samples that I was looking at. The Rebel images were still smother then the D70 samples, but the colors were so nice, the pictures ware so sharp and detailed, even more detailed then the Rebel samples, it seems that the D70 sometimes can show more noise because it produces slight shaper images than the Rebel. The camera has so more features, a faster flash sync, a superb light metering system, instant startup, lighting fast focus, the kit lens seems to be also better then the lens that comes with the Rebel, a nice internal flash, a wonderful this and that, many bells and whistles, so I decided to stop that torture and buy the camera. There are also tons of happy D70 owners, I couldn’t go wrong. I knew that if I bought the Rebel sooner or later I would regret, I would miss a faster flash sync and also lots of the features present on the D70. Ken Rockwell that may not be the #1 photographer on earth, but a pro and a top of the list name likes the camera, so I really couldn’t go wrong. At the same time I sold three pictures, I never thought that I would sell pictures some day. That money helped me with the decision of getting the more expensive D70 in place of the Rebel. Now I still need to buy a 70-300 Sigma glass, 58mm IR, UV, ND, and polarizer filters, a nice flash gun, my Nikon SB22 needs to be retired, and a bag for the camera. For now my S7000 has been dislodged. Lots of money yet to be spent.
I hope I didn’t bore you too much. My first impressions of the camera are on the next post, reply of this one.
--
Best regards,
Guilherme
My photo album: http://www.maccocker.com.br/gallery
It’s a completely different world, the camera is heavy, bulky, with a larger lens one’s hand can get really tired after some dozens shots. I think this is a not really bad, with a heavy camera it’s easy to use slow speeds and not shake; inertia. Don’t think that the D70 is a good choice for shooting parties 
