I mean, who buys a high-end SLR with the intention of only using a single lens? I used to think no one did, but then this hit the market and you can’t even get it it’s so popular.

He does go on to say that he does like it and it is good value ..

Overall, it’s a nice lens and produces good images. If you’re looking specifically for something with an 11x zoom range, for whatever reason, you could do much worse than buying this lens. I’d recommend it if you have to travel light or for day trips with the family. It’s economical, too, when you consider the cost of buying two or more lenses to cover the same range. But any lens covering such a broad range has to make compromises. If you don’t mind switching lenses once in a while, you’ll get better image quality from more specialized zooms or primes.

I guess the main thing to separate the two will be price, you would be choosing either the low cost Sigma or the higher priced but VR-enabled Nikkor. Two slightly different markets I am thinking so the two will find their own following.

sigma, nikkor, nikon, 18-200mm, camera, lens, dslr, photography, news, review

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What did I expect for my $41.25 including postage? Well I expected a book of my photographs printed at the same quality as, well, photographs. What did I get? 53 laser printed pages that look like they could have been run off any colour laser or photocopier.

The packaging was done well, the cover and binding are lovely. Inside? Crap. Grainy, dotty, unclear, bad colour. As I say, just like some 11-year-old kid with Microsoft Publisher has run off some pages at the local school computer lab.

The verdict; Don’t waste your money.

Technorati Tags: qoop, flickr, review, printing, digital, photography

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I’ve recently returned from my first photo trip with my new system—a PhaseOne P45 (39 megapixel) back on a Mamiya 645AFDII . After using a 4×5 for the last 30 years, it was quite a change! Just lifting the camera backpack brought a smile to my face (it’s about 10 lbs. lighter). I greatly enjoyed the agility and mobility of a medium-format camera, especially with the zoom lenses. I was also able to do close-ups fairly painlessly, quite a change from 4×5. I didn’t need to worry about running out of film—my tiny card case had four 4 GB cards, allowing for about 350 exposures! And, unlike 4×5 film, where each click of the shutter adds up to around $4.50—these were…free! (Free, after you pay the rather steep price of admission for the P45 back). This is actually quite liberating, as there is no reason now not to try more adventuresome compositions and/or lighting situations. (Situations that I previously would have talked myself out of, due to film costs, and low probability of success. But…taking chances is important.)

How long will it be before we have access to 39mp …?

He also compares Raw Developer vs. Capture One, I didn’t realise there was so much involved in properly developing RAW, I need to research more I think.

Technorati Tags: phaseone, p45, digital, camera, review

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Canon’s EOS 30D is numbered as if it were a major upgrade to the popular and excellent EOS 20D, and Canon marketing plumps it up even higher than that – the line is that it really has more in common with the 5D than the 20D. Really? With the same 8.2 megapixel CMOS sensor, the same DIGIC II image processor, the same 9-point autofocus system and the same 5 fps burst rate as the 20D, the 30D seems more like a respectable update of the 20D than anything else. When Canon put a bigger LCD and picture styles on the 1D Mark II, they changed the name to the 1D Mark II n. This new camera shows comparable improvements. We’d call it the “20D n,” if it were up to us.

I haven’t touched the camera but I am disappointed with the specs, I have to agree that they ought to have called it an upgrade to the 20D rather than give it the marketing moniker of 30D. The name they have blessed it with gives expectations of a much greater improvement than the specifications can live up to.

Still it looks like it’s a great camera. Check out the full review.

Technorati Tags: canon, eos, 30d, dslr, digital, camera, review, reviews, photography

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