So it's soon bonus time of year at work, and this time around I'm due
for two lots of bonus at once (as the last one got postponed because I
was off work on parental leave [1]).
Unsurprisingly, I'm looking towards camera stuff, but this time around
it's enough that I have more options than usual, so much so that I don't
know (heresy, yes) if it's necessarily Oly that I should be going with.
(sorry if the rest of this seems a bit stream-of-consciousness..)
There's various SLR manufacturers out there; given I want to keep on
using at least some of my OM lenses (the macro ones in particular), my
options for bodies are Olympus or Canon. (right? or am I missing another
alternative here?).
Currently, I've got E-1, E-330, 11-22,14-54,50-200,FL-50, and a bunch
of OM-era stuff.
Option 1: E-3, 7-14, and maybe 12-60. That leaves me with an overall
14-400 range, and a (reportedly) nice snappy 'default' lens. (and
possibly a 14-54/11-22 to sell on, or use on backup bodies).
Option 2: 5D + what? I want something wider than the 11-22 -- with a
FF body, there's more options, but even after all the discussions here
I'm not clear which lenses are worthwhile. (heck, if I just wanted wide,
I've got a 17/3.5 Vivitar lens I could put on the 5D with appropriate
adapter -- but I don't want something that's too fuzzy in the corners,
so I think I'm spending something fairly significant)
Looking on e*ay, 290173491876 (for example) gets me 5D + two fairly
generic lenses for not a lot more than an E-3 body would cost me, but
those aren't particularly interesting lenses. 140172340157 has a better
lens, but is getting a fair bit more expensive. I don't have any idea
what I'm looking at to get something equivalent to the 50-200, either.
Looking at the various pros and cons of the two:
E-3 -- live view, flip out screen, weathersealed, I have existing
(good) lenses+flash. 5fps -vs- 3fps for 5D. Builtin IS, so I don't need
to buy expensive lenses to get that. Sensor cleaner.
5D -- full frame sensor so I'd get more width out of my existing OM
lenses, better(?) overall image quality, better(?) high ISO.
Looking at the samples here:
http://www.dcview.com/article/newreadarticle.asp?last=/article/newreadarticle.asp&id=5705
(use name yws, pw 123456)
the images from the E-3 seems to be just fine; high ISO (image 154)
isn't spectacular, but noiseware cleans it up very nicely, so I don't
know if it's the sensor or just lack of postprocessing. (fair enough,
I'm sure the sensor isn't as noisefree as the 5D's sensor, it's 1/4 the
size..)
Anyway.
Things I don't care about too much: size/weight. If I want a small
camera, I'll pocket the teensy Canon p+s I have, and the two above are
close enough to one another for now.
Weathersealedness is not critical, but not nothing either -- I'm not
often out in the rain, but I _will_ be out in the snow, and I really
appreciate being able to put a camera down on a snowy surface for a
moment without worrying.
Faster frame rate is, again, not a critical selling point, I don't do
lots of sports shooting -- but I do more than none.
Live view + flip out screen are very nice; I really like those on the
E-330, especially for taking baby photos. I don't know that it's more
useful having it flip out than the E-330's flippyness, mind you. (I
guess you can also take shots sideways, which may well start to become a
necessity for sneaking up on Oliver now he knows what a camera is..).
Any more things I'm not thinking of here? Anyone care to chime in here?
thanks,
-- dan
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