Looking for a new camera.

[tony]

I guess the best way to make a decision would be to see some examples .... (hint hint).

if you are going to the meeting sunday i can even bring my s2-is for you to play with if you want

[Ram_Puppy]

i have a friend here at the office that is a professional photographer, and here theory is the following.

Cannon was ahead in digital technology, but everyone has caught up. back in the SLR days, Nikon made the sturdiest body, Cannon and Minolta the best lenses...

however, practically everyone now day has their lenses ground by a computer, and the optical glass and coatings are formulated by the same group of labs, so on and so forth...

so essentially, it's a level playing field in pro-sumer products. (If your a pro your obviously going to go for the monster lenses that cost more than most people earn in a year) but if your not, then an everyday pro-sumer lense is great, and hobbyist lenses are not far behind.

Sigma lenses used to be scoffed at, now not so much. I do know that Nikon lenses have better motors in them, and their glass is better than sigma's glass (according my knowledgable friend and what I have read.) the Nikons lenses can focus much faster.

There is also a new class of lense out in the last year or so called a 'super zoom' these are telephoto lenses that are usually between 70 to 200 mm and this one lenses replaces 4 or 5 from an earlier day... i.e. it's practically a point and click.

the good news is you can probably get a good dslr w/ a macro lense package on it cheaper than a super zoom... so that may be worth investigating. I dfound a D40 online w/ an 18 - 40 mm lense for 548... thats not bad, but it will get better according to the article.