{"id":21,"date":"2008-04-20T21:07:33","date_gmt":"2008-04-20T13:07:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/chekyang.com\/musings\/?p=21"},"modified":"2008-04-20T21:07:33","modified_gmt":"2008-04-20T13:07:33","slug":"boys-and-girls-with-toys","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.chekyang.com\/musings\/2008\/04\/20\/boys-and-girls-with-toys\/","title":{"rendered":"Boys (and girls) with toys"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"blog-2008-Rivervale-PICT4630-toys.JPG\"After a nearly six month search<\/a> for a new camera system to replace my current Konica-Minolta DSLRs setup, we finally decided on going with Nikon<\/a>. We picked up a Nikon<\/a> D300<\/a> at MSColor<\/a> yesterday. This post will be really long so it\u2019s broken into several entries.:)<\/p>\n

Those of us who dabble with photography will know that switching camera systems can measure up to a huge investment especially if you\u2019re already heavily entrenched in one camp with lenses and accessories. Truth to tell, the sort of differences and nuances between the two major camera systems on the same tier i.e. Nikon<\/a> and Canon<\/a> would matter especially to enthusiasts and professionals, but most casual users would do pretty OK with either of these two major players. Ironically, that made things especially difficult for me as I\u2019m sandwiched somewhere between three parts: a casual user, an enthusiast, and a technogeek who loves to discover toys.:)<\/p>\n

Still, Ling had this to say about the way I went about in the last few months on this search: \u201cThere he goes again with his spreadsheets.\u201d Yep, like how we went about choosing our Latio<\/a> last year<\/a>, I wasn\u2019t going to buy anything this major without having done thorough research first. So, spreadsheets identifying functions, feature sets, lenses that I was interested in, and prices got started and updated on a weekly basis as I collected information. The initial range of choices was pretty wide, and included the Canon 40D<\/a> & 5D<\/a>, Pentax K20D<\/a>, Nikon<\/a> D80<\/a> & D300<\/a>, Sony A700<\/a>, and even the Olympus E-3<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Of that list, only the 5D<\/a> employs a full-framed sensor which is probably more suitable for the sort of photography I dabble in – landscape, occasional portraits, and minimal sports – but costs were a few thousand higher than the next most expensive model. So, that option was put on the backburner, but I imagine that eventually my next DSLR down the road in 5-10 years will be a full-frame unit when prices have come down.<\/p>\n

I was pretty certain I didn\u2019t want to get another Sony (who bought over Konica-Maxxum) DSLR, what with their limited range of lenses and higher comparative prices. The Olympus was a huge tank and I had some reservations about the Four Thirds<\/a> system, and while the Pentax K20D<\/a> was a really attractive option, the local user community was small and as quiet as a mouse.<\/p>\n

So, a month ago it came down to the two biggest camera system players – Canon and Nikon<\/a>, and four of its offerings: Canon 450D<\/a>, Canon 40D<\/a>, Nikon<\/a> D80<\/a>, and the D300<\/a>. More in the next post tomorrow.:)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

After a nearly six month search for a new camera system to replace my current Konica-Minolta DSLRs setup, we finally decided on going with Nikon. We picked up a Nikon D300 at MSColor yesterday. This post will be really long<\/p>\n

Read More Boys (and girls) with toys<\/span><\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[277,137],"class_list":["post-21","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-photography-cameras","tag-nikon","tag-d300","wpcat-13-id"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chekyang.com\/musings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chekyang.com\/musings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chekyang.com\/musings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chekyang.com\/musings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chekyang.com\/musings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.chekyang.com\/musings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chekyang.com\/musings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chekyang.com\/musings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chekyang.com\/musings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}