What Camera?
I get asked this question a lot, often followed by “What kind of camera do you use”
Short answer: Buy the camera that best fits your hands and has controls that match your way of thinking (i.e. the one that is easiest to use for you.)
Longer answer:
I harp on this to all my friends who see my kit and want to get something similar. Don’t buy what I have. What I have I chose because it works for ME.
The differences in cameras in any price range are really insignificant in terms of feature sets. There is not a single comparable camera between Nikon, Canon, Pentax, etc. that cannot give you the same results as another, even if one has to go about it in a slightly different manner.
Caveat: More megapixels are not necessarily better.. The difference between 6 and 8 or 10 and 12 megapixels is very small, since it takes approximately four times the megapixel count to become noticeable at the size of an even a 16×20 print. Doubling the linear resolution equates to quadrupling the pixel count since we’re talking about an x dimension AND a y dimension on the sensor. To double your linear resolution on a 6 megapixel camera requires a 24 megapixel sensor!
You are talking about spending a fairly sizable hunk of your hard-earned cash. It’s worth your time to go to a good camera store and actually handle the brands you are considering. It’s annoying to lose a shot because your fingers had to fumble around looking for the right button or you couldn’t remember which button/where the darn thing was for whatever function you wanted. It’s also annoying to have holding the camera become a chore because it was designed by or for a person with really small hands and you have hams for fists, or vice versa. Or maybe you have longer fingers than average. Or your glove maker has nicknamed you “Stubby”. Whatever.
My advice is for you to go to a store that carries the cameras you are looking at. Try each one for fit, and try to do several common operations on each (change aperture, shutter speed, ISO, White Balance) Then try the autofocus modes, and then look at the menu systems to see if they are easy to use and make sense to you. Hand feel is also very important- it’s no fun to hold and use a camera if it hurts to hold it too long or is heavy or awkward to hold, or tends to slip around in your hand because it’s made of a cheap slippery plastic. A camera is a tool, but the camera you choose and use is a personal thing and has an intimate human-machine interface dynamic about it. Use that to your advantage, and I don’t think you’ll ever regret it.
