PHOTOGRAPHER’S JOURNEY.com

Up front, I have to state that I am biased. And please don’t consider this a detailed “review”. Nonetheless, I’ve owned my Canon 30D digital SLR camera long enough now that I wanted to share some (nearly all positive) observations.

1. It is the first digital camera in my mind to bridge the gap between quality and affordability. I held off buying a digital SLR for years, sticking with point-and-shoot digital cameras and my 35 mm Nikon N70, because the image quality just wasn’t there at a price I could afford. But to me, the Canon 30D changes that. It offers not only the outstanding features of a true digital SLR camera, but does so at a price close to what I paid for my last film camera.
2. While it may not be as rugged as some other cameras, I have found the Canon 30D quite capable of taking a few bumps and grinds. I’ve had it about six months and…so far so good.
3. The camera’s features are superb. It has every feature I’d ever want in a camera: fully manual mode, quick auto-focus, and the capability of shooting 5 frames per second! That’s even faster than the much more expensive Canon 5D which shoots only 3 frames per second. To me, those extra two frames can really make a difference in some situations where freezing motion becomes critical. Don’t get me wrong, the 5D is a wonderful camera that has a few advantages over the 30D (such as the larger image sensor).
4. Picture style — Canon’s somewhat gimmicky built-in program for controlling things like color, saturation and sharpness of an image within the camera. Of course, most of this won’t matter much if you shoot in RAW mode like I do and make adjustments to the images later. Still, it does give you an approximation of the final image and a bit more control in the field. And if you’re shooting in RAW mode, you can always change it later.
5. RAW mode. The Canon 30D offers more formats for saving a picture than any camera I have seen. I won’t list them all but the key one for me is RAW. If you are not familiar with RAW and have only heard of JPEG, here is a quick explanation. When a photographer shoots an image with a camera that records that image in JPEG, that image is processed and compressed. When doing so in RAW, the processing and compression are untouched by the camera. The key advantage here — and it’s a big one — is that once an image has been compressed it is impossible to suffer at least some image degradation if one tries to make adjustments to that file later (such as contrast, saturation, etc.). If you’re serious about wanting to get the most out of your files, RAW mode is a must. It takes up more memory on a memory card, but trust me, it’s worth it.
6. Superb line of lenses. Canon has an outstanding selection of images and I won’t go one about them here. You can check them out at Canon’s Website. Frankly, a confession here — I find that if I write too much about the many different lenses they offer, I spend myself silly going to get the next one. Still, if you have more willpower than me, go check them out.
7. The histogram. Many photographers can’t stand histograms or understand them, but I find them extremely helpful. Essentially a histogram gives you a quick glimpse at the image you just took and tells you whether there is any “clipping” going on. Clipping can happen on both ends of the exposure spectrum. On the black end it means loss of detail in the shadows. On the white end it means loss of detail in light parts of an image. An in-field examination of the histogram helps me make a quick assessment of a photograph without relying entirely on the viewing screen.
8. Speaking of the viewing screen — it is excellent, and readable under nearly all light conditions. Canon offers a menu-driven adjustment which is a bit out of the way, in my opinion. It could also benefit from an anti-scratch cover similar to the one that comes on the excellent and competitive Nikon N80. I haven’t personally seen any scratches develop and there are third-party solutions out there, but I think it’s always a concern with these screens and I wish Canon would make it part of the standard equipment package.
9. Software. Canon’s software for the 30D is just superb. The Zoom Browser and Digital Photo Professional (for working in RAW images) are, in my opinion, the best out there. Of course, if you want to do more advanced work with your images, you’d be better off investing in software such as Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Photoshop Lightroom. But both those programs are pricey, though. And Canon’s software is more than enough to get most people started.
10. It looks damn cool in my hands. Dare I say “sexy?” Ok, now I’m sounding like a true geek. :-).

Popularity: 6% [?]

If you enjoyed this post, be sure to subscribe to my RSS feed!