Canon 10D vs Nikon D70 (1 Viewer)

Hi everyone,

Thanks yet again for all the advice I've narrowed the choices right down and I'm buying one of the two;

Canon 10D
Nikon D70

Now I can pick either up at around the same cost.......what do you suggest??

I'm swaying towards the nikon but my other half reckons the canon!

Decisions decisions :eek!:

Which camera!

Hi there,
I have the Canon 10D which is OK, but a friend recently bought the Nikon at Jessops for a very good price and I feel that the image is slightly better than the Canon!
I use a Canon 75-300 zoom which is quite good and only about £120, and you can get it in a Nikon fit as well.
I'm aiming to get the Sigma 170-500 zoon soon, which I tested the other day in Jessops and thought the results were pretty good.
I think some places also offer deals with a variety of lenses.
If you can afford it the Canon 20D may be a better bet but of course costs more.
I have found with the 10D and other Canon cameras that you need to over expose one stop particularly on dull days or with even the slightest amount of back lighting
Most shops, including Jessops, will match internet prices so it's worth checking this before you buy.
Whatever you get it will be out of date in a few weeks, but thats life nowadays!

Good luck,

madmike

Just to spanner up the works the new Canon 350D will soon be hitting the shops. More decisions to be made!

LozSanders said:

Hi everyone,

Thanks yet again for all the advice I've narrowed the choices right down and I'm buying one of the two;

Canon 10D
Nikon D70

Now I can pick either up at around the same cost.......what do you suggest??

I'm swaying towards the nikon but my other half reckons the canon!

Decisions decisions :eek!:

Click to expand...

I'm a bird photographer who has used Nikon equipment for 35 years. However, if I were starting out today in bird photography, I would choose Canon equipment, not Nikon. Canon has proven more innovative than Nikon over the past ten or more years, particularly in terms of vibration reduction ("image stabilization") lenses. If you enter Canon's system you can dream, at least, of moving up to a 500mm. f4 or 600mm. f4 IS lens. Nikon has not come out with equivalent products, as yet. Overall, Canon seems to be running a few years ahead of Nikon, particularly with regards to long lenses.

That said, one can do very well with Nikon's equipment, also. It's likely that by the time you are ready to splurge on a $5000+ lens, Nikon will have a 500mm. f4 VR lens to offer. But by that time, Canon may have something even fancier.

Doug Greenberg said:

I'm a bird photographer who has used Nikon equipment for 35 years. However, if I were starting out today in bird photography, I would choose Canon equipment, not Nikon. Canon has proven more innovative than Nikon over the past ten or more years, particularly in terms of vibration reduction ("image stabilization") lenses. If you enter Canon's system you can dream, at least, of moving up to a 500mm. f4 or 600mm. f4 IS lens. Nikon has not come out with equivalent products, as yet. Overall, Canon seems to be running a few years ahead of Nikon, particularly with regards to long lenses.

That said, one can do very well with Nikon's equipment, also. It's likely that by the time you are ready to splurge on a $5000+ lens, Nikon will have a 500mm. f4 VR lens to offer. But by that time, Canon may have something even fancier.

Click to expand...

I have Nikon gear including a recently purchased D70, but I agree with Doug. At the moment Canon are several years ahead of Canon in digital SLR's. They make their own sensors whereas Nikon have to rely on Sony (and Kodak?). Canon also lead in vibration reduction by 5 years or so i.e. they have had IS in long lenses for 5 years or more whereas Nikon have only a few zooms with IS/VR.

I like Nikon because I have a few lenses, and I can buy old but excellent lenses dirt cheap since I don't need auto-focus.

Leif

What swung it for me when I was deciding was firstly I already had some EF fit lenses & secondly if I wanted to move up later to a better lens then there was a bigger range to choose from.

Cheers Steve.

madmike said:

Hi there,
I have found with the 10D and other Canon cameras that you need to over expose one stop particularly on dull days or with even the slightest amount of back lighting

Good luck,

madmike

Click to expand...

Umm ... The advice I have had in the Edinburgh Photographic Society is that you are _better_ to underexpose with digital at the time of taking the photo. You can easily increase the brightness using PhotoShop etc. If you have overexposed in the first place, you cannot replace any colour that has been burnt out.

Another Mike.

citrinella said:

Umm ... The advice I have had in the Edinburgh Photographic Society is that you are _better_ to underexpose with digital at the time of taking the photo. You can easily increase the brightness using PhotoShop etc. If you have overexposed in the first place, you cannot replace any colour that has been burnt out.

Another Mike.

Click to expand...

I think that in different circumstances each bit of advice may apply. The above comment is correct in situations when there are white areas that can be burnt out. Once a section of an exposure is burnt out there is virtually no way to fix this, as there is no digital information available to manipulate/change. However, for non-white subjects, slight "overexposure" can actually help bring out details in dark blocky/shadowed areas and provide a bit more digital information that in turn can be manipulated in Photoshop.

One other thing that I have found useful is that when it is very bright and sunny and the subject includes light/white areas, it's useful to change the tone control to "less contrast" (or equivalent). This can help to prevent "burnt out" areas, and the overall contrast can be readjusted in post-processing.

On exposure issues I believe you all are right but the decision has to be made virtually on a photo-by-photo basis.
I find that setting the camera to underexpose all shots by 2/3 stop is probably safest as it is a fact that digital cameras record detail in the shadows very well.
Unfortunately, there's a downside to this which shows up particularly if you use the excellent shadow/highlight adjustment in Photoshop. When extracting detail from the shadows the noise will increase producing distracting colour patterns ;-(
The real answer is to use the histogram function of your camera if it has one. This will show up any burnt out whites. If the sun isn't shining then I find that it's usually safe to leave the exposure compensation set to the neutral setting.

Adrian
http://www.mistyduck.co.uk