As my Twit­ter friends know, some­one swiped by aging Canon
Dig­i­tal Rebel XT cam­era after a Cre­ative Com­mons event in San Fran­cisco
on Dec. 15. It was time to move up to a higher qual­ity cam­era any­way (rather
than buy­ing a Rebel XTi), so I’ve been spend­ing some time on the
week­ends doing some research.

I chiefly use my cam­era for peo­ple pho­tog­ra­phy, con­fer­ences and
sports and nature
shots. Your mileage may vary depend­ing on your indi­vid­ual inter­ests.
And, of course, lenses weigh heav­ily in any pur­chase deci­sion, though
the theft of my lenses frees me to go Nikon or Canon.

If you’re an inter­me­di­ate or semi-pro pho­tog­ra­pher get­ting more seri­ous about pho­tog­ra­phy, here’s how to climb up the dig­i­tal pho­tog­ra­phy food chain, in roughly this order:

Nikon D40/D40x

Price on Froogle: $474-$820

Com­ment: Per­haps the clos­est kin to Canon’s Dig­i­tal Rebel XTi.

Nikon D60

Price on Froogle: $640-$750

Com­ment: If I were start­ing out, this new kid on the block — just out this month — is the cam­era I’d buy.

Nikon D80

Price on Froogle: $730-$1,000

Com­ment: An amaz­ing cam­era, though it’s been around for a while and lacks Live View. Robert Cox, pres­i­dent of the Media Blog­gers Asso­ci­a­tion, tells me: “I love this cam­era. You really have to try to take a bad pic­ture with the Nikon
D-80. The auto-settings area great except with poor light­ing but I’ve
learned how to play around with the ISO set­tings and the cam­era goes
up pretty darn high. I can­not think of a sin­gle bad thing about this camera.”

Canon 40D

Price on Froogle: $950-$1,150

Com­ments: I began my hunt here, and was lean­ing toward buy­ing the 40D for a cou­ple of weeks. It has 10.1 megapix­els, weighs 740 grams, shoots 6.5 frames per sec­ond. The fel­low at the counter at Calumet Pho­tog­ra­phy in San Fran­cisco pointed me to the D40. I’ve seen astound­ing pho­tos taken with this cam­era. Draw­backs: Only a 9-point aut­o­fo­cus sys­tem. No aut­o­fo­cus on Live View.

Nikon D300

Price on Froogle: $1,800-$2,100

Com­ments: Like the D200 before it, the Nikon D300 is a Mercedes-Benz of sub-$2,000 cam­eras. The New York Times pho­tog­ra­pher I chat­ted up at Mac­world Expo said, “If I was buy­ing a new cam­era, no ques­tion it’d be the D300.” Nikon boasts a top-of-the-line 51 point aut­o­fo­cus sys­tem, includ­ing aut­o­fo­cus in Live View (called Live Pre­view in some cam­eras, it refers to com­pos­ing shots through the LCD screen rather than the viewfinder), 12 megapix­els and very accu­rate auto white bal­ance. Also, love the ergonom­ics of Nikon cam­eras, and another bonus: the D300 is weather-sealed. Scott Kelby has a good review here. Draw­backs: It’s a bit bulky at 825 grams, and Live View can wear out from overuse. Also, add a cou­ple of good lenses and you’re look­ing at a $4,000 invest­ment. Still, at the right price (used lenses on eBay, any­one?), I might decide to go for it.

Canon 5D (pic­tured at top)

Price on Froogle: $2,200-$3,300.

Com­ments: This is what my pro pho­tog­ra­pher friends Thomas Hawk and Scott Beale wield. It’s a step up from the pro­sumer mod­els listed above. The camera’s capa­bil­i­ties are heav­enly, includ­ing 12.7 megapix­els, full frame and low noise. Draw­backs: At 2 1/2 years old it’s get­ting a bit long in the tooth, tops out at 3 frames per sec­ond and 895 grams is a bit heavy. Hmm, maybe I’ll try to catch a deal on eBay.

Or, go with the Nikon D300. (Inter­est­ing smack­down between the N300 and D5 here.) Or wait for a bet­ter model to be released.

It goes up from there into cam­eras run­ning thou­sands of dol­lars. It’s not my full-time job, so I’ll stick to the cam­eras in this range.

One small issue that gives me pause: David Pogue’s review of Sony’s new Alpha A350. points to a promis­ing devel­op­ment in the field: a sec­ond sen­sor. “On this cam­era, turn­ing on Live View sends light from that main mir­ror onto a sec­ond sen­sor, one that’s devoted solely to feed­ing the pre­view screen. The aut­o­fo­cus sen­sor works nor­mally as you com­pose a shot, since the mir­ror never has to flip up.”

That’s cause for cel­e­bra­tion of what’s ahead — but it will be months before Canon or Nikon fol­low suit.

Later: I’m now lean­ing toward buy­ing the Nikon D300 with  18-200mm f/3.5–5.6G ED-IF AF-S VR DX Nikkor Zoom Lens on Ama­zon.

JD Lasica works with major com­pa­nies and non­prof­its on social media strate­gies. See his busi­ness pro­file, con­tact JD or leave a comment.

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