Our brand-new Canon EOS Rebel XSi camera arrived in the mail this week and we're excited!!(Actually two of them came. After ordering from Dell, then learning the camera would not ship for another week, I got them to cancel my order then bought one through Amazon.com. Meanwhile, Dell shipped our camera anyway. Long story short, the Dell product is on a UPS truck heading back to the warehouse, and my credit card is eager for a store credit.)
I know that was impatient of me to not be able to wait a week for my new camera. But th
e way I see it, our trip to DisneyWorld is fast-approaching (34 days, 16 hours, and 19 minutes as of this writing), and since Karen crowned me the photojournalist for the trip I figure I need as much time as possible to learn the whole "DSLR" way of taking pictures.The need for a new camera started its real fever just over a week ago, when my wife blogged about the flowers I sent her. The picture was awful, and this was more or less the tipping point. She had a right to complain. Our point-and-shoot camera (a Fujifilm Finepix E900) has never taken pictures that were very good - usually snowy, not clear at any zoom level, bad battery life and generally very disappointing. What's frustrating about this is that we bought it on recommendation from Consumer Reports. Note to my beloved readers: Do not use Consumer Reports for decisio
ns on any sort of electronics.So it turns out one of Karen's friends has been blogging about her camera and her pictures are wonderful. And her other friend's pictures are wonderful. And her sister's pictures are wonderful, and our sister-in-law's pictures are great... and, well, you get the idea. It was time to go camera shopping.
... We interrupt this blog for a guilty conscious moment.
Alright I have to be honest. I've dreamt of buying a fancy SLR for a long time now. I'm a pretty patient fellow. Despite the long talks with people who know (you know who you are) and the many strolls through the photography section of Best Buy, I have not pushed very hard for one of these gizmos. You could say there might have been a subconcious part of my psyche that conceived of buying one, final, terrible "point and shoot" camera that would then bring Karen to ask for an expensive Digital SLR. And you would either be correct or slightly delusional. And who am I to judge? But I'm not actually here to dispute the past, just revel in the present....
I have to give most o
f the credit selecting this camera to my brother in-law, Joseph Scott. Thanks Joe! He is a walking photography encyclopedia. For those thinking about buying a camera, I would recommend talking with him first. As I struggled to make my final purchase his advice helped me finally do it. In the end, I bought a Canon EOS Rebel XSi, two 8 GB HDSD high speed memory cards, an HDSD memory reader, and a fantastic book to teach us how to take good pictures called "Understanding Exposure".Our camera is amazing!
Notes: The first picture on this blog was taken with the Fujifilm. If you look at the large version you might see some of the snow (maybe better called hail than snow). The other pictures were taken using the auto mode on our new camera.
10 comments:
We have the Canon Power Shot S3IS... its the same one Susan has. We are very happy with it and consulted Joe before our purchase. He is handy that way. We know we have something great when Joe is jealous of it. Even though his new one is super cool- we love the easy of the point and shot and the video setting. Enjoy your new camera and post lots of pic's of your family to this site and the family site too!
Woo-hoo! I love our new camera. I am so glad we finally bought it. Jason spoils me too much with iPhones and fancy kitchen equipment. I think it's about time we got something just for him (although I'm definitely going to benefit from this too). Thanks for blogging, dear.
Since neither David or I are very technologically minded, we pretty much consult Joe (or Jeff for computers) before we buy ANYTHING with an "on" button!
I look forward to many beautiful pictures from you and your new camera!
Nice camera Jason! Look forward to seeing the pics of Disneyworld with it! :D
Glad to read your comments and have to wonder if not listening to consumer reports goes for vacuum cleaners? Love the pictures and we too are looking forward to seeing more from you.
We love our cheap vacuum and stand gladly behind it. We've loved all the appliances CR recommends. More power to those who buy a Dyson! Their advertisers will love you for it.
don't tell Joe this but I sometimes wish we had bought the Rebel too...it really is a great camera and that's great that you already love it!
If you want a good comparison of old camera vs. new camera, check out my blog. The old camera took the picture of me and Emily. The new camera took the picture of the kids on the stairs. Click on the pictures to see the big version. HUGE difference.
Your DSLR looks great! I look forward to hearing about your experience with it on the trip. I'm sure the pictures will be wonderful, but I'm also curious to hear if its size made it unwieldy in some situations. I've always imagined that the ideal digital camera situation would be a nice DSLR coupled with a slender point-and-shoot.
I'd also be interested in hearing how many of the creative control features you used (shutter-priority, manual focus, or other prgrammable settings). Although my non-SLR digital camera has several creative settings, I rarely use them.
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