Looking out for a new Camera

Sunday, December 07, 2008

It has been three years since I have thought of any equipment upgrades. The camera I have - EOS 350D works just fine and keeps me happy. The picture quality that comes out from the sensor is reasonable, and 8mp is more than enough to make center spread images for a magazine (Not that I have magazines begging me for images every day).

But of late, though I am still content with my camera, I am beginning to think of an upgrade. The reasons are many, the most important being, if the cameras you now get in the market do a better job, why not go for them?

My thoughts for a new camera was first triggered when I saw a stock agency expecting images to be shot from at least a 11mp camera. It simply ruled out my chances of applying with them. And then there are a few things that I can't do today, that I can do by buying a new camera. A 14 to 15mp sensor would allow me to do some cropping and still get reasonably good sized images. The next thing to look forward to is noise levels in higher ISO. The EOS 350D is not much of use at ISO above 400, but I am told that today's cameras can do a good job even at ISO above 1000. It would be of great use to shoot in low light and indoors.

An additional fillip to upgrade was given by a technician who saw me mount my 100-400L over 350D and simply said - 'it is a cheap camera'!

I don't have money for an upgrade at the moment. And even when I do have extra money, I would not feel too nice to be investing it on a camera than a lens. But I think this is one upgrade I should consider.

For what I can afford in near future, I can only look up to buying a 50D. I wish I can wait longer and hope to buy a camera with a full frame sensor. But it would take really long time to gather $2500, cost of a EOS 5D Mark II.