Winsor Crosby wrote:
><snip>
>The E-300 provides a pop up flash and fortunately for the Oly camera
>bottom line that model seems to be doing well in the market place.
>
>If you had bought a pro level Canon or Nikon you would also be buying
>a flash. :-)
>
>
I like to think I'm at least occasionally smart enough to not base my
equipment choices on labels or prestige factors.
Almost 10 years ago, I looked at virtually every non-sports/two seater
convertible available in the US. All had various good and bad points.
Simple example, a Mercedes I looked at was just gorgeous, but had a very
narrow back seat and almost no trunk. I ended up buying an Oldsmobile
and still think it was without question the best choice of features and
function for me. That it was also cheaper than pretty much any of the
others didn't hurt. Still running great and I still really like it.
Needs a new top soon, but they all would by now.
Same thing with camera equipment. All "pro" means to me is either that
it is marketing hype or that the gear is made to meet the needs of
people who use them to make money. In the case of photography, "pro"
covers a lot of different uses, most of them not much like my use. The
results of designing for pros are, in fact, sometimes the opposite of
what I want.
A simple example is the Can*n "L" series lenses. They are more solidly
made, better sealed, etc., to stand up to heavy, sometimes rough use and
to inimical environments. That also means they are larger, heavier and
more expensive than the more pedestrian lenses. It does not, however,
mean they are optically superior to their own non-L lenses or third
party lenses. In fast, much to much perusing of forums and tests leads
me to conclude that, particularly in the wide angles, the L lenses are
often no better than and sometimes worse, than the alternatives from a
strictly optical performance perspective. They seem to do better with
longer lenses in the L line. But even there...
The August Pop Photo tests their new 28-300/3.5-5.6L IS USM lens. The
title of the test is "Like A Rock" and the first part of the text
focuses things like "Pro-level, ultrasturdy metal barrel construction
with Can*n cream-white finish." OK, great pro lens, but, It weighs over
4 pounds, is 7.4 in long, 3.6 in in diameter takes 77mm filters and
costs $2100. AND, it is clearly outperformed in their SQF tests at every
fl tested by the Tamron 28-300 XR LD they tested almost 3 years ago.
That Tamron isn't available anymore, having been supplanted by a newer
model that weighs less than 1/4 of the Can*n, is less than 1/2 the
length, 3/4 the diameter, takes 62 mm filters and costs $370, less than
18% of the price of the Can*n.
Now the Can*n has slightly less, but still significant, linear
distortion. And oh yes - it has IS, and I would need that with a lens
weighing over 4 pounds. And as many here have seen, I get nice sharp
shots at 300mm without IS with the Tamron.
I applied the same process to finding a DSLR. I ignored end use
designations made by others and evaluated features and performance
against my own needs. And no, the "pro" C and N models weren't in the
running for several reasons, lack of built-in flash one of them, just as
that was a big factor in rejecting the E-1.
Moose
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