Another new amateur DSLR

The new entry-level Canon.
One of the readers comments: "This camera has better features then my 1Ds, that cost $8,000." The 1Ds was the first really usable full-frame DSLR, and was released in early 2003. So five years later you can get similar features for one tenth the price. Remarkable.
What I like is that it, like the similar Nikon D40, is compact and light. I only wish it was not only entry-level cameras which were so.

The new 18-55mm kit lens with image stabilization is also getting remarkable reviews. Some say the sharpness (though clearly not the build quality) is similar to some Canon professional line "L" lenses, which is hard to credit, because you pay well for L lenses, both in money and in bulk/weight.
It's early to judge it, but it seems the companion lens may be a similar phenomenon. Meaning sharpness well beyond what you'd expect for the weight and the price.

This means that if you compare this camera and lens to my Canon 5D with the bulky 24-105mm L IS lens, you should get a slightly shorter zoom range, but virtually identical image quality, and at almost half the size, half the weight and half the price. For somebody like me, who value both portability and sharpness highly, this is rather amazing.

Here's a new article from somebody (Nick Devlin) who also like compact travel cameras.
He has the same experience I've had many times... you didn't intend to do "serious" photography, but you brought a pocket camera, and some pictures happened, and some of them were winners. Winners which did not happen with the Big Camera simply because you could not bear to carry that thing around that day.

How about that carp photo? Jim points out the similarity to one of Escher's masterpieces:


This is funny (from the above mentioned article):
"Despite the fact that I never grew to like composing on the LCD, I got excellent results working this way – at least as good as anything I’ve achieve working in my preferred mode. This continues to trouble me. I haven’t the slightest desire to compose my images on a TV screen. In fact, I actively dislike the process at both a practical and conceptual level. The idea of interacting with the world before my eyes through the mediating forces of a machine which disaggregates reality into a sterile digital code and reconstitutes a small and inferior electronic simulacrum of it inches from my face is distasteful to me. Yet, it worked with my way of seeing exceptionally well."

Hehe. Cutting off your nose...
I have found much the same thing. (Though I don't protest as much.) I think the good results may stem from the simple fact that when using an LCD screen one is looking at a picture while making a picture. It makes for a easier mental translation than when looking through a hole at "reality". One tends to see the composition as a whole, including the frame, instead of looking at the central element mainly.

Maybe this also means the rangefinder style of working is not for me. Saves me five grand right there. :)
I think reality is overrated when the end result is a picture.

Mr. Devlin also writes:
"To be blunt, I can’t see the point of non image stabilized cameras anymore. This tool is just too powerful to ignore."

Too true. Any camera these days which does not have full image stabilization has a very serious disadvantage. Which is a pity for a company like Leica which probably considers such a capability only relevant for amateur snap shooters, not for serious camera users. (Remember they only got auto-exposure decades after the others did.) Not to mention they probably don't have the financing to buy or develop the technology.