One of the best DSLRs ever !. Review on Nikon D70s

Hi all

First of all please take the following points into notice

1)Getting a DSLR doesnt make you a Jagdish Mali, You need to be a good photographer to get a good picture.

2)If you think that a DSLR always produces a pic better than a compact digital camera, get over it. If you dont know how to use a DSLR, you will produce worse pictures compared to even a cellphones embedded camera !!!

3)If you ever face a problem of selecting a camera from say 2 or 3 which you have narrowed down to, just go for the one from which u manage to get the most "professional" looking pic acording to u with the best effort from your side.

4)If you are new to photography and this is going to be your first camera ever, please reconsider your decision to buy a DSLR streight away.

5)Go for the Cheapest DSLR that just meets your requirements. Save your money for good lenses. You will upgrade to a better body in a few years but lenses carry on for a lifetime. The depreciation on lenses is much much less than those on the body. This helps you combat the greatest problem of all in the digital world "obsolence".

So here goes.

I am an enthusiastic photographer (not profesisonal) and I really get fussy about the perfection in my images. So after feeling hungry for features using compact digital cameras (The ones like Sony CyberShot W50,70,100 , Nikon Coolpix 5200 etc etc) I decided to move on to the DSLR bandwagon

I had shot previously with the Film SLRs like the ZENIT (Russian Make), Canon , Nikon F5 (Awsome cam) and my old faithful Bronica.

My experience with the previous brands of cameras helped me to narrow down my search to the Nikon (D50, D70s and D80) , Canon (EOD 350D, 400D) and Fujifilm (Finepix series).

I took a few shots with almost 3 models from each series and finally narrowed down to the Canon EOS 350D and Nikon D70s.

Why I went for it ? Lets found out.

1)Resolution : 6.1 MPIX. This is good enough for me, I would have liked the EOS 305D's 8 MPIX but it really didnt make that much of a difference to me and neither will it to anoone else I am sure unless he/she really wants to make a huge poster sort of enlargement for a picture.

2)Sensor (CCD in Nikon vs CMOS in Canon). I shoot mostly wildlife/still life and landscape. So I went in for CCD (Nikon). CMOS is great for the ones who like sports and fast action pictures. This is because of an inherent technical ability of CMOS. It is faster than CCD but there is a well accepted fact that CCD does produce a better image in certain circumstances.

3)Lens : Nikon has a large range of lenses which are world renouned. I got the Nikon 18-70 DX GED lens with the Nikon D70s. Although I suggest you buy the body separately and select a lens that best matches your needs. It just so happened that the 18-70 was good for me , so I went for it.

Its a good idea to keep a a medium range zoom lens for everyday and vacation use. I normally take the more expensive and High End lenses on rent.

4)Features (Only those important to me)

a)Shutter speed upto 1/8000 of a sec. Although you may practically never go beyond 1/3000, there are situations where you may need to go for say 1/5000 to 1/6000 in special lighting conditions. This is limited to 1/4000 in both theD50 and D80.

b)Depth of Field preview : Very important for me. Esp when I take closeups of flowers, insects and say other small objects. This feature is absent in the D50. Let me add over here that the D50 is an excellent camera but fell short of this requirement which I really wanted !!

c)The focus lock : This is very important to me for shooting object not in the same focus plane. This feature is absent in the D50.

5)Ease of use : Let me be honest, it needs a slightly geeky temper to handle this baby. Previewing the images after taking them is a bit of a problem, its much easier to navigate in the D50 and D80 but its a bit more flexible (according to me) in the D70s.

Summary : Go for this camera only when u feel hingry for features in compact and other simple digital cams. If you just want to have a DSLR to start with just start off with the D50 or D40. You will be much more happy with the images that come out from them streight out of the box. If you want to play round and adjust / improve the images go for the D70s. The D70s does very little incamera processing compared to the D50. So in many cases the pix streight out of the box MAY be better off from the D50 !!!.As compared to the D80, well the D80 just didnt match my specific needs thats all else the D80 is superior to the D70s in a few ways !!. The Canon EOS 350D is an excellent camera too. But all in one the D70s is what I exactly wanted.

Advantages summary : Easy to Medium usage learning curve.

Great features at a good price

Nice for a step up from SLR to DSLR

Full fledged profession and Automatic (Point n Shoot) at a turn of a dial !!!

Superb battery life

Disadvantages : Not much of in camera processing sopix out of the box may be a little darker and slightly granier (noiser) than the ones like the D50 and the D80

Approx price in india : Rs 45,000 + Vendors Margin - Your What you managed from your Bargaining Skills with Lens (18-70), V Bag and a 1 GB Sandisk Compact Flash Card. I managed to get this and a 70-300 DED Zoom for 50K over all

Enjoy the D70s