baywolfe3 on eBay

15 Jun, 2010

SX1 Great once you tame it

Fantastic features with horrible image quality, initially. Put a filter on it and stop it down 1 - 1 1/3 EV and most of the blown highlights disappears. A 52mm filter will "snap in" to the front of the SX1 lens or get a 58mm adapter that fits the flower hood ring. Using the fastest shutter speed possible helps with sharpness tremendously. Same goes for the flash, turn it down and pictures are great, otherwise it blows out highlights bad. My favorite camera as far as size, style, and features. Hopefully the next model will improve the IQ. Still, wouldn't trade it for any other brand and carry it more than my Canon DSLR. One lens does it all, and pretty fast at that. Do not buy if image quality is primary to you. The images are grainy when blown up full screen, some noise is inevitable beyond 100 ISO. For me, catching the moment and zoom are slightly higher on the list and this camera excels at both. As fast as my Canon Rebel with up to 4 frames per second as long as your finger will hold the button. Great Full HD video in .mov format (Quicktime).

2 of 2 found this helpful

04 Jul, 2008

Rebel XT is awesome. Fast, fast, fast!

This is my first DSLR after many great super-zooms failed to focus on birds in flight. Now I can not only quickly switch to manual focus if needed, I can take continuous pictures as fast as 5 frames per second. Even with flash this camera is super fast, taking less than 1 second between shots. I have taken 10 flash pictures in a row of the grandkids playing and it never slowed down. The shorter the lens the faster the focus, but with the AF/MF switch it does great with a 300mm lens at catching birds in flight even when autofocus can't lock. I prefer manual focus on birds since it will snap the shot no matter what, when set to MF. In autofocus at 300mm it may not find enough light unless you have a $1,000+ lens. Great lenses are very pricey for Canons but there are some good sharp ones from the EOS film series cameras that can be gotten cheap with the film camera nobody wants. Look for auctions with extra lenses as the kit lenses are usually very low quality for Canon. You can find a 35mm Rebel film camera with 3 lenses for under $100 and chances are one of those lenses is worth more than the whole lot will cost you. There are also some great deals on medium and high end lenses if you do a lot of deep searching for poorly worded listings. I won a 28-135mm IS USM for $53 that is $350-500 new. You have to look hard though because Canon is one of the most popular auctions on eBay and there are a lot of bids on a good lens. Well worth the hunt for a good deal on a great lens. Maybe someday I'll find a good L series for under $500, but in the meantime I am very happy with the XT and using my Canon 75-300, 28-135 IS, and even the EF-S 18-55 USM kit lens which is very fast and sharp for close range work. Stick to Canon lenses if you can, as even there worst ones are generally better than the 3rd party lenses. There are exceptions but do your research before investing in any lenses. There are lots of good sites that rank Canon lenses by sharpness and speed, read them before you waste your money on fancy sounding specs. The sharpest lenses are the "primes" but some of the zooms are very good and a lot more useful. I also have the 2x converter which is good but does degrade the image some and makes autofocus almost impossible in low light. Still for some shots you need the reach, like my Oly SP550 with 18x optical and 100x digital zoom, now that is reach. Too bad it can't even come close to the Canon in speed and quality. If only Canon would make a CMOS super-zoom! The S5 just doesn't have the speed or sharpness of the EOS, not to mention quality. I love my XT!

5 of 5 found this helpful

04 Jul, 2008

Rebel XT is awesome. Fast, fast, fast!

This is my first DSLR after many great super-zooms failed to focus on birds in flight. Now I can not only quickly switch to manual focus if needed, I can take continuous pictures as fast as 5 frames per second. Even with flash this camera is super fast, taking less than 1 second between shots. I have taken 10 flash pictures in a row of the grandkids playing and it never slowed down. The shorter the lens the faster the focus, but with the AF/MF switch it does great with a 300mm lens at catching birds in flight even when autofocus can't lock. I prefer manual focus on birds since it will snap the shot no matter what, when set to MF. In autofocus at 300mm it may not find enough light unless you have a $1,000+ lens. Great lenses are very pricey for Canons but there are some good sharp ones from the EOS film series cameras that can be gotten cheap with the film camera nobody wants. Look for auctions with extra lenses as the kit lenses are usually very low quality for Canon. You can find a 35mm Rebel film camera with 3 lenses for under $100 and chances are one of those lenses is worth more than the whole lot will cost you. There are also some great deals on medium and high end lenses if you do a lot of deep searching for poorly worded listings. I won a 28-135mm IS USM for $53 that is $350-500 new. You have to look hard though because Canon is one of the most popular auctions on eBay and there are a lot of bids on a good lens. Well worth the hunt for a good deal on a great lens. Maybe someday I'll find a good L series for under $500, but in the meantime I am very happy with the XT and using my Canon 75-300, 28-135 IS, and even the EF-S 18-55 USM kit lens which is very fast and sharp for close range work. Stick to Canon lenses if you can, as even there worst ones are generally better than the 3rd party lenses. There are exceptions but do your research before investing in any lenses. There are lots of good sites that rank Canon lenses by sharpness and speed, read them before you waste your money on fancy sounding specs. The sharpest lenses are the "primes" but some of the zooms are very good and a lot more useful. I also have the 2x converter which is good but does degrade the image some and makes autofocus almost impossible in low light. Still for some shots you need the reach, like my Oly SP550 with 18x optical and 100x digital zoom, now that is reach. Too bad it can't even come close to the Canon in speed and quality. If only Canon would make a CMOS super-zoom! The S5 just doesn't have the speed or sharpness of the EOS, not to mention quality. I love my XT!

5 of 5 found this helpful

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