I'm about to spend about £500, maybe a bit more, on a camera body. I will be using it for bird, feathered, photography with a decent 400mm telephoto lens. Am I better offf buying a say used EOS 1d Mk2 with 8mp or a new say EOS 500D with 12mp or even a 550D with 18mp? Has anyone compared old and new? My main criteria is image quality.
Old vs New
- Thread starter joroma
- Start date
Caporegime
I don't know the tech specs of the mk2, but I know that the one serious is a professional body. I do not know how much you do/don't know about photography. But if you are considering the 550D I'm going to guess to say you are a novice.
In this case, I'd go for the 550D as the mk2 would be a waste, its a professional body which takes a decent bit of knowledge to use it properly.
In this case, I'd go for the 550D as the mk2 would be a waste, its a professional body which takes a decent bit of knowledge to use it properly.
Caporegime
Sarcasm?
Not at all.
I have a 1DIII and it is easy and straightforward to use with all the pro advantages.
I had a friend's 1DII for a while and found it confusing to use. It always seemed to need more button presses than I considered reasonable.
Andrew
(in fact, the cameras in question were both the full frame 1Ds version but that's hardly relevant)
I'm a fairly knowlegeable photographer getting back into it after a "children" break. I used to have an Asahi Pentax Spotmatic F and do my own processing back in the 35mm days. My purpose in posting was to tap into the considerable objective technical knowledge available on this forum re old versus new for the same sort of money. I am happy to make the final decision on what I buy but wanted to avoid buying something now and feeling the need to upgrade in six months time. So if anybody can comment on the image quality angle I would be pleased to read their views.
He means you need three hands to opperate the camera. 
[Thats no sarcasm/joke. I think they actually designed it with three-handed-people in mind)
If you know you way around a camera then it'll still whoop the other two cameras in terms of general performance for bird photography. The AF on it should hit 18/19 of 20 shots of BIF in focus.
But it's lower megapixels (no problems IMO - get it right in camera & I have 30in prints done fine with high quality lenses). ISO -it's good - so long as you NAIL the exposure. Otherwise it gets noisy.
Good camera - once you know what your doing.
Also £500!!! More like £700!!
I'll post a 1600 shot & a 500% crop [blown up to 8000x5500] in a sec...
EDIT: 500%
[Thats no sarcasm/joke. I think they actually designed it with three-handed-people in mind)If you know you way around a camera then it'll still whoop the other two cameras in terms of general performance for bird photography. The AF on it should hit 18/19 of 20 shots of BIF in focus.
But it's lower megapixels (no problems IMO - get it right in camera & I have 30in prints done fine with high quality lenses). ISO -it's good - so long as you NAIL the exposure. Otherwise it gets noisy.
Good camera - once you know what your doing.
Also £500!!! More like £700!!
I'll post a 1600 shot & a 500% crop [blown up to 8000x5500] in a sec...
EDIT: 500%
Last edited:
Caporegime
