Does anyone have this camera, who’d be willing to share some impressions? I am curious in particular about battery life (time between charges), sturdiness of the plastic body, and whether you unlocked some of the crippled features with that hack I heard about somewhere.
Thanks!
Just a couple of days ago I advised my younger son to go for either then Nikon D70 or the new Canon EOS 20D (a good bit more expensive) over the Digital Rebel.
Here are some excellent reviews of the three cameras:
[u]Canon Digital Rebel (EOS 300D)[/u]
In particular, here are excerpts from the D70 and D20 reviews:
From the D70 review
Shortly after Canon announced the EOS 300D (Digital Rebel) and it made its way into reviewers hands it was fairly clear that Canon were offering a formidable package at an excellent price which would be the mark for affordable digital SLR’s of the future, with image quality almost identical to the EOS 10D and a sub-$1000 price it caused a significant ripple in the market. Now however it’s clear that Nikon were well aware of this and had the D70 up their sleeve, a camera which is a significant step ahead of the EOS 300D in terms of build quality and feature set and a match, and in some instances better from an image quality point of view.
…in many instances the D70 delivering more detail than our previous benchmark, the EOS 300D / EOS 10D CMOS sensor.
From the D20 review:
As soon as we got our hands on the Nikon D70 it became fairly clear that it was a camera which although priced nearer to the EOS 300D (Digital Rebel) could compete with the more expensive EOS 10D. Canon knew this and obviously also knew that they would have to raise the bar still higher to stay ahead. They should then be fairly proud that with the EOS 20D they have certainly done that.
The other place to go for details about the 300D is [u]the DPReview EOS 300D Forum[/u].
I’ve been a professional photographer for over 30 years (now a graphic designer by profession), have had a 300D for about a year and can honestly say that overall, it’s an excellent camera. I prefer Canon’s CMOS sensor over CCD because of the lower noise and superb color/detail production. To me, images just seem to look cleaner with the CMOS. It’s a personal thing. High ISO quality is impressive due to the CMOS’s low noise. Like all digital cameras, the 300D has its quirks, but overall, it’s been reliable, solid, and produces beautiful images. But it’s not what I’d consider a point-and-shoot, and usually requires some image editing in a program like Photoshop. The important thing is all the information is recorded…from highlights to shadow detail, and the 300D’s CMOS does a vey good job, providing good images to work with.
My 300D gets a lot of use, and I’ve had no durability issues or problems of any kind. The plastic body is solid and well designed. My only complaint about the body is the silver color. But then, the color of a camera isn’t what takes the photos. Battery life is insane! I have the battery grip that holds two batteries, and get at least 500 shots on the average. It’s amazing. With my old Nikon CP950 using NiMH batteries, I could get maybe 50 shots if I didn’t use the flash.
I haven’t messed with any “hacks” because I don’t trust them. My camer’s doing great, and as the old addage goes…if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.
DC