DSLR Reviews

The generation of Canon EOS digital SLRs beginning with the 10D have been evolutionary, with each camera adding resolution and new features. The 60D continues in that vein but also takes a slightly different tack, adding some features from Canon’s own PowerShot series, bringing in functionality like a 3” flip-out LCD screen, and adding some creative effects that show how software is becoming an increasingly important part of any hardware offering. Each of these creative filters, including Soft Focus, Grainy Black and White, Toy Camera, and Miniature Effect, can be applied to a captured image creating a second “filtered” version, leaving the original file unaffected.

The annual meeting of the Technical Image Press Association (TIPA) to vote for the best photographic and imaging products in 2011 was held on April 9, 2011 in Istanbul, Turkey. This year at the TIPA General Assembly 29 member magazines voted for the best product in each category. TIPA has member magazines from nine European countries and Australia, Canada, China, the U.S.A., and South Africa, plus has an affiliation with the CJPC of Japan. The General Assembly selected the best photo and imaging products of 2011 in 40 categories. In the past 21 years the association has given over 430 awards for products from over 70 companies from 15 countries. Shutterbug, the sole US magazine in the association, was represented at the meetings by Editorial Director George Schaub.

Feeling very much in hand like a pro camera, with magnesium alloy top and rear body construction, the Nikon D7000 (list: $1199, body only) has all the bells and whistles of a modern D-SLR, including a high megapixel count CMOS sensor, a new image processor to handle all the data it can capture, including 14-bit NEF, a high ISO 6400 “normal” (expandable two stops), and the currently requisite 1080p HD movie capability. This DX (APS-C) format camera also features dual SD card slots, with spillover or format sort capability, a nice and speedy 6 frames-per-second (fps) shooting capability for up to a 100 frame burst (JPEG), and full-time AF with video and Live View. The monitor is bright and highly readable in just about every lighting condition. Unfortunately, it is fixed and does not articulate, but the penta-prism finder makes one pray that Nikon will never go EVF (electronic viewfinder), yielding 100 percent coverage and being a pleasure to view through, especially after suffering some recent EVF obscuring experiences.

When it was launched in October 2007, the E-3 broke new ground. It wasn’t a me-too SLR; it carried the Four Thirds format into new directions that were uniquely Olympus.

If you look at Canon’s website you’ll notice that the 18-megapixel EOS Rebel T2i sits between the EOS 50D and the price-point EOS Rebel XS, the latter being a camera I tried and disliked intensely.

“Of all of our inventions for mass communication, pictures still speak the most universally understood language.”—Walt Disney

It’s a photokina year and you know what that means; all of the camera manufacturers will be holding off their newest SLRs for launch at the big show in Germany this fall. While Canon was not at PMA, they officially launched the EOS-1D Mark IV...

If you want to test the mettle of a camera intended to satisfy a craven need for speed, take that camera to a hockey game, one of the world’s fastest sports. That’s one of the tests to which I put the Nikon D3S, a brute of a camera that seems to adapt to any shooting or lighting conditions with ease. The D3S is the latest in Nikon’s pro line of D-SLRs, priced for pros (list:...