Changing cameras 2009
There's upgrades, and then there's upgrades.
Switching
Cameras are an investment. Not just financial, but in learning how to use the features best to suit your needs. It takes a lot to switch once you have got used to a camera.
For those who do not know, my main camera until now has been a Nikon Coolpix 5700. It's a neat little SLR-like camera, that has served me well since 2004. Or well, to be fair, the first one had a catastrophic failure in 2007 (the CCD became partly detatched at the start of a holiday, and needed a repair). I liked it so much that after the holiday I went to some trouble to find another one, to avoid having to learn a new camera. After the repair I then had two, and they still work well enough.
The 5700s have served me very well until now, and they have put up with some serious beatings. They have been subjected to sub-zero temperatures, been soaked with rain and sea water, pelted with snow and hail, been dropped, and taken caving. Yet they work. One of them has developed a bug in the contrast button that can make it think the button is pressed, and refuse to take a picture. The other has some dirt on the lens that can't be manually cleaned, and the lens occasionally gets jammed. Neither can automatically open its flashgun any more. But they work.
The Nikons have taken some stupendous pictures. They can do wonders with landscapes, sunsets and storms, and I am really happy with so many of the pictures they have taken. My galleries are a testament to them. The exposure-lock feature alone deserves much credit for that. They cope with long trips, taking around one battery every one or two days, though I could do with more.
The trouble is, the Nikons have let me down. They fail miserably to cope with low light. The ISO setting cannot cope with more than 200 - any higher and the CCD digital noise becomes unbearable. There is no anti-shake, making it impossible to take long exposures without a tripod. Long exposures (anything more than a couple of seconds) produces bright speckles of digital noise somewhat akin to a multi-coloured starfield. This is the camera that tries to fire the flashgun at a mountain at sunset, or on a cloudy day.
The zoom is high, but not high enough (only 8 times), and without anti-shake, full zoom typically is unusable anyway. Cropping out the distant subject of a photo often ends up with a blurred picture. The maximum resolution of 5Mpx is not great for this sort of use, even with steady shots. The zoom lens is annoyingly slow to operate, taking around 3 seconds to change from minimum to maximum.
Then there is the response time. At its fastest, the 5700 takes 10 seconds to start and take a simple picture. (In low-but-not-freezing temperatures, it can take an extra 10 seconds, while showing a blank screen for no apparent reason.) It takes forever to focus on a non-static or distant target, and for fast moving objects or in low light, it will give up focusing after several seconds of focus-cycle lock-up. After taking one picture, it takes a good 3-4 seconds before the next one can be taken, or closer to 10 seconds when using the flash. Wildlife pictures are just so hard with this camera, and taking pictures of birds is virtually impossible, especially without anti-shake.
So the time has come for a new camera, and this time it's going to be a proper SLR. I have tried plenty of other normal cameras; Praktica and Pentax film cameras, Olympus compact film camera, Kodak DC280, Kodak DC3400, Fuji FinePix A360 compact, Fuji FinePix S6500fd with its stupid oil-painting anti-shake, Konica Minolta DiMAGE A2, and loads of others in the way-back-when. The market is saturated with cameras, and there are plenty that would fit the bill. I could stay with what I know and get a more advanced Nikon. However, its very important to get a camera that really does fit the requirements, and without actually testing one in the conditions, it's just not possible to know if it really will cope.
Fortunately, I know people with cameras, and 4 of them have used the Canon EOS 40D in the exact conditions I will need a camera to work in. And it works very well. In fact, it does exactly what I need from a camera (it even allows pictures to be taken in SLR-like mode, for those sunset shots where it's important to see what the camera will see), and copes with all the situations that the Nikon fails with. I'm not saying it's perfect, and there are better cameras, but for the cost, it does what I need, and for now at least, I do not want a camera that takes higher resolution, or has a higher LCD DPI - I'm not taking poster pictures, and I want my batteries to last. It's widescreen format instead of regular screen format, which means I will have to work out what parts to cut off for wallpaper use, but I will overlook that.
Cameras
New and old. Canon 40D with standard EF-S 17-85mm f/4-5.6 Image Stabilised USM lens, and EF 70-300mm f/4-5.6 Image Stabilised USM lens, and the Nikon Coolpix 5700. The larger lens hood on the new camera is almost as big as the entire 5700. The 40D has a 1:1.6 crop factor, meaning that a 30mm lens has about the same perspective as the 'standard' 50mm lens with a standard 35mm film camera. 17mm therefore gives 0.57 times zoom (wide angle), and 300mm gives 10 times zoom.
An 8 second exposure on ISO 800, taken with the Nikon Coolpix 5700, showing the noise. And this is ignoring the horribly grainy picture it would take even if this starfield noise is ignored.
A 30 second exposure on ISO 1600, taken with the Canon 40D, showing the almost complete lack of noise. And this is without enabling the noise-reduction filter or the dust-deletion filter (and ignoring the self-cleaning CCD, which will not be having any effect here).
A 1/60s exposure taken on ISO 800, taken with the Nikon Coolpix 5700, showing how grainy it makes the picture. It should not actually be so light, but the camera has invented a grey sheen of noise over the picture. Image is cropped to keep the original detail from the fullsized picture.
The same picture, taken with the Canon 40D on ISO 1600, 1/60s. The colour is more accurate, and there is some noise, but clearly nothing like the Nikon. The texture of the subject is clearly visible, where the Nikon almost obliterated it.
In lower light, the Nikon Coolpix 5700 fares very poorly indeed. Firstly, it failed to focus. After being forced to focus, it took a hideous picture with stripy grey mush all over it. Utterly useless.
The Canon 40D, however, shows a small amount of noise, but it's still a fairly good representation of the actual picture I was forcing it to take, and the detail is still visible. A little dark, but that's to be expected for such a short exposure (at least with anti-shake, I could take a longer exposure without worry).
Taken at maximum resolution and maximum zoom over 900 metres without a tripod, a cropped image clearly shows the zooming limitations of the Nikon Coolpix 5700. I took several pictures on the 'fine' and 'hi' settings (the former taking an extra 2 seconds to save compared with the 'normal' setting, and the latter taking a painful extra 14 seconds and 14 MB). The best picture was then selected, which happened to come from the 'fine' setting. This also makes it a fair comparison with the Canon's 'fine' setting, as the 'hi' setting does not use JPEG compression.
The Canon 40D, with the EF 70-300mm f/4-5.6 IS USM lens, takes a far more clear picture. The anti-shake does an excellent job. The larger image size (maximum, 'fine') allows more of the photo to be cropped. The zoom is far higher than that of the Nikon (I suspect the Nikon's 8 times zoom means 8 times larger than wide-angle, not 8 times larger than 'normal'). And finally, the burst shooting allows as many as 6 shots per second, which provides steady shooting for several pictures, in order to select the best one.
The bag
A good camera bag is almost as important as the camera itself. My needs are demanding; I've tried all the different approaches for camera bags, and have a very strict set of needs that the bag must serve. As well as serving as a normal bag, it must be usable for long-distance hikes. This means it needs to work with a 30kg backpack. It must be able to stay on when putting on or taking off the pack. It must not obstruct my legs so I can step up or down without issues. It must not put undue stress on the shoulders. Even the small 5700 bag caused problems because it got in the way.
The bag needs enough space to hold the camera, spare lens, enough spare batteries and memory cards for two weeks, and tissues to clean the lens. It needs to provide easy access to the camera. It needs to be rainproof, snowproof, and probably iceproof too.
Almost everyone and everything suggests a belt pack. But they are utterly useless in combination with a backpack, which has its own wide belt. It also gets in the way of the legs while walking. Mounting the bag on the backpack belt is useless as it not only gets in the way, but also cannot be kept in place when the bag is removed. A camera backpack fails completely due to awkward access, and physical impossibility when wearing a 30kg backpack. Some suggest the Lowepro Slingshot bags, which can be worn on the front, but they are so bulky that they block the view of your feet, and make walking downhill quite dangerous.
Lowepro also do a harness for hiking or biking, that allows the camera to be held in front of the chest or belly - the perfect place - while keeping the rest of the body free for a backpack. The harness works with most of their top-loader bags, which are nicely low-profile, and do not obscure vision. There is no way to mount the spare lens inside the bag, though Lowepro do several lens cases. However, they also do not see the need to provide a rainproof cover with a hiking harness. I guess they don't think people will hike in the rain - how wrong they are.
Think Tank Photo make similar bags and a similar harness, but they see the need for a rainproof cover, so given the choice, Think Tank win, with the Digital Holster 20, and Digital Holster Harness. A lens case from Lowepro (2S) can also fit under the same cover. However, none of the top-loader bags provide any useful way to attach the lens case to them. This short gallery shows what I put together in order to get around this problem, in the hopes that you can do the same if you want to. Be warned that mounting the lens case in this way does make the weight distribution a little lop-sided when the camera is not in its bag, but the harness should take care of most of that, and it's still better than any of the other solutions I have seen so far.
To start with, I tried just strapping the lens case to the camera holster, but that ended up crushing the camera holster, and made it collapse when empty. So, time to invalidate some warranties...
The load-bearing adaptor, made from flexible-but-tough plastic (a paint roller tray, as it happens). This is custom cut to be exactly the right size, and with the holes in exactly the right places. The two chain links are actually tiny maillon rapides intended for replacing broken chain links.
The adaptor mounted on the belt-strap of the lens case. The edges of the slot in the adaptor were melted for a moment with a naked flame to smooth the edges, and prevent damage to the lens case.
The maillons attach to the harness/strap loop on the camera holster, giving load bearing support for the lens. The cut-out in the adaptor prevents damage to the strap on the camera holster. At this stage, the whole setup is very wobbly, and the lens moves about far too much. So it needs something to keep it in place.
A loop of thin webbing strap is carefully sewn only to the outer material (not the padding underneath it) under the belt-strap/flap-thing. A metal keyring then connects that to the carrying loop on the top of the lens-case. The webbing loop must be perfectly positioned to make sure it holds the lens-case in exactly the right place, with the load still taken by the adaptor, not by this new strap. The keyring helps it keep a low profile, so that it does not bulge the back, and make it uncomfortable to wear.
A similar loop is sewn to the front (curved to avoid the all-impotant logo, right?), again keeping the tension exactly right. When working out where to put this, make sure there is a camera inside the bag so it holds the correct shape. To sew it on, use very strong button-thread, and a curved needle held with a pair of pliers. Take your time to make it strong and avoid damaging the padding layer.
To keep the bottom of the lens-case snug against the bottom of the camera holster (not essential), a short piece of double-sided velcro - two 'sides' of velcro sewn back-to-back - is sandwiched between the velcro pads of the belt-strap of the lens case. The end of it protrudes out of the left side.
The other end is sandwiched between the velcro pads of the belt-strap on the side of the camera holster. Once it is in place on both lens case and camera holster, the retrofit is complete.
When attached to the harness, it certainly feels a little heavy on the lens side, but not enough to rotate it too much. The lens does not stick out enough to get in the way when using poles. Thankfully.
The harness is very simple, little more than a pair of shoulder straps. This allows a little too much motion on the back, and would probably benefit from something to hold the two straps together at the back, just to reduce movement when used without a backpack. (Oh, and the T-shirt says "I open the Web - www.opera.com".)
Once a backpack is in place, virtually all movement stops. Ok, so I also look like I must be into BDSM, but that doesn't matter, since it's all for a good purpose, including the BDSM ... right?
Repairs
Cameras get used, and they get abused, and they do develop faults. When they do, they need to be repaired. With the Nikon Coolpix 5700, it's quite simple; something breaks or gets dirty (except the external lens or eyepiece), send it in for repairs. With the Canon 40D, it depends on what gets dirty, and what gets damaged. Since the lens is not part of the camera, it can be cleaned or repaired separately. A UV filter is always a good idea to protect the expensive glass of the lens.
The camera body, however, has no way to protect its parts when it's open, and changing lenses always has the risk of introducing moisture or dust, and needs to be done carefully. If this lands on the reflex mirror, it can be cleaned. If it lands on the CCD, it can be cleaned with care (it can also be sent in for cleaning). But there are other parts where dust can get that you cannot clean without invalidating the warranty.
Over time, the Nikon Coolpix 5700 cameras developed faults, the first camera more than the second. The first fault related to getting the camera wet, causing the contrast button to play up. The second was a major fault...
A problem with the CCD on the Nikon Coolpix 5700 caused it to mess up all pictures. The camera was long past its warranty, but we sent it in for repair of both problems (after obtaining a replacement), ready to pay the costs.
For the fault on the Canon 40D, this diagram will help to explain. Part 1 is the lens, 2 is the reflex mirror, 5 and 6 are the focusing screen and condenser lens (it seems the 40D uses a single combined unit instead of two separate ones, and I will refer to it only as the focusing screen from here onwards) and 7 is the pentaprism. [Image is a reduced colour PNG taken from the original (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:SLR_cross_section.svg by Colin M.L. Burnett), and is released under GNU FDL 1.20 or higher.]
A little while after the Pembrokeshire 2009 trip, some brown oily liquid appeared in the corner of the focusing screen. I had not oiled the camera, or in fact exposed it to any significant moisture, so I am at a loss to say where it came from, but assume it is some lubricant used inside the reflex mechanism. I tried to clean the oil with a lens cloth, and succeeded only in smearing it over the screen, giving this horrible damaged appearance.
This also introduced a lot of dust which I tried to remove with a blower - major mistake. The dust was blown into the gap between the focusing screen and pentaprism, and could not be removed (blowing there only wedges more dust in even further). Some dust also ended up on the CCD. The camera shop said that replacement focusing screens are available, but (incorrectly) that fitting them requires dismantling part of the camera and will void the warranty. So it was sent off to the Canon Elstree servicing centre for the focusing screen to be cleaned, and the dust removed.
Results:
The Nikon was returned within a couple of weeks, with the CCD fixed. When asked how much was owed, Nikon replied that it was a known common fault, and fixed for free, even though the camera was not covered by any warranty. Can't fault that. However, they failed to fix the electrical fault with the contrast button.
The Canon was returned after 1.5 weeks, with the focusing screen replaced with a new one, and most of the dust removed (a couple of tiny pieces remain, but nothing compared with what was there before). Cleaning and damage arising from abnormal use are not covered by warranty, but both the screen replacement and cleaning were done free of charge, and shipping costs were also covered. Presumably the initial appearance of the oil was taken as being a fault in the camera, and the rest was dealt with as a result of that initial fault. The CCD was also cleaned, even though I never asked them to do that. Amazing! Of course, I have yet to see how they would handle an electrical fault, but I hope I never have to find out.
It is worth remembering for future reference, that the focusing screen can be easily replaced by the user (Canon even have a simple video tutorial on their site). However, cleaning it is often impossible. Once dirtied by any liquid, it simply has to be replaced, because any attempt to clean it will damage the textured surface. Dust can in theory be removed once the casing is open, but I have not tested that theory. If dirt appears on either side of the focusing screen, do not attempt to clean it with the focusing screen in place, as you will simply trap even more dirt above it. You will need the tool that comes with the new focusing screen to open the casing.
New and old. Canon 40D with standard EF-S 17-85mm f/4-5.6 Image Stabilised USM lens, and EF 70-300mm f/4-5.6 Image Stabilised USM lens, and the Nikon Coolpix 5700. The larger lens hood on the new camera is almost as big as the entire 5700. The 40D has a 1:1.6 crop factor, meaning that a 30mm lens has about the same perspective as the 'standard' 50mm lens with a standard 35mm film camera. 17mm therefore gives 0.57 times zoom (wide angle), and 300mm gives 10 times zoom.
An 8 second exposure on ISO 800, taken with the Nikon Coolpix 5700, showing the noise. And this is ignoring the horribly grainy picture it would take even if this starfield noise is ignored.
A 30 second exposure on ISO 1600, taken with the Canon 40D, showing the almost complete lack of noise. And this is without enabling the noise-reduction filter or the dust-deletion filter (and ignoring the self-cleaning CCD, which will not be having any effect here).
A 1/60s exposure taken on ISO 800, taken with the Nikon Coolpix 5700, showing how grainy it makes the picture. It should not actually be so light, but the camera has invented a grey sheen of noise over the picture. Image is cropped to keep the original detail from the fullsized picture.
The same picture, taken with the Canon 40D on ISO 1600, 1/60s. The colour is more accurate, and there is some noise, but clearly nothing like the Nikon. The texture of the subject is clearly visible, where the Nikon almost obliterated it.
In lower light, the Nikon Coolpix 5700 fares very poorly indeed. Firstly, it failed to focus. After being forced to focus, it took a hideous picture with stripy grey mush all over it. Utterly useless.
The Canon 40D, however, shows a small amount of noise, but it's still a fairly good representation of the actual picture I was forcing it to take, and the detail is still visible. A little dark, but that's to be expected for such a short exposure (at least with anti-shake, I could take a longer exposure without worry).
Taken at maximum resolution and maximum zoom over 900 metres without a tripod, a cropped image clearly shows the zooming limitations of the Nikon Coolpix 5700. I took several pictures on the 'fine' and 'hi' settings (the former taking an extra 2 seconds to save compared with the 'normal' setting, and the latter taking a painful extra 14 seconds and 14 MB). The best picture was then selected, which happened to come from the 'fine' setting. This also makes it a fair comparison with the Canon's 'fine' setting, as the 'hi' setting does not use JPEG compression.
The Canon 40D, with the EF 70-300mm f/4-5.6 IS USM lens, takes a far more clear picture. The anti-shake does an excellent job. The larger image size (maximum, 'fine') allows more of the photo to be cropped. The zoom is far higher than that of the Nikon (I suspect the Nikon's 8 times zoom means 8 times larger than wide-angle, not 8 times larger than 'normal'). And finally, the burst shooting allows as many as 6 shots per second, which provides steady shooting for several pictures, in order to select the best one.
The load-bearing adaptor, made from flexible-but-tough plastic (a paint roller tray, as it happens). This is custom cut to be exactly the right size, and with the holes in exactly the right places. The two chain links are actually tiny maillon rapides intended for replacing broken chain links.
The adaptor mounted on the belt-strap of the lens case. The edges of the slot in the adaptor were melted for a moment with a naked flame to smooth the edges, and prevent damage to the lens case.
The maillons attach to the harness/strap loop on the camera holster, giving load bearing support for the lens. The cut-out in the adaptor prevents damage to the strap on the camera holster. At this stage, the whole setup is very wobbly, and the lens moves about far too much. So it needs something to keep it in place.
A loop of thin webbing strap is carefully sewn only to the outer material (not the padding underneath it) under the belt-strap/flap-thing. A metal keyring then connects that to the carrying loop on the top of the lens-case. The webbing loop must be perfectly positioned to make sure it holds the lens-case in exactly the right place, with the load still taken by the adaptor, not by this new strap. The keyring helps it keep a low profile, so that it does not bulge the back, and make it uncomfortable to wear.
A similar loop is sewn to the front (curved to avoid the all-impotant logo, right?), again keeping the tension exactly right. When working out where to put this, make sure there is a camera inside the bag so it holds the correct shape. To sew it on, use very strong button-thread, and a curved needle held with a pair of pliers. Take your time to make it strong and avoid damaging the padding layer.
To keep the bottom of the lens-case snug against the bottom of the camera holster (not essential), a short piece of double-sided velcro - two 'sides' of velcro sewn back-to-back - is sandwiched between the velcro pads of the belt-strap of the lens case. The end of it protrudes out of the left side.
The other end is sandwiched between the velcro pads of the belt-strap on the side of the camera holster. Once it is in place on both lens case and camera holster, the retrofit is complete.
When attached to the harness, it certainly feels a little heavy on the lens side, but not enough to rotate it too much. The lens does not stick out enough to get in the way when using poles. Thankfully.
The harness is very simple, little more than a pair of shoulder straps. This allows a little too much motion on the back, and would probably benefit from something to hold the two straps together at the back, just to reduce movement when used without a backpack. (Oh, and the T-shirt says "I open the Web - www.opera.com".)
Once a backpack is in place, virtually all movement stops. Ok, so I also look like I must be into BDSM, but that doesn't matter, since it's all for a good purpose, including the BDSM ... right?
A problem with the CCD on the Nikon Coolpix 5700 caused it to mess up all pictures. The camera was long past its warranty, but we sent it in for repair of both problems (after obtaining a replacement), ready to pay the costs.
For the fault on the Canon 40D, this diagram will help to explain. Part 1 is the lens, 2 is the reflex mirror, 5 and 6 are the focusing screen and condenser lens (it seems the 40D uses a single combined unit instead of two separate ones, and I will refer to it only as the focusing screen from here onwards) and 7 is the pentaprism. [Image is a reduced colour PNG taken from the original (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:SLR_cross_section.svg by Colin M.L. Burnett), and is released under GNU FDL 1.20 or higher.]
A little while after the Pembrokeshire 2009 trip, some brown oily liquid appeared in the corner of the focusing screen. I had not oiled the camera, or in fact exposed it to any significant moisture, so I am at a loss to say where it came from, but assume it is some lubricant used inside the reflex mechanism. I tried to clean the oil with a lens cloth, and succeeded only in smearing it over the screen, giving this horrible damaged appearance.
This also introduced a lot of dust which I tried to remove with a blower - major mistake. The dust was blown into the gap between the focusing screen and pentaprism, and could not be removed (blowing there only wedges more dust in even further). Some dust also ended up on the CCD. The camera shop said that replacement focusing screens are available, but (incorrectly) that fitting them requires dismantling part of the camera and will void the warranty. So it was sent off to the Canon Elstree servicing centre for the focusing screen to be cleaned, and the dust removed.