But as you said, I'll need something around 1/100 anyway to stop motion.
Now since it's a DSLR, I can go to let's say 800 ISO to compensate the a-bit-slow f/4 and lack of IS and still get much better results than with my P&S at f/2.8, 50 ISO - correct me if I'm wrong as this is also one of the reasons for moving to a DSLR... with my P&S there is never enough light indoor (I prefer no flash at all) and I can't even think about going to ISO higher than 50.
Originally Posted by Oren
That is true. You can increase the ISO to allow for faster shutter speeds but you will find that unless every light in the room is turned on to full-blast that you will require higher ISO just to get up to 1/30, 1/60, etc. The point is that if you only "need" 1/100 (and like I said, many times you can get away with less, it all depends on your subject(s)) to stop action then it's only going to introducemore noise into your shots if you add an additional 1,2,3 stops of ISO in order to properly compensate for camera shake.
I love taking candids with no flash (is there any other way []) but even when I use my 50 f/1.4 in a dimly lit room I still have to increase the ISO to get a workable shutter speed. You can crank up the ISO to be able to shoot candids with the 70-200 f/4 lens but is it advisable, I'd say no.
Daniel could you please fill in what I left out
Oren,
I own the 70-200 f/4 and the 18-55 kit lens (non-IS). You will absolutely love the 70-200 coming from a P&S. It is my main lens, and I mainly take pictures of my kids in the park and of wildlife. So I encourage you to go for it. HOWEVER, as has been mentioned already, this lens is WAY to long to be usable indoors. You can snap the odd portrait, but forget about framing several people or composing a scene.
If you want to take candids indoors, get something with a wider angle, 35mm or less, and a large aperture. I also have the 50 f/1.8 "nifty fifty" for indoor shots when I don't want to use a flash. On a crop body, it is a little long, but it works asa budget solution.
I also switched from a point and shoot about a year ago, and can tell you that once you switch, you won't look back. Good Luck, and prepare to take your pictures to a whole new level.
At 1/100 I don't need to compensate any camera shake, at least not with my P&S, don't know about a DSLR at 70mm f/4 though. But at 1/100 f/4, I will need few more ISO stops to compensate the 1/100 and f/4 [:P]
Anyway, my question was more like this: with the 70-200 f/4 at say ISO 800 indoor, is it possible to get good = at least "twice better" than with my P&S?
P.S Without defining what "twice better" is, as it's not easy at all.
TSEvanson, thanks for the help. Just making sure... you mean that you have the 70-200 f/4 non-IS right?
Can you post some examples of pictures you've taken with both lenses?
What body do you use?
It gets a lot of undeserved criticism, IMHO. Yet the 28-135 is even worse and costs more money. Check out the It's Time to Praise the Kit Lens thread.
I didn't say it was too short for outdoors, just too short for birding. There are many other things to shoot outdoors besides birds, including people, places, and things. Portraits, landscapes, sports. Animals, vegetables, minerals. Lots of stuff.
I definitely like your idea of buying one good lens.
Perhaps not. But even people acting naturally can allow slowish shutter speeds sometimes (I get people laughing at 1/60 all the time). It depends on several factors: how steady you are, how fast your subjects are, technique and timing, and how large you want to print.
Very steady, fast subjects, one-shot technique, and small prints: IS wont help so much.
Normal steadiness, normal subjects, multi-shot technique, and large prints: IS will make a huge difference.
One of the biggest factors is print size. If you want to make 12x18, you'll have to have much less motion blur than is needed for a wallet-size print (i.e. web size).
Your own steadiness is a factor as well: if you can handhold 200mm at 1/125, the IS will not help as much as if you need 1/500.
Technique plays a factor as well. If you're willing to shoot 1/60 on a continueous burst, then find the one that has the right moment and no motion blur, you win. But if you prefer to get just one shot of precisely the right moment, and not have to wade through a bunch of pictures after the fact, then IS will not help as much.
If you absolutely need to capture a certain moment with no risk of subject motion blur, then too the 1/60 provided by IS will not help.
Keep in mind that ISO varies by camera. For example, ISO 50 on your digicam would probably be called ISO 125 on the 50D. So the digicam was actually better than it seemed. Even so, f/4 on a DSLR will certainly give better results than f/2.8 on a digicam. The only question is: how much better? At f/8, the DSLR is probably the same as the f/2.8 digicam. At f/5.6, it's twice as good as a digicam. f/4 is four times better. f/2.8 is 8 times better. And so on. The only question is how much better do you want it to be?
Another option you may wish to consider is the Sigma 50-150 f/2.8 for $675. It's got more useful focal length range for indoors, double the action stopping power, and very high image quality. The Mark II version of this lens fixes a few of the problems with the original, and with microadjustment you should be able to get accurate and reliable autofocus. Don't forget the f/1.8 or f/2 primes I suggested, either. They're not that expensive, and they don't zoom, but the indoor action stopping power and image quality is very useful.
I've seen the kit lens thread before, they got nice photos there, but there are few awful ones as well. Also, it is f/5.6 at 47mm! very bad I think, but I still haven't read Bryan's review about it as I've been reading your replies and responding to them - thanks guys!
So what are you telling me? that I can be fine with just 50D + 70-200 f/4 L?
As for prints, I barely print my photos. When I do, I print them in the good old normal (and small) size - can't remember what size it is, but it's just the normal size that we used to print when we were using our old film cameras (not SLR).
As to the sigma suggestion, it gives me 50mm that's right and with that it'd be much more easy to NOT buy a general purpose lens, but on the long end it has only 150mm and from the previous posts I fear that even 200mm won't satisfy me []
And lastly - I don't forget the primes, but from another, similar thread that I started here before, I understand that getting a prime instead of a general purpose lens is not a good idea.
First and foremost, the VGA screen.
I tried out the 5D Mark II yesterday at a local camera store, and trust me, the difference is noticable, but not life changing. What I'm trying to say is, the VGA screen is very cool, but IMHO, not worth the extra cost of the 50D. I was faced with the same decision when I bought my 40D - And I just couldn't justify the cost of 5MP and the screen. You will be much better off with the 40D and 28-135 and 70-200 f/4 L. You'll really enjoy this setup.
Now, to answer your field-of-view crop factor question: Basically, the sensor in the 40D, 50D, and Rebel Series are smaller than those found in cameras such as the 5D Mark II and 1Ds Mark III, which are "full-frame" sensors. This means that the sensor is the same size as a piece of 35mm film.
The crop factor comes into play when using lenses. If you get an image at 100mm on a 1.6x crop factor camera, it would be as if you cropped the center of the image captured by a full frame camera. This cropping results in the "effective" focal length being multiplied by a factor of 1.6x. Make sense?
35mm equivalent means that a picture taken with a 40D at 100mm would require 160mm on a full frame camera to yield identical framing.
I hope this helps.
Anyway, trust me; You'll really enjoy the world of DSLR. It's a totally new ballgame. Have fun.
alexniedra, first, thanks for the help of course [
I don't want to sound rude, but guys: I know all that long time ago (thanks to Bryan of course []), please don't keep telling me about the sensor size, cropping and all that - I know it. As for the real question I asked about the 35mm equiv. thing - Daniel pretty much clarified it to me... I'm not an expert now, but a bit smarter [
...but if not too hard, can someone still take a picture with his P&S at 100mm (35mm equiv.) and then another with his DSLR + 100mm lens and post it over here? You know the old saying... 1 picture (actually 2 in our case LOL) = 1000 words [:P]
It doesn't have to be 100mm of course, it was just an example.
Thanks again alexniedra [H]
UPDATE: I've read part of Bryan's review for the 18-55 IS kit lens - didn't even read it all since just the beginning was enough for me... I'm not getting this lens - even if optically it's relatively good. It has a plastic mount! c'mon Canon... you could have done better.
I also didn't mention that I can get the 40D + EF-S 17-85mm f/4-5.6 IS USM for the same price as the 40D + 28-135.
Any thoughts about the 17-85? I've heard that this lens is disappointing, is that right?
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