Comments on: Independence of irrelevant alternatives

By: zdenek v

zdenek v — Sun, 11 Mar 2007 13:04:01 +0000

I think D40 is a fantastic camera but this issue with lenses can be important.

If you bought Canon 400D you might want to upgrade by buying a fantastic relatively inexpensive Canon 100-400 F4-4.5 whic comes with ultrasonic motor and image stabilizer. This lens has some of the key lens elements made from fluoride.

It is a lens used by lot of profesionals and as I said prices have gone down recently and so is accessible to serious amateur.

Something similar from Nikon will not work with your camera because of this AF motor issue.

By: zdenek v

zdenek v — Sun, 11 Mar 2007 12:43:44 +0000

Yes I forgot we were talking about D40. But notice still on this subject , none of the fantastic older Nikon lenses that could otherwise be used with your D40 body—say the fantastic 80-200 F2.8—( fast and not expensive ) cannot be used because your camera will not focus with them ( no internal AF motor ).
This is quite a draw back I think.

By: Chris Bertram

Chris Bertram — Sun, 11 Mar 2007 12:22:40 +0000

Zdenek, what you say simply re autofocus motors simply isn’t true. The D40 has no af motor in the body, only in the lens. (This is often portrayed as a disadvantage of the camera to those with old Nikon lenses.)

By: zdenek v

zdenek v — Sun, 11 Mar 2007 10:10:32 +0000

Another point in favour of Canon is the fact that Canon auotofocus motor is inside the lens and not the body.

As lenses develop the motors become ever more fast ( even the ultrasonic lenses are becoming faster ) so when you upgrade you may be buying a lot quicker focusing lens than the one with which you started.
Because Nikon put their motor inside the body no matter what lens you buy you will be stuck with the same auto focus performance unless you upgrade the body too.

By: Randy Paul

Randy Paul — Sun, 11 Mar 2007 03:34:41 +0000

The only thinng I might add is that the software package that comes with the Canon is very impressive and easy to use.

By: Randy Paul

Randy Paul — Sun, 11 Mar 2007 03:30:02 +0000

The only area where I would give Nikon the edge is with the lenses, but IMHO, it’s not a great enough difference not to get the Canon.

I have a Canon Digital Rebel XT and the fact that I had some Canon lenses (22-55mm zoom; 75-300 mm zoom) sealed the deal for me. I also have a Canon APS SLR (though I don’t really use it any more) and I took some terrific photos with it.

I just got back from 2 weeks in Italy, took some 600 photos and was very impressed with how it hheld up. I only had to recharge the battery once in two weeks.

By: zdenek v

zdenek v — Sat, 10 Mar 2007 14:03:19 +0000

“I should have bought the Canon”

This is correct I am afraid because CCD sensors that Nikon uses are prone to premature failure ( the sensor outputs just noise or goes completely dead , of course it can be replaced but will cost half the price of the new camera ).Until this is sorted out by the manufacturers of CCD sensors CMOS type sensor Canon uses I am afraid is better bet.

By: eweininger

eweininger — Fri, 09 Mar 2007 03:24:02 +0000

Aw crap. I was gonna make some joke about needing the Nikon on the red bus and the Canon on the blue bus. Oh well.

By: radek

radek — Fri, 09 Mar 2007 00:58:29 +0000

Peter, I think the key is the word “Irrelevant” in Independence of Irrelevant Alternatives. Relevant context is fine. In a broader sense though you’re right, as the famous blue bus/red bus illustrates.

By: Peter

Peter — Thu, 08 Mar 2007 23:47:22 +0000

I disagree that violation of the IIA Assumption is evidence of irrationality. Surely, it is rational to consider context when making decisions, yet the IIA Assumption asserts that context is ignored—like so much of western thought since Descartes.

By: radek

radek — Thu, 08 Mar 2007 22:06:01 +0000

unless it is a constituency of one

Or two. Sorry for being pedantic.

By: maidhc

maidhc — Thu, 08 Mar 2007 09:20:04 +0000

More megapixels don’t necessarily “let you crop”. If the resolution of the sensor is greater than that of the lens, cropping is like using that useless “digital zoom” feature. It just increases the relative size of the blur.

If you read a lot of photography sites you’ll find people arguing that 10 megapixel sensors don’t give any better resolution than 6 megapixels if you have consumer-quality lenses.

35 mm film has more resolution than any current digital sensor, but the results you get with film will still vary according to the quality of the optics in your camera.

Digital gives you the advantage that it doesn’t cost anything to take a lot of different shots, so you can try a lot of things like framing, depth of field and exposure at the time when you shoot, and pick the best result when you get home. You don’t necessarily have to spend a lot of time adjusting the picture later, although you still can.

I bought a Pentax digital SLR because I already had Pentax lenses from my film camera, and I’ve been very happy with it. But I imagine that all of the well-known companies probably have pretty decent products.

By: Harald K

Harald K — Thu, 08 Mar 2007 07:10:00 +0000

Chris Bertram, that was not necessarily just irrational thinking!! So Arrow’s theorem says there can be found no social choice funcion which satisfies blah blah criteria, unless it is a constituency of one. Who says you’re just one?! You probably have lots of different reasons for wanting to buy a camrea, and look, now they’re locked up in a CYCLE!! Woot!

By: derrida derider

derrida derider — Thu, 08 Mar 2007 02:25:13 +0000

You get more megapixels to let you crop. You don’t have to worry about composition when shooting, and you can mostly get away without a bulky long lens.

But yeah, most buyers overestimate the importance of bulk MPs compared with other things.

By: watson aname

watson aname — Thu, 08 Mar 2007 02:14:45 +0000

I think the Canon vs. Nikon thing here is misleading. Basically, Canon doesn’t offer a direct competitor to the D40 … but neither does anyone else, really. Nikon has bracketed the low-to midlevel offerings of Canon this way (there isn’t a Canon to directly match up with the D200, either). So you are choosing to enter the market with a Nikon that doesn’t (yet) have any direct competition.

I think the existence of the D40x muddies the mid to upper entry level stuff a bit for you, but doesn’t change much. The D40 is in a class of it’s own, it’s small, lightweight, and quite capable. It has some limited lens compatability, but that probably doesn’t matter to you.

It’s the lenses that really matter. If you stay at this long enough and get interested enough, you’ll build up a bag full of lenses that will make it difficult to change mounts. But this is as it should be; glass is more important that bodies. Less so now that with film, but still true.

by the way rm is quite confused with the Toyota vs. Chevy comparison—Nikon dominates (technically, not in unit sales—- yet(?)) the middle range of DSLR’s. Sure, there are trade offs, but the D200 is a much better camera than the 30D, and a better sensor with one caveat—- high ISO shooting.