Well, I finally bit the bullet and got the Canon EOS 350D. Gotta say it’s a brilliant camera. For those who don’t know it’s an eight megapixel digital SLR, which refers to the mechanism by which photos are taken.
In practical terms, it means you don’t get an LCD viewfinder, and you don’t get videos. However, you do get an accurate viewfinder, remarkable battery life and the quality of photos are simply superb. The EOS 350D also allows you to mess about with all the usual parameters of cameras (aperture, shutter speed, ISO, etc) very quickly. The auto focus is incredibly fast, the power-up and capture times are almost instantaneous and all round the results are great.
I also bought a Sigma 70-300mm lens – had great fun with it already, and I’m expecting to buy more as I can afford them
Among the purchases was a heavily protected backpack. In just over two weeks I’m off to America and I’m planning to take loads of photos (I’m also planning to get a bunch of 1 and 2Gb CompactFlash cards – RAW images are huge!). At the end of the month I’m also off to Cork, Ireland for three days, and the camera will be in hand there too. In the meantime, you can see my flirtations with the new camera already on Flickr.