Canon Sixty-Dee
Meet the new stunning addition to my Canon family 
I am absolutely in awe of my new 60D which ardently complements my G11 and happy snap IXUS 130.
First and foremost I am a writer/photographer, but I also enjoy dabbling in television journalism/feature videos – which is why I purchased this camera solely for its mind blowingly crisp, Full HD 1080p video recording.
Earlier on in the year when I was in South Africa, MTV Jo’burg were filming on Nikon SLRs. Although SLRs are becoming the way of the future for video, I stick with Canon, baby. I’ve even heard the TV show House use a 550D as their second camera on-set. Whoa!
Anyway, below is the first photo I snapped within two minutes of owning this cam. I’m kind of obsessed with shooting glasses; since you can see the clarity and meticulous fingerprint detail picked up by 60Ds. Insane!
Special thanks to my photography specialist, Andrew, from Harvey Norman Alexandria for hooking me up with all of my much-neeed additional accessories. Your lens knowledge is impeccable. I love my 50mm/1.8 L that I use for video interviews for maximum depth of field.
I’ve got my eye on an L-series 16mm-30mm fixed 2.8 L which I’m thinking of buying. With a $1999 RRP price tag, the lens is uber sharp. To all the photography buffs: can you kindly suggest a good lens? I’m after something wide-angle with a little zoom, a fixed maximum aperture that’s quality which performs better than your run-of-the-mill kit lenses. I don’t want to constantly change my lens; especially if I’m filming.
DISCLAIMER: Thanks to Raffi for the camera body feature pic (shown first).
The swivel lens is a worthy new key addition and beats my 50D. Thinking about upgrading now. Have you expanded on your lens collection at all? I have the 20-105mm, except it is F4 not 2.8
Hey Michelle,
Sorry it took me so long to get around to posting. Was busy finishing off writing the new program I sent you.
The best advice I can give you regarding lenses, photographic equipment (or anything else for that matter) is to be as informed as possible before you make your purchase. The lens has to be one you’re going to be happy with and what is important to one person is not necessarily an important factor for another. For any one person who touts the virtues of XYZ product, you will no doubt find an equal number of detractors. Artistic people tend to be rather touchy-feely types people when it comes to equipment. They often love it because they’ve produced some great pictures with it or it’s what they first owned rather than because it actually has the best specifications.
The only way to get to the truth of the matter is to do some internet research for some of the various sites about that independently review cameras and lenses. I’m not talking about the ones that just write up a monthly blurb for the latest edition of their mag that gives one of those touchy-feely reviews like, ‘Our editor took Canon’s latest baby to the beach with his dog and a packet of Tim Tams and after using it for half an hour has concluded that it’s the best thing since sliced bread, (with the possible exception of Tim Tams)’ I’m talking along the lines of the types of review that give you hard and fast information using controlled techniques which seek to quantify various parameters concerning the equipment performance and error and then analyse, graph and tabulate that information for you, allowing you to compare between various makes and models.
One technique important in evaluating lens performance is to shoot controlled images using one of several available charts. The ISO 12233 Chart is one of the more famous ones. Various pieces of information can be gleaned from such tests, such as lens resolution, pin cushion/barrel distortion, chromatic aberration etc.
Here is one site I found on a quick search, giving a review of your camera. It’s open on the ‘resolution’ section.
http://www.digitalcamerainfo.com/content/Canon-Eos-60d-Digital-Camera-Review/Resolution.htm
Unfortunately they only review cameras along with their ‘standard issue’ lenses but if you have a bit of a hunt around you will find the type of thing I’m talking about. There are better sites than this one that give you even more charts, graphs and numerical data.
In the end, any decision you make it going to be a compromise, because no equipment is perfect. There is no such thing as a lens with no distortion, no chromatic aberration etc. Such an ideal lens would be nice but physics and the laws of the universe tend to get in its way. Finding the best compromise is our only choice. That said, it is probably worth noting that electronic imaging has come a LONG way over the last half century or so since it’s development. Where issues of ‘quality’ are concerned, increases in performance and simultaneous decreases in price have placed image quality into the hands of the general consumer, for next to nothing dollars-wise, that far outstrips even the multi-million dollar equipment of media industry standard, even a decade or two ago. For example, with regard to video performance, your current camera will out-perform anything owned by channel 10 even a few decades ago! So, perhaps in seeking better and better equipment, we are just, in the end, splitting hairs. Still… I guess it pays to be a perfectionist.
The only other thing I can think of, at the moment, is to check out whether your camera’s sensor is full-frame or not. Not only will the size of the focal plane alter the DOF and thus also the bokeh effect for any given lens at any given focal length but it will also give you a different angle of view. That is to say, when we talk in terms of 24mm lenses we talk in terms of 35mm photography. If your sensor is smaller, any sited focal length will not return the expected angle of view on your camera… just something to be aware of also.
I hope this advice is helpful to you.
Napier.
i only use Canon too. Leica’s are okay. can’t stand Nikons!!!!
you should get a prime lens…. the clarity is more important