Thanks Stick. Quark it is. Will be my first 4Sevens light. Wondering if I could tap into that wealth of knowledge for a camera question. My wife says before another large knife purchase I must by a new camera. Looking at the t3i or something comparable. Will be mainly used for pics of my 11 month old as well as family outings. Maybe a few knife pics as well. Want a very user friendly camera as we have only used the pocket type cameras in the past. Thanks.
The t3i will serve you quite well. The stock 18-55 lens can handle most general shots and even low light shots can be taken as long as one plays with the shutter speed or ISO.
I use it for my family shots and some knife photography and I'm very happy with the results I get with my limited photography knowledge. The t4i has a touchscreen interface and continual autofocus when recording video, that's about the only real difference between them if I recall.
Not long ago, I'd have recommended the T3i as well, however I have to say now that I don't recommend it, even for the lower price you can get it for now since it's two generations old. They're at the T5i now, with the T4i being out for less than a year before they released the T5i. Touch screen on the new models is nice, but the menu system isn't really that conducive to a touch interface, so that's bleh.
Funny comparison:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oNyuP98KO3A
What really got me away from Canon is just the picture quality. Outside of their flagship models, the low light performance on the Canon DSLRs is just meh. That's it...meh. It's not as bad as a consumer camcorder, but after working with the footage from the Blade Show interview and comparing it to what came off the sensor of the NEX VG30, I was left with a bad taste in my mouth. Noisy...gross looking...not fun to work with. Granted, I wasn't using a fast lens, but the lens on the VG30 was the same speed and it got much cleaner results with a finer grain to the noise that was not noticeable.
Does this translate to photography? Well, yes and no. The noise will show up at higher ISO settings with the stock lens. I personally don't like using onboard flashes, so I tend to just go without. That opens the door for noisy photos just as it does noisy videos. The image that Canon puts out on their mid-range ad lower end models is just not good for what's available now, for less money.
I'd say you should take a look at the Sony NEX cameras. The NEX 5N/R use the same sensor (well, the N does) as the VG30, and if you do a quick YouTube search of NEX 5N videos, you'll see the images that the tiny camera can pull off. The 5R is what I'm getting, and it's the same general camera, but an updated version. You could get the 5R with the 18-55mm kit lens for just under $600 brand new from Amazon. They have a newer, power zoom lens that's a smaller pancake format, but not bundled with the NEX 5R. It's bundled with the 6, and it's an awesome lens. I have that lens now, and have been using it on my VG30. It's pretty awesome, and really slim.
The NEX cameras are about the size of point-n-shoot cameras, but the 18-55mm standard lens that comes with the 5 series is big, sticks out, and kind of kills the purpose of a tiny camera. The new pancake 16-50mm power zoom lens is smaaaall, and does pretty well for its size. When you turn on the camera, the barrel extends, but when it's off it retracts into a tiny package.
There are GREAT deals to be had on eBay, both on used lenses, and items that have been parted out. The trend is for sellers to take a NEX 6 bundle, and part out the lens and body. That's how I got my 16-50mm pancake lens. It was only a couple hundred, essentially new. Check out some video reviews of the NEX 5R, it's really a nice camera. I've played with it a lot at B&H, since B&H Photo is three blocks from where I work. It's worth it, I really think so.
http://www.youtube.com/results?sear....6j2.8.0...0.0...1ac.1.11.youtube.G810O3-jvH8
