So Mike,
For us non professional photographers....what do you think of the Olympus E-volt 500 ?

Mike & David ... hope you dont mind me jumpin' in here too. I have a Nikon N6006 with a couple of Nikkor lens: 35-70mm @ 1.3.3-4.6 and a 70-210mm @ 1.4-5.6. I was thinking of buying a D70 or otherwise, to utilize these two lenses. Would they work well with the Nikon digitals? Any recommendations of the current crop of Nikon digitals for some of us amateur photographers?

Thanks guys!

You're right I think. Some cameras have a slightly bigger sensor with a 1.4 lens reduction value. But the game really has changed in the past few years. Most DSLR mfgs are now making lenses specifically designed for smaller sensors and not film. They're called Dx lenses by Nikon. In a decade, all the old 'film to DSLR' transitoners like me won't be of much concern to camera makers. Their new client base won't have an arsenol of old 35mm film lenses to transition. That's also why Nikon will probably never make a full frame camera. They're putting all their R&D into new lens technology that fits a smaller sensor. This is also why Canon may fall behind some day....(wink) Newer shooters will be buying the latest lenses designed for digital and not looking for lenses designed for film size. There will be nothing sacred about 35mm film size in the future and so no need for "full frame" cameras really.

But right now we are at a technological end with CMOS and CCD design. There does seem to be a limit as to how small and close together you can place image receptors (pixels if you will) on a piece of silicone without affecting image quality. A totally new design is needed, some breakthrough. But until then most camera mfgs are concentrating on refining the other and actually more important things about digital capture. Bit depth per pixel for example is much more important to image quality than the 'megapixel count' of your sensor. I think that for the next few years sensor size will stabalize and that refinement will be in finding better ways to utilize what's already in place......stay tooned!

And I apologize for not knowing the Olumpus evolt was an 8MP DSLR. Sure doesn't sound like a prosumer cam to me. Only 2 lenses though....that's a weak point.

Mike .. thanks for the 'in depth' reply! I have allways enjoyed your posts on DSSI and your replies (more frequently here nowdays, I believe). The technology changes so fast in so many arenas these days its really hard to keep up. I appreciate all of your thoughts and appreciate the links you provided to check into them even further. I had done some quick reading a little bit ago concerning my lenses, which are auto focus, fyi, and wasn't too sure as regard to their compatablity with the current batch of Nikon cameras. I am wanting to get more into murals as well so I am wrestling with the 'pixel wars' as well to maximize whatever I get.
Robin's choice of camera does look excellent and I am considering it as well but would still like to get the most 'bang for the buck' by utilizing my other lense.

Thanks again for your imput.

Dave,

You might consider renaming this thread, "DSLR Discussion" or something similar as it's beginning to widen out.

Chuck, I did look at the E-500, and a couple of other brands. The 500 is very similar specs to the Rebel XT (some better, some worse). But after doing a lot of research I found it really came down to what Mike said about lenses. They are the key to good images, and Canon and Nikon are the big players in that field. I've always had a big respect for Nikon (my father is a pro photog and always had Nikons) but the bang for the buck seemed to be with Canon at the price level I was looking at.

I figured if I was going to get serious about it, I needed to pick between Nikon and Canon, and whichever I chose I would probably be using for a long time, since as Mike says, the lenses stick around longer than the bodies.

I ended up buying the Rebel body and then carefully picking my initial lenses. I picked a good general purpose zoom (17-85mm), a 60mm macro lens (I love closeups) and a 75-300mm telephoto (a cheap one, since I don't do much telephoto). At some point I'd like to get some good fast prime lenses, but I have this camera for a mix of personal pics and an occasional product photo, so can't justify spending too much per year on it.

My brother, on the other hand, has a Canon 1Ds MkII attached to the back of a 4x5 camera body and uses that for product photography in his graphic design business. He makes more money than me. ;-)