FC: Back from vacation; D30 camera minireview and photos

[Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>]

Well, I'm back from vacation and there's been plenty of news being 
committed in the last 10 days or so. I'll send along some of the backlog in 
a minute.

First, a brief camera review. I was in Aruba for eight days, offline and 
loving it. I brought along an analog Canon EOS 5, a digital Nikon Coolpix 
950, a digital Canon EOS D30, and an underwater Epoque ET-100 -- the camera 
gear took up more space in my luggage than clothes.

The D30 was spectacular, and I ended up using it for nearly all my shots. 
It's finally a digital camera that is almost affordable and handles as well 
as an analog SLR. I went analog only when I needed the higher quality for 
slides that might be turned into prints someday, or when I needed to use a 
wide angle lens. The D30, like many other SLR digitals, has a multiplier of 
about 1.6, so my 28 mm wideangle lens becomes a 45 mm normal lens.

Downsides: An unusual bug that meant the camera occasionally refused to 
recognize a 50 mm lens, a user interface that isn't as well thought-out as, 
say, the Nikon Coolpix line (especially the 990), a lack of ability to take 
more than three shots in quick succession when bracketing exposures, 
Windows software that didn't install properly the first time, and problems 
using my external EZ-series flash.

But those are minor, and can be worked around. The camera's external 
battery pack built into the vertical grip lasts for 300-400 shots with 
average LCD screen use and recharges in 90 minutes. One charge is enough to 
last a full day of heavy use. I wouldn't recommend getting the D30 without 
the IBM 340 MB microdrive, a perfect combination. An adapter allows you to 
insert the drive as a PCMCIA card, where it shows up as a normal hard drive.

Some D30 photos from Aruba:
http://www.mccullagh.org/theme/aruba-highlights.html

This one shows it off nicely:
http://www.mccullagh.org/image/d30-1/red-parrot.html

-Declan




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