In search of the "perfect" DSLR

Actually, despite initially thinking the 400D anti-dust wasn't brilliant, I've concluded that it works well. The problem was there was some stuff on the filter when the camera left the factory, once I cleared that off it's remained fairly dust free since, even after a trip to the deserts of Morocco. After that initial clean I haven't had to do anything subsequently, despite shooting at f/32 from time to time...

Any DSLR will have problems with dust getting onto sensors. Also they are bulky and not very handy in locations where you want to be more discreet.

If you can afford it then I suggest get a DSLR for when you can carry a bulky camera and when you won't get it wet, dusty, bashed around etc, and a compact for when you are in markets, crap weather, beaches etc (the Olympus mju 770 SW is ideal for that apparently - although I've only just ordered mine so cannot say for sure - that was GB£220.

I have a Canon 20D for 'proper' photography and am very happy with it, but am restricted by it's inconvenience on occasion, so am getting a new compact to carry in my pocket. I've previously taken excellent shots (which I've blown up to A4 size and sold prints of) with compacts. Remember, the most imp[ortant thing with getting a good picture is the person behind the camera - photographers 20 years ago took fantastic images with much more basic kit than we have available.

I bought a Pentax K10d and have already taken some snaps at over 6000m. Plan to take it over 8000 m next month.

From Nikon I'd say the best option is the D200

Pros :
Partial weather sealing

Cons:
Poor image quality and AF performance in low light conditions (at or above ISO 800)

From Canon I'd go with the 30D

Pros:
Great low light performance

Cons: no weather sealing.

I personally have a Canon 20D & 5D. Neither are weather sealed and they've both done fine in India and some challenging conditions here at home. I wouldn't own a dSLR without a sensor cleaning system. Visible Dust is overpriced but gets the job done better than anything I've seen. In camera stabilization is ok but it's more effective built into the lens. All the bodies mentioned have a magnesium chassis so I wouldn't bother with a protective 'armour', seems like just another layer to trap moisture.

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<hr>it's more effective built into the lens<hr></blockquote>

Actually it probably isn't.

I'll be willing to change my mind if you've got some actual data to the contrary.

I think the Adorama site explains it fairly well. Plenty of other sites have similar explanations.
Lens vs Body stabilization

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<hr>In practice, both systems seem to provide similar levels of stabilization for wide, normal and short telephoto lenses used on APS-C sensor DSLRs. If and when more cameras with full frame sensors become avialable, image stabilized lenses will still be effective on them (as they are on current 35mm film cameras). With the additional size and mass of a full frame sensor, it may be difficult to impement a full frame sensor camera with in-body stabilization.

In-lens stabilization may also be more effective than in-body stabilization for long telephoto lenses. This is because the image shift is proportional to focal length and can become quite high at long focal engths. For example for a 0.5° deflection of a 600mm lens, the image moves by about 5.5mm, and Canon IS telephoto lenses can shift the image by this amount. Moving a whole sensor +/- 5mm both horizontally and vertically to compensate for image movement is difficult, even for APS-C sized sensors, due to both space constraints and limitations on how fast the mass of the whole sensor assembly can be moved. Optical stabilization in the lens can be designed so that a small movement of the optical steering elements causes a large deflection of the image and so rapid and effective stabilization is possible even for large image shifts.<hr></blockquote>

Let's pause a moment and consider the opening statement....

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<hr>In practice, both systems seem to provide similar levels of stabilization for wide, normal and short telephoto lenses used on APS-C sensor DSLRs.<hr></blockquote>

Perhaps if one is using extremely long teles (600mm on a 1.6x sensor = 960mm on a 35mm camera) then in-lens might be better. But this is a travel forum and I doubt that many "travelers" are wandering the globe with a 600mm monster in their pack.

Bob: Vis-a-vis long teles, it really depends on where people are going. Sure if you're in city then you're unlikely to be carrying anything really long, but if you're doing a safari I think you'll find the number of photographers carrying long lenses increases substantially. It's strongly destination dependent.

As for testing; it's very hard to come up with an accurate and fair IS test. Human motion is random, and random motion by its very nature might make for a good result or a bad result, depending on whether you're at one end of a swing, or in the middle. Real human shake is also dependent on caffeine and tiredness and a whole host of other things, so even if you use a real human test platform you won't get reproducable results.

Best option I can think of is to create a system that records real human shake and then moves the camera based on that; but you still can't get the timing identical as the shutter lag etc will throw things off even then. Maybe if you shoot a certain number of samples and average the result you'll get a good answer. Maybe.

If you can come up with a fair and realistic test I'd be interested :)

Designing a good "real world" test of IS systems would be a piece of cake for any of us whose careers involved human testing. That's the sort of thing that I've done tons of. Takes nothing but a decent sized sample, in-lens and in-body systems, randomization of IS on/off, and a reasonable set of shutter speeds.

Too many people seem to come from an engineering background and want to spend their effort first designing a machine that mimics human behavior. That's a waste of time as there are tons of willing subjects on any high school or university campus. Don't worry about "caffeine and tiredness", those are part of what photographers are made of. They should be included in any meaningful test. Just make sure that they are equally distributed across all conditions (in-lens/in-body and IS on/IS off).

If you think shutter lag might be a contributing factor then select cameras with similar lags.

You're going to get some sort of distributions which will be easy to sort out with some simple statistics. People have been turning out good data on this sort of stuff for well more than five decades.

(And I don't think you'll find many people traveling with lenses longer than ~250-300mm unless they are dedicated wildlife shooters. Or they are traveling with an IS superzoom.)

I think that might just do it; the non-IS shots would be a control and show whether or not the user was working correctly that day ;)

Obviously the target would need to be at the same distance, and you'd need to test at a variety of different focal lengths too.

Right; now all I need are some cameras! Thanks Bob.