I’ve had a Nikon 5700 digicam for a couple years now and it’s served me well. All the same, it’s been getting on my nerves a bit recently as I've been pushing its limits — my current gripe is that there's no way to disable the internal flash while leaving an external flash enabled.
And, while reading Ask MetaFilter, I came across an analogy from kcm which was able to nicely summarize my perspective on the camera:
I was never happy with the prosumer choices like the S2 (I had the PowerShot G2 and G3). Not enough control to justify the size. It’s like driving a PT Cruiser because you need to haul stuff for construction projects but you want a small car to autocross: it sucks for both. […]
Now, I don’t think my Nikon 5700 sucks, but I have been keeping an eye out for an upgrade. The hard part is where to go from there, which kcm comments on as well:
If you DO go for a DSLR, be prepared to have two cameras — one to slip in a pocket, like your Elph, and the DSLR, which is generally too bulky for events where your primary concern is not photography.[…]
So maybe that would be a workable long-term strategy (buying both a compact digicam & a DSLR). The predicament I have now, though, is that I can't afford both of those :-/. Decisions, decisions…
Hey Alex,
Just want to let you know of a little compromise I may have found. As you know I’m looking for a new camera since my tiny one was stolen on my wife’s trip to India. Anyway, I’ve been looking for a new one, I found one in the under 400 dollar club:
The Canon Powershot A620. Now I know it is not an actual SLR, but the upside to it is that you can buy an adapter and then buy a telephoto as well as wideangle lense for it as well. So, it gives some of the functionality of a bigger SLR, yet it is still quite nice and compact. Of course, does not have a turning segment on the lense for the manual focus… still have to use the zoom controls to do that.
Anyway, I plan on purchaseing it on Monday, so I’ll definitely let you know how I like it once I come back from my trip to India.
For what it’s worth, I think the Canon 350D/Rebel XT is a good compromise such as what you’re looking for. As a DSLR it is very small, almost too small, but it’s not too much bigger than a compact. In fact, it isn’t much bigger than the one you have.
Admittedly I don’t own one, but it won’t be long before I do, for those same reasons; I don’t need a pricey and massive pro camera but I still want an SLR. But of course SLRs are still far from cheap :-(
I agree with the “be prepared to have two cameras” – I have a DSLR and an Elph, depending on where I’m going and what I’m doing I’ll take one or the other (or sometimes both!).
I’ve never really liked the mid-range models, either go for small, or go for a DSLR!