DSLR startup costs

[Groucho]

But the mini van will not pull my boat

Yeah, but most people aren't pulling anything.

tyedye, I agree on the "auto correct" features, they rarely give you what you'd really like. Even the "auto tone" in Adobe Lightroom usually looks lousy. (Though the Auto white balance in Lightroom is generally quite good.) The majority of the time, any color issues are corrected with proper white balance, beyond that it's mainly a matter of cropping, rotating, and setting the exposure to slightly higher or lower. Lightroom adds the very useful "recovery" (for highlights) and "fill light" options, which can really help a photo pop, especially a night shot where certain areas are quite bright and others are very dark, and you want to bring in the very bright or dark areas without losing the other.

 

[webshark3]

well said. let's not forget that adding a 25$ filter turns your 800$ lens into one with $25 optics. n

I've run this test a million times... low end filter, high end filter, no filter, and can't find any evidence to support this claim. Search on Dpreview where 2 pics are thrown up next to each other (filter and none, or high-end low-end) and you'll see immediately that even professionals had trouble telling them apart.

If you have some references with examples, I'd love to see them.

 

[Groucho]

This is an issue that'll never be resolved, and with photos, you can always find photos to support any side of a debate.

I'm sure that someone can produce a sharp, very detailed daylight photo out of a 12mp PnS and declare that that it's just as sharp as a 12mp photo from a DSLR (especially when resized to web-viewing area.

We've seen plenty of times where someone will say "this lens isn't substandard, look at the great photo I got" where it was taken at F8 or a similarly high aperture where nearly every lens will produce sharp results.

And we can see examples of lenses with and without filters. I suspect one of the prime ways you'd notice a subpar lens is with flare, and a photo not in danger of flaring is unlikely to be much different. And again, higher apertures will make it difficult to notice any differences.

Even if it didn't make any optical difference, I still wouldn't bother as 1) I'm a cheap SOB and am not going to buy UV filters for all my lenses, 2) I simply don't believe that it'll give me much in the way of real-world protection. That's what lens hoods are for. (Well, and to reduce flare, but they do a great job of protecting the lens, too!)

 

[MarkBarbieri]

i think you'll find such great handling and excitmemt with minivan ownership, that extra vehicles will be unnecessary.

plus on our mini, we put the boat on top--a canoe.

We've been known to put two canoes (18'6" and 23') and a kayak on the roof of our minivan and another kayak inside. Good fun.

 

[MarkBarbieri]

I've run this test a million times... low end filter, high end filter, no filter, and can't find any evidence to support this claim. Search on Dpreview where 2 pics are thrown up next to each other (filter and none, or high-end low-end) and you'll see immediately that even professionals had trouble telling them apart.

If you have some references with examples, I'd love to see them.

In good conditions with anything but a disastrous filter, I doubt you'll see a difference. The problem with added glass elements in flare. See this article.

In my opinion, your chances of either scratches with a hood and no filter or flare problems with a filter are pretty small. Do whatever makes you happy.