Tom makes an excellent point. Nearly all "point and shoot" digital cameras go to work once you press the shutter release button down to take the picture. You can defeat that somewhat by anticipating the shot. Of course, that works a lot easier with subjects that are going on a predictable course - like say cars on a track. With kids, pets, birds, etc, it becomes more of a challenge since just because they're going in one direction at the time, doesn't mean they'll continue on that path in the next millisecond.
As someone else said, FPS does not necessarily equate to a better camera. FPS is if you just want to "throw frames" at an event - but that doesn't guarantee you'll actually get the shot you want. In my photography business (and for the work I do for paper), I rarely shoot in burst mode. Ken Rockwell's website (www.kenrockwell.com) is definitely a great place to go look for information. Ken is a "into cameras" and buys equipment as soon as it's available. While he's mostly looked at Nikons in the past, he's not a "Nikon bigot". He's got lots of good, practical advice. The D70 and the D40 are both great cameras. I have a D70 and my brother has a D40. I've put about 25,000 (or so) shots through my D70. My brother recently got his D40 and I've used it too. The D70 you're looking at is almost definitely used as the D70 line was dropped in around 2005 or so. The D40 is newer and somewhat lighter. In your original email, you said the D40 was about $500 less. I'd go with the D40. You could probably use the savings (if you're okay with stimulating the economy and spending money you were thinking of spending) and get one of the D40 kits. Most come with an 18-55mm lens (either VR or non-VR) or the 18-55mm and the 55-200mm (also VR or non-VR). (VR is Nikon's Vibration Resistance technology - sort of an image stabilization but it's minimizes shake when taking pictures under certain circumstances. Just know that it works really nicely). OR... you could spend a bit more, get the D40 with the 18-55mm lens and then get Nikon's 18-200mm VR lens. That's a fantastic lens and it'll handle 99.999% of what you need to shoot. The only catch is the 18-200mm VR goes for about $679.95 (yeah, it's an expensive lens). Just out of curiosity, what store is selling the D70 and for how much? Larry P.S. Don't forget to get a UV filter for any and all lenses you get. Some camera shops will try to sell you something *really* expensive, but you don't need to spend all that much money on it. The UV filter is there to protect the lens from things that might strike the glass. It also does a dandy job on fingerprints (smudges like that are too close to the lens when they're on the filter, so they won't affect the shot. Smudges on the lens however, will). And it's far, far better and cheaper to have a $30 UV filter get broken than a $700 lens. -----Original Message----- From: Computer Guys Discussion List [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Tom Piwowar Sent: Thursday, June 05, 2008 7:34 AM To: [email protected] Subject: Re: [CGUYS] DSLR question (was over shooting >Camera newbie question. I hate shutter lag in digital cameras. >The frames per second rate in the Nikon D70 3 fps whereas the >D40 specs claims 2.5 fps. Note that shutter lag and frames per second are not related. Shutter lag depends on how quickly the camera sets up for the shot (focus, metering, etc.) while FPS depends on how well the camera disposes of the shot (size of internal buffer, transfer speed to memory card, etc.). Plus the kind of memory card you use will affect the FPS rating. ************************************************************************ * ** List info, subscription management, list rules, archives, privacy ** ** policy, calmness, a member map, and more at http://www.cguys.org/ ** ************************************************************************ * ************************************************************************* ** List info, subscription management, list rules, archives, privacy ** ** policy, calmness, a member map, and more at http://www.cguys.org/ ** *************************************************************************
