Stephan Paukner :: syslog

Yesterday, I had a 1.5 hours talk with HGFei about further proceedings. I told him about my status and what I did the months before. He said that he could partly integrate me into the NuHAG from September on, where I’ll be attendant one afternoon and Friday morning every week. As working title for my master’s thesis we fixed “Gabor Analysis for Image Processing”: Some results have already been delivered in that area, and it should be my task to collect these together and give a survey. He will look for corresponding literature. During my stay at NuHAG, I could also be involved in the arising Computational Science project.

I’ll have to look if I should buy the Matlab student version. Also, the TF-toolbox of Peter Søndergaard seems to have been updated - it’s partly compatible to Octave.

I don’t have anything better to do than thinking about which camera I should take: The Nikon D200 or the Canon EOS 30D?

The Nikon has a higher resolution of 10MP, whereas the Canon only has 8MP. At first, clearly Nikon was the leader for me in this case, but now I know that the resolution is heavily dependent on the lens. They both are at the very same level here!

The Canon simply looks better. It has a bended appearance, whereas the Nikon looks like a box. If you look from above, the Nikon looks a bit like it had been hit flat, compared to the Canon.

Only Canon has lenses with their Image Stabilizer in the lower focal length range (about 18-70mm), whereas Nikon doesn’t have their Vibration Reduction in these lenses. On the other hand, Nikon provides additions like a GPS module or a WLAN networking connection. Canon has no optional modules here. But, if I really tend to use such extensions, then not within the next one or two years, I assume. So, there might already be a better DSLR on the market at that time.

Shooting JPEG sequences, they both are almost at the same speed of 5 images/second: The Canon manages a 41 frame burst, whereas the Nikon has a burst of 39 frames. Using their RAW file format, the rates change clearly: Still providing a speed of 5 images/second, the Canon drops down to a 11 frame burst, whereas Nikon manages a burst of 23 frames. On the other hand, I’m no paparazzo, so this can’t be that argument.

Nikon provides a little better support for bracketing with up to 9 images per bracketing shot, whereas the Canon only provides a three-shot sequence. On the other hand, HDR image creators find Nikon’s so many shots a little superfluous.

But, a major drawback of the Canon is its viewfinder: Nikon provides grid lines, and more information is shown in the viewfinder. Also, the Nikon has two more autofocus-spots.

On the other hand, Canon is the leader in camera manufacturing. Only Canon has professional models with a full frame sensor, whereas Nikon still has some difficulties, maybe rooting in the smaller diameter of their lens mounting system. I have the impression that Canon lenses have a larger diameter and therefore larger (and therefore better) lenses, but I’m not sure with this. Paparazzi use Canon.

Nevertheless, in the end I’ll stay with the Nikon, I assume, at least for the current time. But Canon becomes more and more attractive to me. I’m looking forward to the next semi-pro Canon model.