A New Camera

Well, after doing a lot of research I finally broke down and got a digital SLR. I got the Canon Rebel XS (10 megapixel) and a Tamron 28-300 telephoto lens. I have always been pleased with the quality of the pictures I get with my Panasonic Lumix and if this camera can live up to those, I will be happy -- even happier if they are better (which I suspect they are!). The great part and the main reason I did the upgrade was that the Lumix was just plain slow. I am delighted by my ability to take a whole lot of pictures in the row and get them focused besides!! I have just begun to play with the settings. I am used to controlling some of these things but my first shots were using pretty much the auto ISO features although not the automatic setting. This was the inside of the last of our clematis with the macro end of this lens. Pretty good considering I got it for telephoto but it will do as a closeup. I also have the 17-55 lens that came with the camera and haven't played with that yet.

This was a closeup of the early buds (for us) on the Rose of Sharon next to the house.

The flowers in front of my neighbors -- you have seen these before. A hummingbird was flitting around but much to fast for the light this late in the day.

I looked at the properties and many of these pictures were taken with an effective ISO of 800 with little noticeable noise so that is good. I almost always use 100 ISO with my Lumix.