Canon Rebel XT vs. Nikon D40

[krystal99]

Hello,

My girlfriend just bought the Nikon D40 and when I compared pictures (see below thread on focusing) there is clearly a difference in clarity. Now the pictures are in low light (dusk), and her camera lens had a little more zoom. She uses Picture Project software that came with her camera, and I use Photoshop Elements. When I go to image size in Photoshop my picture size is
48 x 32, resolution is 72 pixels per inch, and pixel image size is 3456 x 2304. All my pictures are downloaded in this size. When I do the PP I change the resolutuion to 300 in cropping. My friends Nikon images in her software are at the 300 resolution. Her camera and mine are both set at the same image quality.

Can any tell me why the difference in photos? Is it the low light, and use of different lens sizes? Is it the processing software? Really I could see hers were going to be clearer on the camera's LCD. Does the Nikon just take a better quality? I would so appreciate anyone who could answer these questions as I have been frustrated with the clarity of my pictures, and can't seem to find the problem. I thought it was just in manual, but clearly it still has the same problem in fully auto mode. I'm going to take some more with the same size lens on both cameras in auto to get a really good comparison.

Thanks

[Technophile]

i wouldnt worry about the pixels per inch really, youre comparing 2 different programs that might be doing things differently. the fact is that your rebel XT has a higher max resolution of 8MP, while her d40 is 6.1MP. however, that difference in megapixels is negligible.

if you want to do a comparison between cameras, use manual mode - NOT auto. you will want the settings to be as identical as possible. using auto on both cameras will will not be a good comparison since they will probably choose settings differently.

its hard to answer any of your questions without knowing shutter speeds ISO, aperture, or even which lens was used. if you can please post some example shots with aperture, focal length, shutter speed, and ISO, we can help you out better.

[krystal99]

Thanks, I will do comparisons as you said. Frustrating not to get the clarity you expect in your photographs.

[JeffreyG]

Thanks, I will do comparisons as you said. Frustrating not to get the clarity you expect in your photographs.

Try shooting both cameras in manual exposure mode with the same settings and RAW capture format and then compare the results in a program like PS Elements.

If they do not look similar then there is a difference in the camera's performace or in operator error.

If they do look similar then the difference between the cameras is entirely in the RAW to JPEG conversion settings. If this is the case you can mess around with the defaults on the Canon and probably get it to look pretty close to the Nikon. In my limited Nikon experience I find their cameras tend to use heavy sharpening and saturation in the default settings.