Canon Rebel XS/1000D vs Nikon D80

My wife and I were in the Smoky Mountains this past weekend and my FIL was kind enough to let us borrow his Nikon D80 and 18-105 4.0 lens.

I looked up the stats of the camera and found that it wasn't that different from my Rebel XS and yet I was consistently disappointed with A-B comparisons between my Rebel XS w 18-55 kit lens and his Nikon. My images were frequently blurry, or not entirely in focus while the Nikon's images were almost always crystal sharp. My one beef with the Nikon is that is drastically overexposed face portrait pictures.

Am I crazy? Is something wrong with my camera? I know his lens is nicer than mine but I wouldn't expect that to have anything to do with focus or sharpness because that's a calculated value from the camera body.

I've been thinking of upgrading to a T4i but after this weekend, I'm questioning whether I should be using a Canon at all.

Not enough info/samples. There's nothing about the D80 that would inherently create better images, so it likely comes down to settings and usage.

Rebel XS has a very sharp sensor and the 18-55 is reasonably good, so it's probably something you are(or are not) doing.

I respect your informed opinions but running both on the landscape "auto" setting, the Nikon was just better shot for shot.

I'm sure that if I shot every single photograph manually and with a tripod I could get the results I want but for point and shoot type shots, the Canon is proving difficult to use.

jcwillia1 wrote in post #16408816
....... but for point and shoot type shots, the Canon is proving difficult to use.

Based on this one single instance.

I appreciate your expertise but I feel like your just arguing with my impressions.

jcwillia1 wrote in post #16408824
I appreciate your expertise but I feel like your just arguing with my impressions.

How did you want the discussion to go? Nikon is definitely better, always?

Without samples and settings used, it's just one guys opinion of a single weekend.

sounds like the main difference is the photographer

I would have said - Different not better or worse just a different apperance from a nikon and a canon, im discovering this with my D200 the pics from it have a different look to my 30D - more clinical from my nikon and more treacle-ated from my old 30D(like a thicker color).


P.

Were you shooting .jpg or .raw?

If .jpg did you have all of the in-camera post processing options enabled on both cameras? Without all of the details on how the cameras were setup its hard to say what the cause is. Is it possible that with all the same settings, with the types of photos you were taking, using in camera processing that the Nikon gives you photos that look better acording to your personal preferences... ..absolutely.

I'd be interested to see some examples of each. Generally when I hear someone outright say the photos are blurry, that usually is a dramatic problem and the result of something other than the quality of the camera model.

ok guys thanks for insulting me. I'll just go elsewhere. I've come to expect better from this community.

[QUOTE=jcwillia1;16408​592].....

Am I crazy? Is something wrong with my camera? I know his lens is nicer than mine but I wouldn't expect that to have anything to do with focus or sharpness because that's a calculated value from the camera body.
......

jcwillia1 wrote in post #16408816
I respect your informed opinions but running both on the landscape "auto" setting, the Nikon was just better shot for shot.

With respect to your first statement about the lens, I'm not sure what your trying to say but I'm pretty sure your wrong. There is no "calculated value" in a camera body that determines the quality of your pictures.The quality of the lens plays a big role in the sharpness of the images. So a better lens on the Nikon than you have on your XS will probably result in sharper pictures.

I see you are using Landscape AUTO mode for emulating a point and shoot. There are three problems with expecting sharp, properly exposed shots using that mode:

1 - You are letting the camera choose how to expose the image and what to focus on.

2 - You are letting the camera software develop the image and choose the contrast, saturation etc settings for you.

3 - The camera is saving the results in a .jpg file which diminishes the amount you can tweak the image afterwards in post processing.

Hope this helps

Added later: The other point I wanted to make is that in making this comparison using AUTO modes your actually comparing the cameras developing process rather than its actual ability to take great pictures. The comparison would be better if you used RAW images for the comparison then you could apply exactly the same changes to each in post processing.

jcwillia1 wrote in post #16408592
.....
Added later: The other point I wanted to make is that in making this comparison using AUTO modes your actually comparing the cameras developing process rather than its actual ability to take great pictures. The comparison would be better if you used RAW images for the comparison then you could apply exactly the same changes to each in post processing.

This. In auto, you're basically letting the camera's pick some random settings.

jcwillia1 wrote in post #16410497
ok guys thanks for insulting me. I'll just go elsewhere. I've come to expect better from this community.

Insult = asking for more information or actual comparison photos?

My only conclusion is operator error or you have a bad XS