A Happy Ending to a Crappy Situation Creates Another Dilemma for Me

My wife and I were in Chicago in early August and my DRebel XT and 17-40L lens were crushed by a hotel courtesy van. The guy forgot to load our luggage and he backed up over my pilot case, which of course, had the camera and lens inside of it. Well the good news is that their insurance reimbursed me the full purchase price of those two items (from early 2005 dated receipts), so I ended up netting $1900.00 from the ordeal.

Not bad, huh?

Now my dilemma...what to buy? I was eyeing the 40D for a long time, but the 50D just came out and it has some nice add-ons. You can get a new 40D for around $850 for the body when on special sale at Dell Home. The 50D goes for $1300 new. Also, I want to replace the 17-40L. I might just buy a good sharp used copy of that lens from the buy/sell threads on here.

I don't need the extra speed, but I do like the 15 MP sensor and the live-view implementation.

I do primarily landscape, fine art, and portraiture photography, so I was actually eyeing the 5D, but just don't have enough of an incentive to put down that much cash. Here is an example of the type of stuff I like to shoot (shot with the now dead DRebel XT):

HTTP response: 503

Better make sure your wife doesn't see this thread. 100% for option 4. (1 vote.)

Seriously, though: you won't be able to buy a 50D for two months or so, I bet.

-js

If I were in your specific situation, I'd wait to see if the S/N performance of the 50D lives up to the hype. If it does, and with the image size it's gonna be capable of producing, I think I'd want one. Just my $0.02...

Helluva image of "The Ditch"

From the picture posted, Id say that clearly your body is not limiting you in any way. Thats an awesome picture. I suppose the only thing to consider is that more MP means larger possible prints which is always nice when youre doing work like that.

Just how much of an improvement is the 50% higher pixel count? Let's examine that point...

22.2mm, 3888 pixel 40D vs 22.3mm 4752 pixel 50D...
At 250 ppi, that seems to yield 15.5" photo vs. 19.0" photo...apparent enlargeability advantage
But, wait! 15.5" is 17.8x enlargement to final size, vs. 19.0" is 21.65x enlargement to final size...
So if we start with the identical lens, a hot performer that provides 84 ll/mm resolution...
...the 40D delivers 4.72 ll/mm to its 15.5" print, but the 50D delivers 3.78 ll/mm to its 19.0" print. (we should keep in mind that 5 ll/mm is usually a minimum we need to maintain for the eye to perceive a print as 'sharp')
If we then try to neutralize the lens resolution to 4.7 ll/mm for both prints, then we are comparing a 15.5" 250 ppi print vs. 15.5" 312 ppi print.

So in other words, we are LENS LIMITED for max final print size, but we can get high PPI count for the identical print. But would any human eye perceive the higher PPI spec? don't think so...if anyone could, they would have the eyes of an eagle, literally!
_______________

AdamLewis wrote in post #6204861
From the picture posted, Id say that clearly your body is not limiting you in any way. Thats an awesome picture. I suppose the only thing to consider is that more MP means larger possible prints which is always nice when youre doing work like that.

That is along my lines of thinking, since I like to print big. I printed the above picture as a 20" x 30" after upsizing using PS-CS2, but it just did not have the amount of detail I wanted. I could only imagine how it would look if I had taking it with a 14-bit RAW format using a 15 MP sensor.

Lanscape = 5D

If you can, wait a month or two if/when the 5D refresh is announced and prices start to drop on the 5D. You'll probably be able to snag one for a very good deal.

You know you want it.

$1900... I'd pick up a gently used 5D for $1100 and a gently used 24-70L with the rest. You may have to be patient to find prices like this, however.

FlyingPhotog wrote in post #6204859
If I were in your specific situation, I'd wait to see if the S/N performance of the 50D lives up to the hype. If it does, and with the image size it's gonna be capable of producing, I think I'd want one. Just my $0.02...

Helluva image of "The Ditch"

Good thinking. I won't make any decision until the 50D has actually been field tested by the review sites.

Wilt wrote in post #6204883
Just how much of an improvement is the 50% higher pixel count? Let's examine that point...

22.2mm, 3888 pixel 40D vs 22.3mm 4752 pixel 50D...
At 250 ppi, that seems to yield 15.5" photo vs. 19.0" photo...apparent enlargeability advantage
But, wait! 15.5" is 17.8x enlargement to final size, vs. 19.0" is 21.65x enlargement to final size...
So if we start with the identical lens, a hot performer that provides 84 ll/mm resolution...
...the 40D delivers 4.72 ll/mm to its 15.5" print, but the 50D delivers 3.78 ll/mm to its 19.0" print. (we should keep in mind that 5 ll/mm is usually a minimum we need to maintain for the eye to perceive a print as 'sharp')
If we then try to neutralize the lens resolution to 4.7 ll/mm for both prints, then we are comparing a 15.5" 250 ppi print vs. 15.5" 312 ppi print.

So in other words, we are LENS LIMITED for max final print size, but we can get high PPI count for the identical print. But would any human eye perceive the higher PPI spec? don't think so...if anyone could, they would have the eyes of an eagle, literally!
_______________

So what you are saying Wilt is that if I uprez a 10 MP RAW from a 40D and a 15 MP RAW from a 50D to larger than 15.5", then I won't see any difference? But I also crop a lot, and could use the extra pixels for interesting compositions and larger prints.

number six wrote in post #6204855
Seriously, though: you won't be able to buy a 50D for two months or so, I bet.

-js

Not sure if this has been posted yet, but it looks like B&H is expecting it in October.

http://www.bhphotovide​o.com …_EOS_50D_SLR_Di​gital.html

pradeep1 wrote in post #6204915
So what you are saying Wilt is that if I uprez a 10 MP RAW from a 40D and a 15 MP RAW from a 50D to larger than 15.5", then I won't see any difference? But I also crop a lot, and could use the extra pixels for interesting compositions and larger prints.

That is essentially my point...that the CAPTURE by the sensor is only as good as the DELIVERY by the lens, and you can be lens limited by the total resolution of the lens divided by the mag factor to achieve final large print size.

When the 50D finally comes out, if someone could shoot the identical scene with 40D and with 50D, with only a brief period of time between the shots (to keep the conditions as close to the same as possible), and then post 100% crops of some fine detail, this would prove the point. The image might be aesthetically more pleasing from 50D, but the absolute detail content will be identical!

The 30D to 40D increase in pixel count is somewhat equivalent, albeit less dramatic, at 9% increase in linear pixel count for 30D-to-40D, vs. 22% increase for 40D-to-50D. DP Review summarized about the 30D-to-40D...
"It made sense to start our comparison with how the new camera measured up to the camera it replaces. The step from the EOS 30D's eight megapixels to the EOS 40D's ten megapixels equates to just 384 more horizontal columns and 256 vertical rows. Not a huge 'leap' in resolution by anyone's standards and that's pretty clear from these crops. If anything the EOS 40D looks slightly less crisp 'per pixel' than the EOS 30D, although there are some identifiable areas of the image which are marginally better defined because of the increased pixel count. As we may expect "


This is the age old moral of the story in photography that has always been true...BIGGER counts. Larger format always wins over smaller format because the difference in lens resolution (less, for the larger format) is so greatly offset by the deceased magnification factor to achieve the same final print size.

40D is pretty kickass. RAW image quality is definitely better than the XT. It's totally a step up you'll notice. For $1900 I would get a 40D and 17-55... AMAZING combo!

I would wait for the 50D reviews. Or you could probably get a great deal on Black Friday..