| Wednesday, February 16, 2005 |
16:14 - I have the touch
|
(top)  |
I was all set to buy a Canon Digital Rebel for the Alaska trip I'm planning. I figure I have six months to get good at using it, or at least to convince myself through lots of muttering and tinkering that it makes more pleasing photographs than I could get with a little pocket-sized point-and-shoot.
I'd read countless reviews, all of which glowed. I'd looked at the product history since its 2003 introduction, during which it's become one of the most popular digital cameras out there. I'd talked to camera geek after camera geek, discussed lenses to buy, accessories to scrounge, beanbags to make (for quickly grabbing shots out the car window, to steady it on the windowsill). I'd gone to pricegrabber.com to find well-rated stores with criminally low prices at about 40% of MSRP. I'd placed the order.
And the day I do so is the day that the Digital Rebel gets discontinued.
How do I do it, huh? The same thing happened with the armoire and TV stand combination I bought last year: after searching for weeks to find the perfect style at the perfect price, I placed the order, only to find that the manufacturer had just killed the entire line, and since all the online furniture retailers just drop-ship from the factory and don't retain any inventory of their own, dozens of stores kept saying they had the units in stock, only to call me back after I placed the order and tell me that the manufacturer had shipped out the last unit the day before I placed my first order (of many, all of which I eventually gave up on).
Maybe I should live in New York, where people don't seem to have these problems.
Anyway, I'm not too worried—the reason for the Digital Rebel/300D's being discontinued is allegedly that it will soon be replaced by a newer, more studly model, presumably at the same price point, with 8 megapixels instead of 6 and the second-generation image processor—in other words, a stripped-down version of the new 20D rather than the (now-discontinued) 10D that the 300D was based on. Makes perfect sense. All I have to do is wait. The guy I talked to at the online camera store told me that his information confirms these rumors (the announcement is supposed to be at PMA this weekend, so this is all the same stuff we all go through right before a Stevenote); I can either get a better camera for the same money, or pick up a clearance-priced 300D for a song.
Gee, I sure hope the actual photography is this much fun.
UPDATE: Whew! Thank you! Boy, I posted this just in time, huh?
|
|
Brian Tiemann
