More rampant Western materialism over cheap technology...

Stuff I like

• The Auto ISO control: you can set a base ISO and let the camera raise it to maintain a minimum shutter speed (e.g. 1/30th to avoid camera shake). Working in low light, I'm not overly worried about noise or high image quality so long as I can get the shot.
• The weight and handling: any SLR could always stand to be lighter, but this feels nice in the hand and has a good heft.
• The way you can just hold the button down and blast away, sometimes without even putting the camera to your eye. I wouldn't normally say this is good photographic practice, but for certain subjects (like, say, hyperactive children), it's A-W-E-S-O-M-E. Some of these informal grab shots often turn out to be the best in terms of capturing a moment. And no celluloid trees have to die to make them.
• RAW files: thanks to UFRaw, I now have an element of 16 bit workflow under Linux.
• Resolution: those files look surprisingly clear at 100% compared to the average scan.

Stuff I'm not so keen on

• Menus: Being aimed at the naïve user, most of the settings are buried in the menu system. It's a good system, but it's difficult to remember where everything is. If one thing would have ameliorated this somewhat, it would have been putting the metering selection on a dedicated button; sometimes you want to swap rapidly between matrix, centre and spot. ISO and White Balance - which I care less about - both have shortcuts so why not this?
• Out-of-camera JPEGs: The D50 is supposed to output the best ones of all the Nikon DSLRs, but many of the ones I've seen so far look visibly poor - dim, unsaturated and off-colour - and even the ones that pass for acceptable on first glance look much worse after post-processing and comparing the NEF versions.
• Digital workflow: the tedious manual process of scanning negatives and slides is replaced with the involving and creative act of fiddling with RAW conversions and, for B/W, the channel mixer. This is more satisfying but ultimately achieves no reduction - probably the opposite - in the time spent on images. Digital brings out your worst inner perfectionist even - perhaps especially - on the lousiest shots.
• Managing hundreds of 6MP output files: Basically, I have enough spare disk to dump a full 1Gb card four times and then it's time to start archiving to DVD. I'm going to need an external drive sooner rather than later. And while I swore I would be more aggressive when it came to deleting sub-par or duplicate shots, in practice it hasn't happened - particularly when your Glamorous Research Assistant says, "Aw, they're all lovely, keep them!"
• Lack of time to try long exposures, multiple exposures, pinholes, manual lenses, etc.

Stuff that wasn't an issue in the end

• The viewfinder: it still sucks, but not yet sufficiently to overly bother me. I haven't felt the need to spring for a magnifying eyepiece yet.
• DX crop factor: My 24mm and 50mm AFD lenses give me 35mm and 75mm equivalents on the D50, which is a good pairing.

I haven't yet bought the Sigma 35mm prime or any DX wide angles, or even a Lensbaby, as I haven't had sufficient time to justify their use: that's one aspect of photography that buying a DSLR has completely failed to address.

Nikon launched the D200 at the tail end of last year and from the specs, it was finally the DSLR I said I'd been holding out for. So I bought a D50. Eh?

I had few requirements, but unfortunately those I had were also of little appeal in the (m)ass market:

• Decent viewfinder, rather than the tiny portholes of the D50/70.
• Backwards compatibility with AI lenses.

Full frame sensor, 16 megapixels and all that jazz - not bothered. Just gimme a proper view and a meter that works with secondhand glass. The D200 has these. I figured I could even sell my F80, which I only use occasionally for colour slide work or flash pics - rather poor slides, that I could happily do without scanning and archiving.

It also has an advanced multi-segment meter, 5 fps shooting rate, metal chassis with full weathersealing and a ton of other pro features that, not being a pro (like 90% of the people who would buy one), I'd never need. And a price tag I didn't need either. I re-examined my needs:

• The viewfinder in the D200 was notably better than the consumer models by all accounts, but in the overall scheme reckoned to be "almost" as good as the F80's, which in turn is still no match for an old FE. Wow, you mean I can have that for over a grand?!

  In fact, there are ways to adapt a DK-17M magnifying eyepiece to fit the D50 and D70, which at least mitigates their worst shortcomings - and for a lot less money.

• My main reason for wanting AI compatibility was to use the wonderful 35/1.4 Nikkor that I had spent some time seeking out last year. It's my best lens (no, not for the optical quality - for the characteristics) and, even via import, probably my most expensive.

  However, thanks to the DX sensor crop factor, it becomes more like a 50mm lens with a DOF equivalent to f/2.6, which is much less exciting. And the clincher: for less than the cost of the D200, I could buy a D50 and a brand new Sigma 30/1.4. Not to mention a third party DX wide angle zoom if necessary.

  I have other AI lenses, and I'd still like a 50/1.2, but again the DX metric renders them less appealing on a DSLR.

• Weight: One area in which the D50 definitely scores over the D200 is its lighter weight - for me anyway, others often seem to rate a camera by how many inches it makes their neck droop. Here are some comparative figures:

  Model	Weight (g)
  D200	830
  D50	620
  D70	680
  F80	515
  FE2	570
  EM	460

  Note that these are rough figures, although I think the D200 weight shown is without the battery - so it would be even more in practice. Of course, all that weight is a sign of the build quality - but again, I'm not a pro and I don't expect to be wearing it while jumping out of a helicopter on to the frozen tundra at the North Pole during a blizzard and having to whack an attacking polar bear. Personally, I find that even the FE2 feels like too much of a brick to actively want to lump it around for long, whereas the cheap, insubstantial little EM is perfect for carrying anywhere. So the D50 is still at the wrong end of the graph, but at least it's not twice as bad.

With the money saved on the D50, I'm also considering a few fripperies like a Lensbaby and a proper laser-cut pinhole body cap - yeah, quality comes at any price for me. And if I'm a digital king after a year or two, there should be some bargain offers on D200s as the herd moves on to the D250X or whatever.

Of course, you might still need a D200 to:

• take fast action shots of your dog;
• capture those elusive and rare sunsets;
• check the resolution of 10MP images of crockery and compare noise handling at high ISOs when photographing woven cloth;
• balance your huge telezooms or ego.

New year, new camera: I wanted to buy a Nikon D50 DSLR. I'm not proud and I'm not giving up on film, but I needed something digital that accepted fast lenses, gave acceptable images at high ISOs and had a shooting rate that could keep up with my nine month old Junior Research Assistant's expression changing between joyful, intrigued, puzzled and raspberry-blowing every few seconds. If it weren't for the F-mount compatibility and ridiculously low price, I'd be buying a proper DSLR with a decent viewfinder. </rant>

So I took a moral stance and went down to the shops...

Specifically, I went to Jacobs, who have given me good service in the past (chiefly through their willingness to recommend somewhere else when they didn't have something). After all, I wanted to handle a D50, and I didn't want to see every high street shop fall victim to discount Internet pricing (just Jessops). And I didn't want to risk an unknown web retailer who might take my money and ship a box three weeks later containing a dead rat, and then demand two years of protracted wrangling before replacing it. And besides, Amazon wanted twelve quid more.

The fondling bit went quite well, but then it turned out that they didn't have a black N50 body-only - like the one I was holding - in stock. But they could get one by next Wednesday, which was only three days (uh, plus a weekend) later. So I remembered my moral stance, reminded myself it was a crappy camera that I regretted having to buy anyway, and gave them my details. (Why didn't I just buy a silver body instead? Because dammit, I'm the bloody consumer and I want that one!)

Five days later, I went back and was told that they couldn't get one. We're not talking about the ultra-rare platinum-plated special edition D50X with the built-in submarine periscope here. A bog standard consumer D50 from the second largest SLR manufacturer, and the best they could do was special order it in "about two weeks". I was polite; I said, "Thanks anyway" before walking out.

Back online, I hunted around for better luck. To be fair, it appears that black D50 bodies are indeed somewhat rare at present (although "out of stock" on the Jessops web site certainly replicates the experience of visiting one of their stores). I found two UK Nikon retailers who were warmly recommended by other owners: AJ Purdy and Park Cameras; both seemed to have stock. I went with AJ Purdy and got the camera I wanted for £355 plus free delivery via Royal Mail, so there could be no hassles dealing with a courier. (Incidentally, that's less than price of the F80 I bought from Jacobs that started me on this pointless, frustrating hobby three years ago - although if you remove the magic word "digital", the D50 is actually a sub-£200 basic SLR.) It arrived 36 hours later. Obviously I never felt the human touch at any point (i.e. the bit that smarms at you, gets upset when you won't buy an overpriced memory card as well and then puts the wrong box in the bag), but there are pictures of Purdy's glamorous staff on their web site if I wanted to gaze soulfully into their eyes, something that often gets you thrown out of a shop unless you're spending over a grand (in which case the assistant may gaze back and blow kisses as you leave).

From this triumphant finale, I conclude that high street camera shops - even the tolerable ones like Jacobs - could well be dead men walking. If you're working in one, I hope you're also studying that "Teach Yourself PHP" book in the evenings. The street price of the D50 is £399, and at that level there can't be any profit unless they can also flog a pile of overpriced accessories at the same time - and that was never going to happen (we're talking an extra forty quid for an SD card). (Of course, there probably wasn't much margin in it for AJ Purdy either; but they're going to get repeat business.) The online store:

• carries more stock;
• usually has cheaper prices due to lower overheads;
• ships next day, sometimes for free;
• doesn't let you handle the goods, but on the other hand gives you plenty of time to consider your purchase.

...while the high street store:

• never has the thing you want in stock;
• can't tell you when it can get one either ("Errr...we might get a delivery on Thursday but I dunno what's in it");
• prices the same as every other shop, even in a "sale";
• may employ monkeys, the less well-mannered kind.

Grass 'em all over and plant trees instead. Or more likely, Tescos.

Other bubbles

• HMV boss is first victim; admits he didn't see it coming and was blindsided by the appeal of lower prices and more stock. Who pays these idiots??