Monday, November 07, 2016

Camera Quandary

So, I have gotten a bunch of mileage out of the Nikon P7000 I bought used in March of last year. However it has never really recovered from getting left sitting atop my range bag in the blowing grit on the range in Topeka earlier this year.

Alas, little Nikon...
The little leaf shutter that protects the lens would stick in a not-fully-open position. Some alcohol on a Q-tip helped, but it got a fresh dose of grit at either Blogorado or ECQC and I think it's probably snapped its last. Considering I bought it used for about a c-note and carried it everywhere for well over a year, I'm thinking I got my money's worth.

So I'm on the horns of a dilemma when it comes to replacing it...

On the one hand, shopping the used market in the same class of camera can get a lot of bang for the buck in the $150-$250ish range. Plenty of cameras with reasonably fast lenses in the superzoom category; you can find four- and five-year-old high-end P&S in this price class.

Alternatively, for $300-ish, I could pick up a used Sony NEX-5N or -5T and a compact 18-50mm Power Zoom lens. This would be crowding the boundaries of what I can carry in the document pocket of my gun burkha, but it uses the same E-mount lenses as the Hasselblad. That means that in addition to being my day-to-day pocket camera, I could probably carry both around the zoo, one with the short zoom (or a fast fixed lens) and one with the long zoom, for less bulk than the D200 and its big battery grip and a second lens.

Also, it would use a conventional lens cap instead of the fine little leaf shutter. I'm a little paranoid about the durability of the latter right now.
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