I hear that a lot, that question. Especially as in “should I buy Canon or Nikon”, or “can I buy Olympus [etc])?”.

That is a tough question to which there is no one good answer except “it depends”. It depends on things like:

• Are you already invested in lenses, etc, of one brand? Then that has the edge. Provided you can use that equipment.
• Do you want a LOT of support, knowledge, available third party hardware, etc? In that case “Canon or Nikon” is a good answer. There is less support for Pentax, Olympus, Fuji, and so on. If that is very important to you, shy away from those. But it is only important to some people, who use their equipment very intensively.
• Do you like the menus, etc, of one brand or another? Personally, I do not like the Sony menus one bit. That would at least slightly edge me toward that brand if I were to buy new equipment from scratch.
• Do you really like one brand or another? Then buy that brand.
• Is the range of cameras, lenses, flashes, etc better in one of the brands you are considering? Then that is the right answer.

There are no bad brands: technically, these are great times to be a photographer. I think that a very important thing is to actually hold the equipment you are considering and use it for at least a few minutes. If you do not love the gear you are holding in thos eminutes, you will never love it.

So in essence: buy the brand you like, but hold it by the logic of the points above.

Michael

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