witch camera would be the best to buy the conon 30d or the nikon d80 i do a lot of in door sport shooting

The Nikon D80 is a clear choice for serious photographers, and here's are some raw facts why.

I have been following CMOS technology since late '90s when it was introduced in digital devices. The original concept for CMOS was to create a new photo imaging technology that would pack more megapixels in a chip and also make it more cost efficient than CCD. Well, they did just that, but the drawback to CMOS technology is, the same high quality imaging could not be achieved as in CCD technology. Even though CMOS produces a good quality, the CCD is still more superior. To compensate for some imaging weaknesses of CMOS, it takes up to around 25% more CMOS megapixels to bring the quality some where equivalent to CCD megapixels. So, for e.g. an 8 megapixel CMOS chip would be equivalent to around a high quality 6 megapixel CCD chip, or a 10 megapixel high quality CCD chip could be rated in comparison to around a 13 megapixel CMOS chip. This would mean that the Nikon D80 in a best case scenario is able of producing high quality photo images up to double the size than from the Canon 30D. These image results become more noticeable when printing large display prints or where certain detail is critical like in the lower 10% and or the higher 90% of RGB DATA. For brochure and web images either camera at full frame are generally over kill. Some Nikon D80 users have complained about the images looking a little soft, that's because there is tons of detail data packed in the image file which will appear soft looking when viewing an image at a lower magnification, but if you enlarge the image to a huge display print its perfect. The solution to this image softness is to just lower the resolution first before you decide to use sharpening option when you are using images at smaller size, because at full resolution the file size would be over kill for small prints.

Nikon was founded in year 1910. The top three major optics company in Japan merged together to form the Nikon Corporation, originally known as Nippon Kogaku K.K. Their expertise is based around high quality optics, originally with binoculars and microscopes, then progressed to nikon cameras and many other instruments that required the best optical quality. Nikon had about 30 years of optical expertise before the nikon camera came was introduced. That's why the Nikon razor sharp optics is and has been so famously known for. At the same time, optical detail can be degraded from poor supporting recording media, whether its film or digital. The high quality results of CCD technology is why Nikon will not stand down or compromise.

I have never come across any photographers that purchased a Nikon camera system for the reason of: cosmetic stylish looks, marketing trends and gimmicks, fancy packaging, cheap price, or because it was an alternative to some other higher quality camera system. They all purchased a Nikon camera system for the same reason, for the high quality. There is not one other major camera manufacture that can claim that. Around 1980 when Nikon introduced the great line of Nikkor AI lenses, a percentage of photographers did not like cosmetic look of these AI lenses and switched over to Canon because it was more attractive, regardless of how good the Nikkor lenses were. Around the same time, Canon introduced the fancy AE programming that attracted more non-serious photographers, "I REST MY CASE"

As far as making your final choice between the Nikon or Canon., they both have similar features that will do the job for your sports photography needs. The new 18-135mm Nikkor zoom lens that Nikon has packaged with the D80 and the D200 has to be one of the best versatile digital lenses available, "OUTSTANDING". The coverage from this zoom ratio will be more than likely the only digital lens most Nikon photographers will ever need. The auto focus motor is quick and extremely quite. The optics are razor sharp.

One final thought to consider. If you are at a professional commercial photography level, I would recommend looking into a Hasselblad digital camera system. The H1D offers a 22 megapixel CCD (medium format) camera or the H2D that offers a super high quality 39 megapixel CCD.(DSLR).

Good Luck!
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