[Bob_Wilson]

I fought it for years. I only embraced digital after an acquaintance of mine whose pictures appear regularly in National Geographic told me that he has switched almost exclusively to digital. It took me a long time to decide whether I should stick with the Nikon line or switch to Canon. I decided to stick with Nikon primarily because Canon was simply too damn expensive.

If money had been no object, I would have gone with the D2Xs line, but since I do not shoot professionally I could not justify the expense. I chose the D200 kit with the 18-200mm lens, and I could not be happier. I picked the D200 because of its metal body, the physical layout of the camera, and its features.

Since I don't have to buy film, and it does not cost anything to have film developed, I find that I am taking many more pictures than I would if I were still depending on chemically based photography. With an 8GB card and the auxiliary battery holder, the camera will take 480 RAW images before it has to be down loaded. The real test will come next year when I will document my church choir's concert tour of England and Scotland.

Software wise I got both Adobe's Lightroom and Nikon's Capture NX. I like the user interface of LR much better than NX, but NX produces better results when correcting an image.

I don't really know why I am taking the time to post this, but perhaps it will contain something that will help someone else.