Nikon Vs Canon and Why We Switched to Nikon

Some of you may or may not know but we made the switch from Canon to Nikon! I know, I know, we came over to the dark side and when I say we are brand loyalist, we LOVE our brands. Let’s start with everyone’e favorite, and if its not, there’s grace for you too.

Apple – we love that sleek look, and it just works, it has its ups and downs and mostly downs right about now, but I’m going down with the ship if it goes down hill.
Nike – I mean come on, some of the coolest shoes on the planet are made by Nike. Because I love their shoes so much, I don’t even want to wear Reebok or Adidas clothes.
Then there was Canon – Man. Let me tell you! When I first saw that cool red ring around “the expensive lenses” and that huge white lens, I was sold! Canon is clearly the coolest camera system (other than Leica, but who can afford that) and all of the coolest photographers shoot with them, no offense to Nikon shooters.

That list could go on and on but there are just some times where you say enough is enough and thats where we hit out breaking point with Canon and we had to make the switch. So we are going to tell you why we think Nikon is the perfect camera for wedding photography.

Now, this is just our opinion and this isn’t the end all be all but we will share some of our practical pros and cons of the cameras! I won’t give an exhasutive list of pros and cons between the two, just things that were noticeable for me while shooting 30 weddings a year with canon gear!

I also shot about 12-15 weddings shooting both Canon AND Nikon and I even shot a whole wedding shooting with one camera and one lens (Nikon d750 and Sigma 35mm 1.4 Art). So I feel I have a pretty sample size for the capabilities of each system under the same scenarios.

I will also note that, choosing between Canon & Nikon is also a style preference for you style of wedding photography as well. In our experience, the camera bodies almost seem like they are preferred more by certain photographers depending on their styles, it seemed to be a trend that we saw. People that shoot film and digital or like more of a light and airy look tend to be Canon shooters and shooters that have a moodier feel or had more vibrant/contrasty colors tend to be Nikon users. In the Charlotte Wedding Photography market our style is a little different but you can mostly guess who is shooting with what!

As far as pricing, it came out to about even surprisingly! We made most of our money on the flashes but by switching from used Canon gear to brand new Nikon/Sigma/Yongnuo we actually made a little bit of money! haha!

holding her between the arches under the tunnel during their anniversary session

Canon

Our gear list for Canon included:

Canon 5D Mark 2
Canon 5D Mark 3
Canon 85mm 1.2L
Canon 50mm 1.2L
Canon 34mm 1.4L II before switching to the Sigma 35mm 1.4 art lens.
Canon 27-70 2.8L II
Canon 70-200 2.8L Is II
Canon 100mm Macro 2.8L
5 x Canon 600 Ex-Rt 2 Flashes

Pros:

Depth of Field in lenses – This is a huge perk for some people that love a lens that can go to 1.2 and get that extra depth of field. Canon Glass has also been at the top of the list for many photographers
Workhorse Bodies – Canon builds them strong and they feel strong!
Easy User Interface – Canon created menus that are simple and efficient. They were easy and helpful for us to use.

Cons:

Dynamic Range – If I messed up a shot, I could almost guarantee I wouldn’t be able to bring it back in post production. Canon files don’t do the best job at bringing out details from shadows or highlights. I haven’t personally used the Mk4 yet but I know a lot of people have said that it still doesn’t compare.
Low Light Capabilities – OH Y GOODNESS! I rarely went over iso 2500 without seeing noticeable grain in my images, and that was with the Mark 3!
Focus speed and accuracy – Equally as frustrating as the previous two is the amount of images that were composed perfectly, during the perfect moment and ended up being blurry! Some of this was user error but other times it was the focus motor in the camera, it just wasn’t good enough!
Wasn’t impressed with the 600EX flash system, they are SUPER expensive and I often misfired or took too long to buffer. The Yongnuos are a quarter of the price and have performed just as well!

Nikon

Nikon Gear:

Pros:

Wifi – The Wifi is pretty freaking awesome! You can take the images straight from the camera to your phone. The only downfall to that is that I shoot in Monochrome so my Jpgs that would be transferred would all be monochrome!
Dynamic Range – OHHHH MYYY GOODNESS! This camera is amazing! I haven’t experienced dynamic range like this and it is awesome. We generally under-expose things to we can save a lot more detail than over exposing and losing details in the highlights. This has allowed us to keep SOOO much information in those shadows and highlights and its amazing! Words can’t describe it, I will include some before and after gifs below!
Low Light capabilities – Lets just say I have no problem shooting over 5K iso if I need to!
Focus Speed and Accuracy – Nailed It! That is all.
THe flip screen! – This may not seem like a big deal, but I freaking love that thing! I use it at every shoot, all of the time!!

Cons:

They don’t have the strongest lens selection as far as Nikon lenses So we use all sigma glass, and its amazing! We LOVE our sigma lenses!
Build quality is not as high as Canon’s but still good enough.
The Eye cap falls off allllll of the time. So now we just take them off and save them in case we sell the camera later!