Brand Loyalty

Choosing your camera brand is a little bit like getting married. You agonize over making sure you’ve chosen the the right one, spend the big bucks to make the big leap, and if you choose to divorce aka “switch”, there’s hell to pay (as well as a few thousand dollars).

We’re of course talking about the big two DSLR brands here: Canon and Nikon. (Wait, you use LOLympus? We’re sorry about that. Better luck next time).

When one photog meets another photog, they basically turn into dogs, sniffing each other’s asses and making an assessment about the other person’s gear. You can try to hide your brand with a piece of black gaffers tape, but you know you’re not fooling anyone. The trained eye of a photojournalist can see (and photograph) your shame.

Let’s ignore the fact that Canon and Nikon are two reputable brands that do the same job very well. ONE HAS TO BE BETTER THAN THE OTHER, RIGHT?

Let’s also ignore the reality that most of us chose our brands based on the first type of camera we used. As far as we’re concerned, we used our innate, infinite knowledge of the camera world to pick our brand, and anyone who says otherwise is wrong, dammit.

Have you ever tried to be helpful and suggested the other team to a fellow photographer who seems frustrated with their current gear? Chances are that you got your head ripped off. Your harmless tip obviously means that you are a condescending prig who is trying to undermine anyone and everyone who uses a different brand than you.

Quite possibly the biggest slap in the face is when someone asks for your opinion on which brand to use and they end up choosing the other. What the fuckballs?

No matter your “orientation”, we’ll still be friends with you. Unless you choose Nikon.

(this post was in no way influenced by the reality that 2/3 of the writers use Canon and the lone Nikon user is about to switch. Not at all…)