Nikon or Canon cameras?

Right now I'm looking to buy a dslr. I'm looking at the Nikon D3100, but is there a better Canon? I'm really confused at the whole "this one is better" thing. So if anyone could give the pros and cons of each brand and what they would recommend?

There's no "better".It is purely subjective. Each manufacturer fights with marketing to attract buyers, and at any time one brand or the other may have one or two oftentimes worthless "features" on their cameras that clueless amateurs think of as "better". New camera bodies come out almost constantly. One is always trying to be "better" than the other, but when it comes down to actually taking photos, there are no real differences.

The best thing you can do is go to a photo store and actually see and handle each camera. One may simply feel better to you. You may just like the name of one over the other. Just get whichever appeals most to you. Don't base your decision on some meaningless opinion from anyone here.

There's no better Canon at $700, equal but not better (Canon T1i/500D)

This whole thing about Nikon entry level cameras using "only" AF-S lenses is not to big a deal since all most all the most used Nikkor lenses are AF-S lenses

You can look here to see which those are

http://www.nikonusa.com/...index.page

To list the pros and cons of one model Canon to a similarly priced Nikon is going to be based upon ones point of view.

All you can do is compare the two in a camera store as well as do a lot of research of not only the specific camera bodies, but the camera systems too.

Here is a link that tests the two camera bodies (D3100 and 500D/T1i)

http://www.dxomark.com/...nd2)/Nikon

As you can see if your interested in shooting in low light, the Nikon is clearly going to produce less noise. You can also see that the extra 1 mp on the Canon sensor has done nothing to improve its sensor performance when compared to the D3100

The D3100 has Full HD video; 1920 x 1080 @ 24 fps
The T1i/500D has Full HD video, but at a weird fps of only 20

You can get a whole lot more camera for your money with a Sony…

Neither is better. Both are good brands.

No need to be confused.