so wait... you have an $8,000 dollar canon with maybe $5,000 worth of L lenses and you couldnt afford an $800 canon macro lens?!? it seems like it would be the cheapest part of your kit
dont just look at dpreview. a lot of these review sites are biased, read actual reviews on forums
i made a light box out of a cardboard box and paper... the pic in my avatar was taken with it. ill upload some pics of the simple box later ; )
why did i choose canon over nikon. personally i didnt like the fact that nikon used sony sensors. canon engineered and created their own. also build quality of the camera. the canon to nikon in my price range had my canon made out of magnesium and the nikon polycarbonate (plastic) also canon is made in japan, says so right on the body. nikons are made in thailand, says so right on the body. also low night noise canon proved to be better. recently tho new things have developed, and since the d300 came out id pay some attention to nikon. even the d40 is being replaced with the d60. dont let the higher sensor size (i.e MP) fool you. its mostly marketing, and anything over 3mp is actually better than film quality. in fact on a seonsr with a crop of 1.6X anything over 10mp youll start to see more noise interference. on full frame cameras they shouldnt really surpass 12-16mp any more is unecessary until they change the format size. hasselblad makes larger format 35mp and up cameras (used exclusively by nasa, and commercial photographers. any picture in outter space was taken with a hasselblad even on the moon landing) but their cameras start at $30,000.
so look at the rebel XTI (400D) or XSI (450D)
nikon D40X or D60
these new offerings from nikon (D60,D300,D3)are direct competition with canon and finally for the first time in the digital era VERY worthy and maybe even hard to beat competition.
i find canon images look a bit warmer (white =more orange)in terms of color, Nikon a bit cooler (white =more blue. which i actually prefer). its preference tho to which you like better. you cant wrong with either camera choice. theyre both solid performers with pros and ocns over each other, but all you need to know is the image quality on either choice is top notch