Slashdot Mirror
Guide to your Perfect Digital Camera
Alan Dang writes "I've just posted a new digital camera buyer's guide at FiringSquad titled A Tale of Two Cameras. It explains why the digital SLR may not be the best camera for you, and helps you narrow down your holiday digital camera buying to a short list."
...for pointless use of Flash. :-(
OOPS!h tml"
"/pfucata_digicam_guide_04/lowres/upgrade.
The document you are trying to view is not available or the URL is incorrect. Please double-check the URL you are trying to visit at the address bar above. If you know the URL is correct and you are still viewing this message, please contact FiringSquad Tech Support.
Just go to dpreview and get better information without all the annoying page transition "features".
Look one post up. That's it. There is no article to read, slashdotters rejoice!
I just think it would be helpful when making a "buyer's guide" like this to include some printer recommendations for the layman all the way up to the pro...
Meet today's nominee for the 2004 Worst Application of Flash Award.
Obliteracy: Words with explosions
DSLR Cameras: $1200 and up
Point, shoot and wait cameras: $200-500
I've already bought a new camera just a few weeks ago for the Thanksgiving holiday. It's the Canon 75 - 3.2M - with a 512 CF card. I can take the highest resolution and have room for 300+ pics, and that's more than what I need. I would suggest going with 3.2M unless you need to print larger than 8x10, anything higher is just for bragging rights. This Canon is all auto, but has a ton of options (via the dial on the top) to turn on/off diff auto aspects, so you can do allot manually if you want to. I love it.
I've handed down my old Olympus 460Z to my daughter (4 1/2 years old) to play with, and she's having a blast. Amazing how much digi cams have improved.
Pcv%%
free ipod and free gmail!
It looks like an attempt to view any page past the "Choose your resolution" screen results in a page containing an iframed advert, some Flash, and some JavaScript to see if you hava Flash.
Users without Flash then get redirected to what appears to be intended to be an instruction to upgrade (I can't, and wouldn't if I could) which is actually a 404 error page.
Does anyone have a mirror which doesn't depend on Flash?
may be the one you already own.
I have the ubiquitous 1.3Mp, compact-flash, USB 1.0 model. I got it on sale a couple of years ago, and take pictures maybe two or three times a year, usually in a batch of 50 or so.
Until someone can tell me why I should upgrade when my simple needs are already met, I'll stick with the devil I know.
sigs, as if you care.
The article asserts "Your eye has a lot of depth of field. Everything you see is sharp and in focus. the laws of physics make it impossible for a camera to do this".
Well, actually most of what one sees is out of focus, since the eyes constantly adjust to favor a specific depth of field at any one time, leaving everything else fuzzy. If you compare this to an autofocussing camera, they are actually quite similar, and well within the "laws of physics". The future's flexible lenses will bring cameras even closer to the model used by the eyes.
Worst flash ever. It's one thing to have useless flash on an artsy site, but to use flash like this on a site/page that should be informative is worse than annoying. I would have read the article if it were plain HTML, but after 15 seconds of the flash navigation, I left and won't be back.
Are you a Candy Addict?
Basically, though, there are two types of camera users: Hobbyists and casual users.
A hobbyist wants a DSLR and is willing to buy accessories and learn to use it. If you're not willing to do these things, you'll be disappointed. I'm one of these guys, and I'd suggest that people find a cheaper hobby. As a side note -- $900 for the dRebel? *After* rebate? Shop around a little, pal...
Casual users are a little more involved, but it comes down to three things that are easy to answer once you get asked the questions:
Megapixels: You almost certainly don't need more than 4.
Zoom: Think carefully here. Most cameras are 3x zoom, but is that enough? Are you planning to take pictures at Disneyland or at, say, your kid's soccer game? At Disney for a posed shot, 3x zoom is enough. Otherwise, a 10x or 12x megazoom with IS might be worth spending money on.
Size: Remember that the best camera is the one you have with you when you need it. What is easiest for you to carry around?
Think that over, then go to www.dpreview.com and look at the test shots for the cameras that meet your specs. I usually end up recommending one of the Canon Sx00 series (S410, S500, etc) for a good balance of size and picture quality. I'd specifically stay away from the Minolta Z line myself (very disappointed with the Z3).
And for the love of God, shop around! Don't buy at Best Buy unless you're ready to pay $100-$200 extra. Go on PriceGrabber.com and consider the retailers with good reviews -- I won't specifically mention those I've bought from in the past, but the retailer reviews are a good guide; don't go with someone poorly reviewed to save $20.
Every year during my review, I just pray the words "slashdot.org" aren't mentioned.
Aw, damnit.
If you want to take pictures of your family at the holidays and keep memories of your vactation to Disney World, you get a standard digital camera. If you are a more serious photographer interested in artistry, you buy an SLR.
---Technology will liberate us if it doesn't enslave us first.
That's all great information...but what about some advice for the budget segment? I want to buy someone a digital camera for Xmas but I don't want to spend more than $200.
To me, this segment is the MOST likely to have a wide range of quality for the price point. Does anyone have advice here as to makes or models in the $200 or less price range? "Don't bother for less than $X" is also valid advice if you can back it up, of course...
Xentax
You shouldn't verb words.
Single Lens Reflex. In an SLR camera, you are looking through the lens when you put your eye to the viewfinder. In a simpler camera you are not.
When the axe came to the forest, the trees said, "Look out - the handle was once one of us."
Unless all your photos are landscape mode, you likely have to go through one by one and rotate appropriately. Many newer cameras have an orientation sensor that records EXIF info so that programs like jhead can automatically rotate them for you. This removed the biggest chore I used to do with my digital photos. Also, if you take group photos to enlarge more than 5x7" you'll notice that 1.3MP is not enough. I think 5MP is overkill, but 3 or 4 is good.
Hate to be an annoyance:
I don't understand why cameras with big sensors need to be SLR. Are there professional grade cameras with interchangable lenses that don't depend on the optical viewfinder?
Are there semi-compact digital cameras with high quality lenses and big sensors?
Why does every digital camera have a crappy motor-driven zoom? Aren't there others out there that would prefer a normal (no-zoom) lens? Isn't a motor-driven zoom totally useless?
Are there decent digital cameras with decent macro lenses?
There are no trails. There are no trees out here.
Given the prices of getting real prints made are dropping through the floor, its weird people even bother with photo printers, unless you're shooting pictures you don't want the processor to see.
I have an Alps MD-5000 dye sublimation printer, and at a cost of a buck a print, I can make prints quite a bit better quality than a consumer optical process can do, or those dyesub Kodak kiosks. But for $.24 a print, I can get them printed as true photographs at Wal(greens|mart), and will end up with a quality that is nearly as good for most stuff.
Considering the best ink-jets I've seen aren't even in the ballpark in terms of quality as compared to my Alps or a photo print from a Fuji processor, I find it funny people drop a couple hundred bucks plus ink on a photo printer.
The break-even point is in the thousands of pictures, in terms of cost, and you get grainy, pixelated prints of unknown long-term image stability.
I just got a D70, and am extremely happy. I already had a nice lens (Nikkor 24-120G VR AF-S Lens) and flash, so it was a no brainer. After selling my old body, it was about $500 to upgrade, and considering how much I spend on film and developing, I saved money.
Some Advantages of Digital for me (I shoot Concerts):
-ISO 1600 is very usable, enabling VERY low light pics like this one.
-Auto White Balance (or simply the ability to change it) alows me to go from outside to inside to inside w/flourescent lights
-I can carry the equivalent of 4 rolls of film on a 1GB CF card, which is more than enough most of the time.
I'd like to know how you are using the LCD to compose a photo with a DSLR ;) I'd think that the mirror would kind of get in the way of that :P
I got a 1.3 mp cmos based aiptek and a samsung 2.1 megapixel ccd based camera the cmos aiptek takes a picture that looks warmer and more vibrant than the samsung and I only paid 24 dollars for it the only thing is it does not come with a flash like the samsung though even that is about useless the damn samsung does not even have a IR filter. I will say this though If you know how to adjust the various settings on a cheap digi cam you can get a picture to come out a lot better
Single Lens Reflex
Single lens reflex - the viewfinder looks through the main camera lens, so what you see - focus, zoom, filters, etc - is what you get on film.
It is a camera that use a single lens system to frame the picture from the viewfinder and to capture the pictre on film or on CCD. Also known as TTL (Through The Lens).
One feature the dpreview buying guide doesn't ask you for is the orientation sensor. Not all new cameras have it; I know Canons generally do. The orientation sensor saves you the trouble of rotating from landscape to portrait because EXIF information is written that lets programs like jhead do it automatically. If you take photos in batches, I highly recommend buying a camera with this feature.
I do agree that dpreview is a great source of information overall, and I didn't have patience to work through much of the annoying flash presentation in this article.
Is the perfect one. At least that's what he tells me.
is what you get on film
Or CCD, in this case...
...win for me every time. Flash cards are too costly by comparison. USB is too slow. Mini CD-R/RW is the perfect medium for digital photography. Check out my latest JE for my "Ask Slashdot JE" entry regarding digital photo management.
-"...bad old ideas look confusingly fresh when they are packaged as technology" - Jaron Lanier (Digital Maoism on Edge.o
Doesn't anyone realize the humor in an article about cameras totally done in Flash? It's like an ethereal pun!
This article was focused on a single point pretty much, SLR or non-SLR.
The way I see it is - if you're looking to get a digital camera and you don't even know what SLR is, don't get one. It's designed for advanced and more knowledgable photographers.
That being said, I own a Canon A80 which I am quite happy with. Also, a good book on digital photography which I also own is Complete Digital Photography 2nd Ed
# fuser -v
#
The guide to your perfect website design.
Don't use flash for text.
The biggest problem I have with my Kodak digital camera (and even some of the nice Canon ones) is the large amount of redeye that is introduced into pictures.
Are there any cameras that take 1 sec to take a picture with flash and have eliminated red eye?
A camera without flash would be pretty useless.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
The main thing to focus on when buying a digital SLR isn't the cost of the camera itself but the lenses.
The camera itself will set you back around $1000, and if you're particularly lucky you'll get a lens in your package, as with the Canon digital rebel kit.
However, unless you already own lenses from your traditional camera days (AND they have the right mount! Canon mounts usually require Canon lenses!), you better be prepared through the nose for a lens that's equivalent to the the 10x (35-350mm)optical zoom on the Nikon 8800, or the 12x (36-432 mm) Panasonic Lumix FZ20. Both of these cameras have vibration reduction systems... and for SLRs, the stabilization is on the lens side, not on the camera side.
So you're looking at something like a Nikon 70-200 f/2.8D Autofocus Lens with VR - lists for about $1,500 or so.
Also keep in mind that these aren't really the cameras professionals use. The EOS 20D comes close, but the D70 and Digital Rebel (aka 300D IIRC), are crippled compared to a higher-end ($2000+) pro slr. The amount of shots captured per second, frame buffer, noise are far closer to that prosumer "all-in-one" solution than a Nikon D2X. In fact, a lot of manufacturers will intentionally limit the or reduce some of the features of their cameras, using throttled-down versions of the same memory chips, so as not to have the cheaper line usurp the larger profit margins of the more expensive camera.
I got a little way through this piece and came across a gross error which, for me, made the rest of the article of very dubious worth.
One of the reasons extolled at length for choosing one type against abother is that a DSLR has a narrow depth of field and a "standard" digital camera has a greater depth. As anyone who knows about photography would know this is total tosh.
The depth of field depends upon the aperture of the iris. A small aperture acts rather like a pinhole camera and hence will give a great depth of field. A large aperture relys upon the lens for focus and hence depends greatly on the focal length of the lens system giving critical focus and a very narrow depth of field.
Cheap "standard" digital cameras will usually have a small lens and small (fixed?) aperture hence a large depth of field. More expensive "standard" digital cameras are more sophisticated and allow the user to change the aperture and have a larger lens, so they can have a narrow depth of field.
Digital SLRs are totally dependant upon the lens system. However, because they have a variable iris within the lens systems they can have either a very wide depth of field (if they're stopped right down) or a very narrow depth of field (iris wide open). Both the end points of these will depend entirely on the characteristics of the lens systems.
How many people would accept an article which said that you shouldn't buy a 35mm SLR because you only get a narrow depth of field?
Agrajag: "Oh no, not again!"
That seems steep. Maybe this article is designed for the semiprofessional photographer who carries more than one camera around? That way the discussion about weight and bulk sounds more relevant. I mean if you're going to spend $1000 on a digital camera you may already be familiar with Digital Hasselblads.
Unless you are a newspaper photographer or photo journalist.
Do you still use LP's?
Another really good resource for selecting and learning about digital cameras can be found at imaging-resource.com.
It has quite detailed reviews of pretty much every digital camera out there as well as sample images (there are even pages that allow you to compare images of the same thing taken by different cameras) and discussion forums.
I found it particularly useful when I was picking out my camera.
"why cameras with big sensors need to be SLR"
Sensors are expensive. From a manufacturing perspective, smaller is cheaper and as all buisness is driven by the bottom line. The drive is to smaller sensors. I have seen 3mp sensor shrink about 3 times now.
SLRs using current lenses are exempt from this shrinkage as they have to mate with lenses designed for Film. So they have to be of similar size. It is more like SLRs force big sensors when using current lens systems.
"Are there professional grade cameras with interchangable lenses that don't depend on the optical viewfinder? Are there semi-compact digital cameras with high quality lenses and big sensors?"
There is a digital rangefinder with interchangeable lenses and a big sensor. Epson RD-1. $3000 for the body.
"Why does every digital camera have a crappy motor-driven zoom? Aren't there others out there that would prefer a normal (no-zoom) lens? Isn't a motor-driven zoom totally useless?"
Digital SLR take the same lenses as film counterparts and are manual zoom. Point and shoot digital mirror point and shoot film cameras that also have motorized zooms.
There are exceptions. Sony 828, Minolta A2 both have manual zooms. Obviously manual zoom is better, but there moto zooms still get the job done.
"Are there decent digital cameras with decent macro lenses?"
Macro is very good out of the box on many digitals (esp nikons) and add on lenses are available to make it even better.
here is what it seems to me... the page have no content, and it try to link me to an advertisment site.
You can retrofit them with chips and connectors to use the light meter. There are people who will do it for you in exchange for a modest sum of momey (definitely kess than a D2H would cost).
Nope.. IMHO...
There is a lot more to photo quality that the megapixels. You you can't get anywhere near the level of detail and sharpness that a DSLR gets with the tiny lenses and tiny sensors that point-and-shoot cameras have. They're fine for many situations, but to claim that they're almost as good as a DSLR simply because they have a similar number if pixels is absurd.
People will spend $900 to $1500 on a digital SLR, then spend $130 on a "consumer" zoom lens, and find that the images produced are not very good.
There are 2 reasons for this:
The "average" lens is really good at "average" conditions.
Few people realize how much "post-processing" is done "in-camera" with a point & shoot. With a DSLR, most of it is taken care of afterwards in software, Photoshop, Capture1, or some other software. Sure, you can set a DSLR to do sharpening, saturation, contrast, and a few others in-camera... but letting the camera decide defeats part of the purpose of having almost infinite control that a DSLR offers.
There are a lot of things to learn with a DSLR. Consumer-grade lenses are not going to be much help in adverse conditions. Yet, many people bought a DSLR for just that reason. They don't understand that a great lens is 50% of the deal.
Trying to take wedding pictures in a dimly lit church with a $130 zoom lens ins't going to cut it. Wait til the bride finds out that Uncle Ted and his new toy didn't get any "dreamy" shots of the wedding. He got a bunch of dark, gloomy junk! Suddenly, the $3000 she saved on a pro wedding photographer doesn't seem like such a bargain.
Low light means you need better lenses. Fast action indoors (basketball, volleyball, etc) means you need something better than that $130 75-300 f4-5.6. You can do ok, probably better than the average point and shoot, but it takes some skill, and it takes time to learn how to handle the equipment, and most people don't have the patience. They just want a point and shoot that will do it for them. For those willing to learn, it's worth it.
-- No sig for you!
In the US, you can purchase a Canon Digital Rebel (EOS 300D) for $1000 with the 'kit' lense. Without the lense, I have seen them going for nearly $700 on various web-sites.
If you have a Old School Film 35mm Camera body with a plethora of lenses, then it makes sense to look at a DSLR made by the same or compatible manufacturer. It also makes sense to look at a DSLR if you are at all slightly serious about getting into photography. For either having photography as a significant hobby or to act as a lower cost professional.
Although if you have the insane dough, (often priced $10k and up) there is no reason not to look at Wide-Format Digital Backs for Wide-Format Cameras, the type typically used for Wedding and other professional photographical work.
If you ignore the other uses of a tool, does that make the tool less useful, or you less useful?
I am serious, that combo kicks ass, yeah...and the hack.
Plan to take outdoor pictures or pictures at a distance of objects 20 ft or greater? You need at least 10X optical zoom.
"God fights on the side with the best artillery." - Napoleon, Marshal of France - speaking truth to power
If you want to have flexibility of interchangable lenses with excellent quick autofocus, total control over the camera, possibility of using external flash, studio strobes, you are serious about your photographic hobby and are willing to pay more for the camera and lenses (sometimes a lot more) and have heavier but more sturdy equipment, buy DSLR.
Otherwise buy point-and-shot.
P.S There are some advanced "prosumer" point-and-shots which are more DSLR-like in some aspects.
Save the bandwidth. Don't use sigs!
People who use the LCD all the time get a lot of fuzzy photos. You can't hold the camera nearly as still if you aren't pressing it against your face with both hands. Additionally, LCD resolution is vastly inferior to your eye's resolution looking through the viewfinder.
Even more important, you'll experience much less lag with SLR. Note that I called them "point, shoot and wait" cameras in my original post.
All this notwithstanding, I keep my film-based Pentax K-1000 around for those rare situations where I really need SLR. I bought it in 1991 for $135 at a used camera shop. I'm waiting for DSLR prices to drop more before I buy one. "Point, shoot and wait" will have to do for my casual photography until then.
This thing forced you to use flash to relay simple text would have sufficed.
The content was practically non-existant to erroneous (DSLRs have Narrow DOF, pocket cameras wide DOF: The correct answer is both have control over DOF, both can do wide DOF, but The DSLR can do a much nicer narrow DOF).
In the end the info is not much better than if you want a camera to put in your pocket, don't get a DSLR.
What the heck makes this merit billing here?
Regardless of your political affiliations (this was taken at Bank One Ball Park at the Republican Rally)
The Bush Family walking onto the field.
This is an excellent shot for a "cheap" camera and a pair of binoculars. I was sitting in the nose bleeds behind home plate a couple hundred feet from the president.
Before the Pres showed up I was playing around and managed to get a full frame picture of the cop at the opposite end of the ballpark.
I also got the camera to work with a telescope and found it can get crisp images of the moon. It's not sensitive enough to take low light shots so night objects need to be well lit.
My objection to this "review" it the big giant ad for very expensive point and shoot cameras which is unnecessary. I don't know who the audience is for that review or even if the author knows. Digital SLRs can be had for $500 or less. Quality point and shoots can be had for under $200. The A330 is about $180.
The review would have been less junk if the author had bothered to compare pictures taken with various cameras. I know why my old point and shoot sucked (Vivitar something or other). I have plenty of images to showcase where it went wrong. But also a lot to show where it worked.
Ben
Work Safe Porn
Digital imaging is pretty convenient, because it lets you skip film processing and (if you wish) have much greater amount of control over the output. However, I can't get myself to buy a digital camera because of the sheer price of the DSLR bodies. I am an amateur photographer, and I go through about a roll of film per two weeks. This means 26 rolls a year, and since the price of a slide film roll and development (or, alternatively, a B&W negative film roll and development at home) is about 8 euros, my habit costs me about 208 euros yearly in development costs. Amateur-grade film SLR bodies cost something like 200-400 euros. Compared to the cost of a DSLR body + memory cards + archival media, I can shoot many years and still have excess money for better lenses. :-)
I'm not saying anything about megapixels or image quality or anything, but this: if you are not a pro or planning to take a great amount of pictures, you should consider film photography for the price alone. Quality film bodies can be found at bargain prices from sellers of used equipment or even as new -- the digital stampede gave a boon to the film photogs.
If you find you do not like the hobby or if you do not possess the 'eye' for great photos, the money spent for trying out photography will be much less. However, if you later think you need a DSLR, the lenses in your film camera kit most likely fit the digital body. It's a win-win situation. Most digital photographers also have a film body for backup and special purpose films (B&W, IR).
Most important thing to remember is that digital and film photography have exactly the same rules when it comes to artistic talent. You can't spend more money and have better photographs -- even though they might be technically better, the subject is what makes the photograph interesting. Dante Stella has some more reasons why film might still be a viable alternative to digital. I suggest everyone read the article: Dante Stella is not a troll or a luddite, but a real photographer interested in digital.
- Ismo
When I picked up my Digital Rebel (EOS 300D), I had no idea what the term SLR meant (Single-Lense Reflex BTW). What I did know was that I wanted to own and learn how to use a higher end camera with more versatility then the camera that I had.
I knew going into it that there would be much to learn and that if I stuck to it, I would be able to take some excellent images. Perhaps well enough to do some photography on the side for some extra dough in a semi to actually professional capacity.
If you ignore the other uses of a tool, does that make the tool less useful, or you less useful?
Did anyone else find the methoed in which this article was posted to be totally annoying?
I don't want to read a hundred words and then click "next". I don't want to have an annoying Flash-ish page that just shows me text and graphics. I want the info. I want as much of it on a page as possible. And I don't want cutesy tricks getting in my way.
I'm getting sick of these Slashdot stories that are just ads. This 'Digital Camera Buyer's Guide' is just a pretext to try to sell 'digital camera bundles'.
I got a Nikon Coolpix 3100 a couple years ago. I've been very happy with it as a 3MP point-and-shoot compact camera. It's small enough to carry around with much better image quality than a phonecam.
Since I want to pretend I can take decent photos, I couldn't resist the Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ20. While "only" a 5MP camera, it's the better controls that attracted me. It's got full manual capabilities such as control of shutter speed, aperture and manual focus. It also has the nice auto-focus capabilities and shooting modes like the compact cameras.
Since the FZ20 is only about $500 (street price), it's significantly cheaper than true DSLRs and gives me the flexibility of photography I've always wanted. It even has interchangeable lenses. Considering the cutting-edge pocket cameras are in the $500 price range it's a hell of a buy.
DPReview.com is ok. Remember, it's an equipment forum, and people there have opinions.
It's like walking into a Chevy, Ford, or Dodge dealership and asking them, "Hey, what's best?" You can predict what might happen.
Lately, there are fewer and fewer "experts" and more and more newbies. More and more complaints about Canon, Nikon and the lack of progress on this or that. Lots of rumors. If you like rumors, give the place a try. Especially with PMA coming in February.
If you want to hear people whine and complain about this, or that, you can hear that too!
Frankly, fredmiranda.com and robgalbraith.com are seem more civilized. If the search engine were worth $.25 at DPReview, I'd say go there, but it's got to be the worst search engine ever.
Someone should volunteer to help good ole Phil on that search engine.
-- No sig for you!
Where? You forgot to post a link to one.
I could do an 8x10 dye sub at home for less than I can do it in the store, by about fifty cents, but its a hassle, and I don't trust the dye sub prints to be long-term archival.
How many 8x10's are you shooting? I had one printed this weekend, I think it cost me $2.20 or something in that range, for a true photo print. It might cost me $1.75 or $2.00 to print on my Alps, and the quality would've been better, but the hassle of setting it all up and waiting for the print just isn't worth it.
It was more skewed when I bought the printer, though. When Alps was still making them, supplies were a lot cheaper and I could print an 8x10 600dpi dye sub for about 80 cents. 8x10 photo enlargements were upwards of ten bucks, and there really wasn't wide-spread consumer level access to digital printing. (It might cost me $50-$80 to get a digital image transferred onto a 35mm or 4x5 positive and get a cibachrome print made from it).
I haven't used the printer in almost two years now, though.
I'd personally rule out ink jet for photo prints regardless of cost. I expect a lot higher quality than they deliver.
...a digital SLR has a shallow depth of field, which means it can be more difficult to get everything in focus. Not true at all. A SLR makes it easy to control depth of field, and (on many models) see the effect of depth of field.
And it doesn't matter how much control you have if your lens cannot stop down that far. With DSLR, plan to spend as much (probably more) on lenses before you realize the benefits.
http://www.rupertphotography.com/
http://fromthemorning.blogspot.com/
[FromTheMorning]
Yes, most people who are doing photos for magazines, even full page ones will use digital cameras. I'm not postive, but I'm sure that a lot of people who make posters and other larger prints use large or medium format cameras. Hasselblads and Mamiyas.
I personally like analog cameras because I can afford a good regular SLR, but can't afford a good digital SLR.
If I took all of my pictures with the first digital camera I bought, it would look like crap right now. I have used my Nikon F3 for a long time with good crisp pictures that can be blown up to be quite big.
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To obtain decent 5x7 images. Not professional grade images, but decent images nonetheless. The only thing that would hold you back from good 5x7 capable shots is lighting.
I have an older model 2.1mp camera and with the proper lighting, I can obtain some very nice low-noise images that are great for printing at 5x7. They are good enough that I can hang them in my home and get compliments on them.
If you are looking for larger prints or professional quality shots, I wouldnt' hit anything less then 5 megapixels and even then, I would go higher by picking up a Digital SLR camera.
The Digital SLRs have larger sensors then the Prosumer and "Point and Shoot" cameras, thus providing higher quality pixels which equate to better images then higher Megapixel Prosumer cameras.
If you ignore the other uses of a tool, does that make the tool less useful, or you less useful?
I confused it with E300 (which is one crappy camera)...Thanks...
"mirror lock-up"
Beauty is truly in the eye of the tiger
I own a Canon i550 which is a great printer for printing out my own images. I have printed out dozens of images on that printer and have only had a few minor problems here and there, such as banding which comes from 'dirty' print heads, which is cleared up after performing a 'deep clean' on the print heads.
I have taken a disk of images to the local print shop and they do end up looking better when you hold them right up to your face and scrutinize them. However, when you put both on a wall and stand back at a normal viewing distance you can't really tell any difference on at least up to 5x7 images. (I have yet to print out anything larger at a print shop.)
If you ignore the other uses of a tool, does that make the tool less useful, or you less useful?
It's not the MPs that matter idiot. It's the CCD size and quality and that's what TFA talks about. With the small cameras you usually get a tiny-winy crap quality CCD with a very high MP count. With a decent D-SLR, you get a very high quality, large CCD with a moderate MP count and it still outperforms the other.
There's another issue which is very much swept under the carpet with dSLRs, namely the sensor size in comparison to the 35mm frame-size of the body means that all lenses effectively get their focal length multiplied by around 1.5. Only the middle of the 35mm frame is actually captured by the sensor.
This makes wide-angle photography very awkward on pro-sumer dSLRs. An 18mm rectilinear lens actually captures images more like a 28mm! You'd need a 12mm lens to get down to a reasonably respectable equivalent focal length of 20mm...
If you want to shoot landscapes or in-the-thick-of-it action shots, this is likely to be a significant limitation.
So, you end up either paying for a full-frame sensor dSLR (many K$s), or put up with a very limited and expensive range of wide-ish lenses, many of which won't be rectilinear anyway, and will require digital-processing to remove distortion.
Alternatively, pay double the rate for a dSLR to get the Olympus E-1 using the 4/3, which at least has a frame size that is the same as the sensor.
Think today's great? Should've been here *yesterday*.
there's one good analogy for this..
two cameras, one pocket and one professional(properly used) - same film(hence, same "resolution") - different results.
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
That's why I called them "point, shoot and wait". I just plan on taking a lot more shots when I'm shooting my kids. The Canon Powershot S45 I recently lost let you press the shutter button halfway to fix focus, then press the rest of the way for the shot; that made things tolerable. I have enough good shots that I don't think the extra $1000 is worth it...especially if the camera gets dropped after warranty or lost.
That's exactly what I thought. What better way to promote his amazon.com referral fee?
Fuji S602Z
Fuji S7000
Fuji S5000
Olympus C-750UZ
Kodak 6490
I went for the C-750. The S602 was good, but bulky and, I felt, rather conspicuous for inner-city photography. The S7000 was also good, but was similarly bulky and cost more. The S5000 was also bulky, but cheaper, and with a zoom that matched the C-750, but had rather over-aggressive JPEG compression, forcing one to use RAW mode and post-process more extensively than might otherwise be the case. I'll confess to not examining the 6490 as closely as perhaps I should have, but I gather it is rather more limited in terms of manual controls and also uses a proprietary Li-Ion battery.
The C-750 was the right choice for me, for now. I might well be shopping around for a D- or film SLR in a couple of years, once I've improved my technique with the C-750. But I'll cross that bridge when I come to it.
I bought my PowerShot A75 back in August for about $250 - it's now down to $199 nearly everywhere.
The reason why I recommend the Canon is that it has the right mix of features for someone who doesn't need all the bells and whistles. Let's face it, 90% of people don't need a bunch of advanced controls and the other features of an SLR camera. They just want something they can use to take pictures of the kids to send to Grandma and Grandpa. The A75 is easy enough that it can be used as a point-and-shoot camera without much trouble.
What's nice is that for those of us who know what an aperature setting is, there's also enough manual controls to give you a wide variety of choices. Plus, it has a decent optical zoom, a good lens, and uses cheap CF media.
In all fairness, you will get some noise in low-light images from the sensor, you're limited to Type I CF cards, and it's a bit bulky. But still, for your average camera user, none of those things really matter.
Plus, it works just fine with iPhoto on my Mac right out of the box, and even does the same on Windows - no need for proprietary drivers like some cameras insist upon.
Granted, you could get a camera with more features for more money, but in terms of price/performance, the PowerShot A75 is a damn good camera. It was a good deal when I paid $250 for it, and it's even better now.
Man, that Epson R-D1 sounds rad.
There are no trails. There are no trees out here.
It does give some benefit to those who use telephoto lenses, so I suppose most reviewers figure it balances out - especially since telephoto lenses usually eat up the lions' share of the budget for most photographers.
That being said, as someone who does a lot of photography, I've been seriously considering buying a wide-angle fixed lens digital camera for just these purposes - I don't think the dSLR market will be getting there anytime soon
Quick correction: Doubling megapixels only increases size (1x, 2x, 3x, etc.) by sqrt(2). E.g., if you have a 1000x1000 pixel image (1 megapixel), and you want to double its size to 2000x2000 pixels (equivalent to 2x optical zoom), you need 4 megapixels to do it.
Imposing Libertarian views on everyone online since 1992.
Depth of field (AKA DOF) depends on three things. Focal length, subject distance and aperture. "Pocket" digicams have very short focal lengths, around 7mm on the wide end. This makes DOF very deep at reasonable subject distances.
7mm lenses for 35mm and APS cameras simply don't exist. The widest rectilinear lenses only go to 12mm, and at 12 mm you can observe the same thing as with pocket digicams - very deep DOF.
Now if you put on a 35mm f/2 lens, you get to see the "narrow" DOF, and if you use 70-200mm f/2.8 lens, open it to f/2.8, and position your subject close to the camera your DOF will be paper-thin (i.e. tip of the nose is in focus, eyes aren't).
You simply can't do this with a camera whose lens tops off at 25mm, and has a max aperture of f/8 at this focal length (which is what pocket digicams often have at the long end of their range).
If I had a living room, bedroom or bathroom that measured 19" or less diagonally, you can bet I would fill it up to the walls.
Go to a newsstand and check how many publications use 30% whitespace on their pages. It's just not practical to do that when your purpose is to present informative articles.
Sites that use tons of whitespace think of themselves as museum walls. That's not even appropriate for most photo sites. Think more in terms of a family photo album. You put several photos on one page so people can quickly flip through and find the ones they're interested in.
For reference, cheap digital P&S cameras typically have zoom lenses with focal lengths ranging from 3-50 mm, depending on the sensor size and zoom range. Minimum aperture numbers are usually between 2.0 and 5.6, with maximum aperture numbers rarely being larger than 8.0. Since they have such great depth of field at an aperture number of 8, they don't even bother putting on controls for smaller aperture sizes.
---
Find out more about the impending downfall o
Prosumer to Professional: SLR-like to SLR
Unless you are a really, really serious photographer, a DSLR is a waste of money, because it will cost you 2-3x what an equivalent SLR-like camera will by the time you get an equivalent number of lenses, etc...
"I'd rather be a lightning rod than a seismometer." -Ken Kesey
Just move closer to the subject. Zoom lenses are wussy. I worked as a pro photographer for 5 years and although I owned a zoom lens (bought for $50 at a garage sale) it never came out of the bag. I use a Canon A-70 now and it spends 95% of its time zoomed all the way out - this is about the equivalent of a 35mm lens on a 35mm camera.
Optical zoom is particularly useless on a small-sensor camera because you are zooming in on few pixels - optical-zoom pictures on the A-70 look like crap and I leave it disabled all the time.
BTW Staying zoomed all the way out is somewhat useful in overcoming the time lag between shutter press and the time the picture is taken. Depth of field is much greater at wide (short focal length) zoom. Zoomed all the way out, you can manually focus the A-70 on infinity, the time lag is virtually eliminated, and everything more than a few dozen ft away is in focus.
Give a man a fish and you have fed him for today. Teach a man to fish, and he'll say "WHERE'S MY FISH, YOU IDIOT?"
And that X-Ray Spec lens that removes the clothing from every person of whom you take a picture. It's polarized so it will only remove women's clothing, but if you are so inclined, rotate it 90 degrees and it will remove men's clothing, but the women will all look like busty Dark Elves, so not a complete loss.
I might have dreamt that second lens.
--- Ban humanity.
... so that it's harder to refer to the inaccuracies of the article.
For starters some SLRs use a Prism instead of a Mirror and thus allow live previews. It also wouldn't surprise me if some of the DSLRs out there have a mirror lock like my old Canon AE-1 that expose the sensor and allow live previews as well.
There there was the bit about DSLRs having a shallow depth of field. Hmm... isn't that a result of the lense. Was the reviewer using a 300mm zoom? You can get nice a nice 55mm lense with a 22 F-Stop.
It seems like this author was trying to convey the fact that DSLRs aren't for everyone and couldn't think up a good reason so he lied.
I would use the analogy of "What's the point of building your own PC when you can buy one much cheaper from Wal-Mart?" Sure, there's performance differences, sure there's the ability to more easily exchange components for different performance. However, there's still a little bit more to the difference between a Digital P&S and a DSLR camera.
I know that Digital SLRs have much larger image capturing sensors then P&S Digital Cameras have and thus are capable of capturing better quality pixels, which equates to much better final images.
I know that DSLRs can have a variety of focal length lenses installed on them providing upwards of 1200mm focal lengths. At the same time, there are simply snap-on kits that will mutliply the focal length of P&S Cameras, but they will get you nowhere near the Focal length and f-stop of the interchangeable lenses on the DSLR.
If you ignore the other uses of a tool, does that make the tool less useful, or you less useful?
An interesting (and not inflammatory) take on the current situation can be found here, and if you read it it you should also read this. I'm just a snapshot photographer, and while I don't have dogmatic views about the digital/non-digital decision for other folks, I'm just about fed up with my 3mp Canon Powershot S230. Apart from the ultra-annoying 1 second delay after you press the shutter-- forget about getting candids -- there are the normally slow exposures, which magnify any shake at all in your hand into a blurry exposure, and the completely non-self-evident complement of controls.
I sat down for hours with the manual, partly to learn how to override the default shutter speed, and finally decided the camera was designed without any real feeling for UI considerations. Some features are activated by pressing one button and deactivated by pressing another; other features are activated and deactivated with the same button... It's very hard to remember how to use this camera if you don't use it constantly.
Mr. Rockwell (mentioned above) opines that "The best way to get a digital image is by shooting film and having it scanned." I don't know about all of you more-expert-than-I photographers out there, but I'm going back to my trusty viewfinder 35mm, with which I used to take an occasional pretty good picture.
One of the nice things about having megapixels to spare is that you can crop more off your photo and still have plenty of resolution left for a high-quality print.
-73, de n1ywb
www.n1ywb.com
If all you ever want to use is the kit lens, you'd probably be more satisfied with a prosumer 8mp or something.
Sorry, but I briefly owned an 8MP prosumer (the KonicaMinolta Dimage A2) and returned it. I've been much happier with the Digital Rebel, even with just the kit lens.
Why? The short answer is picture quality. The A2 took some really lousy pictures for me. It took some really nice ones, too, but I got very inconsistent performance, and in low-ish light, the picture was very noisy. I got visible (and objectionable) noise even at ISO 200, and at ISO 400, the picture was far too noisy.
It wasn't just noise, though. The camera itself must have had about two dozen knobs, switches, dials and buttons on it, and every single one of them did more than one thing. It's nice to have a really configurable camera, but when you need to snap some photos and you don't want to futz with the settings, it's nice to have a camera you can count on to take a high-quality picture without much intervention. The A2 failed miserably in that regard.
At least 15% of the pictures I took with the A2 were out of focus or suffered from motion blur. The out-of-focus problem was inexcusable because it wasn't possible to easily tell whether a photo was in focus when I took it, and it was tough to tell in the viewfinder what the camera had chosen to focus on. The motion blur problem was caused by the sensor's poor light sensitivity, which led to needing longer exposures in any given situation.
The objectionable noise and the motion blur were both the result of the small sensor and its high resolution. Essentially, each photosite (pixel) gets smaller as the sensor size shrinks or the resolution of the sensor increases. When you put a small, 8 MP sensor in a camera, you have really tiny photosites. Those photosites can't gather as much light as larger photosites, so when the signal is amplified, there's more noise.
The 6MP sensor of a Digital Rebel is about 6 times the size of the 8MP sensor in the Dimage A2. Factoring in the difference in resolution, each photosite on the sensor of the DR is about EIGHT times as big as each photosite on the sensor for the A2 or any other prosumer 8MP camera. The end result is that the DR doesn't need to amplify the signal as much, and introduces less noise. I see less noise on the DR at ISO 1600 than I did on the A2 at ISO 400.
The end result is that, especially in low or natural light, the image quality is noticeably better on the Digital Rebel with the kit lens than it was on the A2.
Oh, and one other point in favor of the DR. It's actually much simpler to use than the A2. My wife (no photography nut) has no problem using the DR to take great shots of our six-month-old.
No you don't. You could look more carefully at what I wrote. You aren't the only one to miss the word "might" in my subject line -- others also mistook my posting in that way. However, those others at least understood that the comparison wasn't between digital and non-digital.
I never said DSLR wasn't for anybody. Sheesh; my post was short and not written in Flash. People have little excuse for missing parts of it.
I recently bought a Canon 20D. Although I am very happy with the purchase, I have to admit that in most situations my old Canon G3 produces photos that look just as good. Granted the 20D's shots will always have twice as many pixel, but 95% of the time they are not needed.
The one place where the 20D and other DSLRs excel is that their much larger sensor allow for very low noise, even at very high ISO settings. But again, 95% of the time you are never going to notice the difference, and programs like Neat Image and Grain Surgery do an amazing job in situations where there noise is noticable.
Another problem with DSLRs is that good lenses are very very expensive. Even in DSLR bundles, the lens that comes with the camera is not likely to be as versatile as the built-in lens of a good 'pro-sumer' camera like the G3. Granted, DSLR lenses are probably much higher quality than the built-ins, but again, it's quality that you don't notice most of the time. So you will end up spending extra money for a wide-angle and a zoom lens, and these things are not cheap.
I guess the moral to the story is, that unless you really know what you are doing, and know you want to explore that 5% of photography where the DSLR excels, you are better off with a good pro-sumer model.
For $200 or less, go for the Canon Powershot line, specifically the Powershot A75. It can be found for $175 or less from reputable retailers. It uses AA batteries and CF cards, so there aren't any other big hidden expenses waiting (at the cost of larger size), and gets ~5 hours of life from a set of NiMH batteries, which is a heck of a lot better than anything out there.
The 85 and 95 will go beyond your price point, and only add some resolution, although the 95 adds a flip-out screen, which can be used to protect it if you just throw it in your pocket.
It's fairly small (still pocket sized, as long as you're not wearing tight jeans), takes excellent 3MP pictures (which print wonderfully at 5x7 when cropped a bit, haven't tried larger), and has the best lenses you'll find at that pricepoint. It also offers lots of manual controls (although with a menu interface).
I just bought one recently. My feeling is that once you crossed the $200 line, adding $200 only gets you small improvements in ability, until you cross the $800 dSLR line. There just isn't any point in paying more, unless you want a long zoom (~$350).
One of the reasons extolled at length for choosing one type against abother is that a DSLR has a narrow depth of field and a "standard" digital camera has a greater depth. As anyone who knows about photography would know this is total tosh.
Actually, the article was perfectly right about that. I didn't like the way it dumbed the whole subject down, but it was correct in saying that non-DSLRs usually provide a greater depth of field --- because they do, in fact many times greater.
If you want the maths, here's a recognized authority on the subject, Bob Atkins. It's easy to summarize the relevant point:
Depth of Field (DoF) is inversely proportional to the linear size of the sensor, ie. CMOS or CCD or old fashioned film. Taking the standard 24x36mm frame of 35mm film as the basis for comparison, the most commonly used DSLR sensors employ the "APS-C" size which is just a little bit smaller: for example, Canon's 20D has a CMOS sensor 1.6 times smaller than 35mm film, and the Nikon D70 has a CCD sensor 1.5 times smaller than 35mm film. As a result, DSLRs provide slightly more DoF than 35mm cameras if all the other variables are left the same. 1.5 or 1.6 is not really a significant amount though.
In contrast, digital non-DSLRs almost all use *much* smaller sensors: for example, the Nikon E3100 is perfectly typical in employing a sensor with linear dimensions 6.5 times smaller than 35mm film, and hence 4+ times smaller than DSLRs. This is a very marked difference, and is immediately noticeable in the greatly increased DoF in almost any landscape shot containing nearby trees and distant horizons. Obviously other factors come into the equation as well, but by far the most significant factor for broadly similar conditions and lenses is the sensor size.
If you don't like maths, convince yourself by looking at photo galleries that provide full EXIF info for their shots. You'll find non-DSLR shots at f/2.8 over 1/60s in UK-style weak sunshine with a DoF all the way from 30 yards to the horizon, which is quite impossible with a DSLR. That said, I much prefer my DSLR, since I love the effect of narrow DoF.
"The question of whether machines can think is no more interesting than [] whether submarines can swim" - Dijkstra
For this reason, and this alone, I simply love my Pentax Optio S. It takes decent pictures, fits comfortably in any shirt pocket, and weighs so little you'll forget it's there.
Hobbyists beware, though. The picture quality is decent for its class (as an ultra-compact), but the lens has serious flaws: the left edge of the picture is always noticeably out-of-focus, and at moderately wide angles, barrel distortion is quite large. Nevertheless, I've taken a few great landscape shots with that little camera.
That said, for me the Optio S is a perfect backup camera, to have at hand when the DRebel is simply too inconvenient to carry around. Disclaimer: I am not affiliated with Pentax ;-)
I have two P&S digitals, neither of which work. One is on a slow boat back to its maker for warranty repairs. Thus, I'm looking at alternatives.
I'd have a personalized plate on my car, but "toxic bachelor" won't fit into 7 letters.
You need to try different light levels, giving your iris time to change its aperture accordingly.
Although the other sites should feel insulted by the comparison. Seriously. They have experience with hundreds of competing models of cameras.
I use my HP K60 printer and while I can see slight pixelation 95% of the people that visit our house can't tell the difference between photo lab and our printer. Some we've even blown up to 8x10.
"Thanks to the remote control I have the attention span of a gerbil."
Okay, so I used to do a lot of photo back in the day. I've been wanting to do a darkroom setup so I can print since i lost my darkroom access. It doesn't look like it's going to happen...
So I go out and purchase a Canon A80 becuase it seemed to have many of the options I had come to expect on my Elan IIE. Obviously it was a point and shoot but I figured it would be a good entry into the digital world...see if I like digital enough to abandon my dreams of building a dark room. It's a good camera, but one of the things I noticed is the piss poor depth of field. I take pretty much all my pictures in aperature priority just so I can max it out as much as possible.
I figured this was a result of the smallest aperature on my A80 still being pretty large, and that if I ever bought a digital SLR (I would buy Canon so I can keep using my lenses) that I would be able to get better depth of field because there would be smaller aperatures available...
Is there something I'm missing here? Seems to me that if the A80 is a decent example of a good P and S digital camera, the maximum amount of depth of field would be much much better on an SLR. I don't need the noob lecture (well at least the photography noob lecture, the digital noob lecture maybe), I understand that SLR = control = complexity for those who don't know how to use it, but the article went to such a level explaining how apparently you can never ever get the same depth of field with an SLR that you would get from a P and S that now I'm confused. That doesn't make sense to me. Even if they said oh you have to have tons of sunlight to use the smaller aperatures because the effective ISO speed of the sensors were too slow that would make sense...but that doesn't seem to be what they're saying.
I find that essentially *none* of the current crop of digicams can replace the simple 35mm film point-and-shoot cameras, mainly because it takes anywhere from 1 to 3 seconds to "power up" the camera, even from standby, and typically anywhere from a 1/2 to 1 second to take a picture *after* you push the shutter button.
This makes digicams unsuitable (and surprisingly so), for a lot of folks that are unaware of these limitations.
So, at the moment, DSLRs are the only digital cameras available that can operate at the speeds of the film-based cameras that everyone has been using in the past.
Don't underestimate the importance of this point. Soccer moms and football dads that want to snap a picture of their offspring in action will find digicams to be a total waste of money. Even trying to keep up with a toddler will be more than a digicam can handle. They simply focus too slow, and by the time the shutter goes off, the kid has already stuck his nose in your lens.
I bought an inexpensive photo printer last year. (A basic Canon model, does OK print quality for my needs.)
Truthfully, with ink costs and the like, I've gone back the other way.
I'll scan my own, put 'em on a CD, and take the CD to a place that can do cheaper prints than I.
Most places nowadays are pretty cheap for printing digital images, so I'l pushing all of my printing off my own printer.
It's just easier to digitize from film prints and then do duplicates/blowups from there.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
You clipped of the next few words were I said they were of "similar" size.
I think there have been 3MP digicam sensor of 1/1.8" 1/2.5" 1/2.7" and 1/3.2" in recent years.
During the same time period DSLR sensors remain APS size. Thus it is free of this shrinkage issue. It is already at the smallest reasonable size.
Two parameters on digital cameras that are never mentioned:
burst - the time from when you press the button to when the picture is actually taken, and
speed - the time it takes to store the picture to the memory device
I have not used many digital cameras, but the (low budget) ones I have used are terrible at both of these. I never seem to capture the fleeting smile of my kids because of the 250-500 ms burst delay and I have to wait 2 seconds or so (longer when the batteries are low) for the picture to save before I can try again.
I'd rather use my 35mm SLR, but I love the instant-review and capacity of a digital.
Check out the Olympus E series if you're concerned about dust on the sensor. They have a built in dust 'remover' that works very well if you go by what people say about it. They basically shake the dust off the sensor during startup. (all marking about 'hypersonic wave filters' aside - this technology seems to work)
An SLR camera (Single Lens - Reflex) was an innovation because you could actually see through the lens that the picture was going to be taken through. Other cameras had a secondary viewfinder lens that could only approximate the final picture. In an SLR camera, you see through the lens via a mirror that flips out of the way when you take a shot.
With a digital camera and preview screen, you ARE seeing what the camera sees, through the lens, without bothering to use a bulky mechanical mirror. The other points the author makes about controlling the aperature and shutter speed seperately, in order to control the depth of field, have NOTHING TO DO with the camera being an SLR. Those features could be added to any camera with the right lens. They have traditionally been available on SLR cameras because they are high end. No photographer interested in controlling the aperature wants the parallax you get with a two-lens point and shoot 35MM.
SLR makes no sense on digital cameras with a preview screen.
Digital SLR always struck me as peculiar. With a digital camera, you can see what the camera sees on the display. I almost never look through the viewfinder of my digital camera, so the additional optics to divert the lens-image to the viewfinder would be a waste.
In at least some film SLR cameras (i.e. my old Canon EOS Rebel), the viewfinder optics had to flip up out of the way to allow the film an unimpeded view from the lens. I don't know if digital SLRs also work this way. It seems like a lot of mechanical complication given the pay-off.
I suspect that only professionals and very, very serious amateurs would find looking at the LCD display unsatifying by comparison to the viewfinder.
Get one with a meter in it at least, until you get experienced enough to figure out the exposure yourself. Otherwise what you may get is randomly over and underexposed pictures, and the photo lab will adjust them all to average anyways and you won't be able to tell what's wrong with them.
But on price, you could use a roll of film a week for about 4 years before a $200 used SLR, film, and developing costs more than a decent dSLR.
The lenses you probably want are: 50mm (normal), 28mm (wide angle), ~135mm prime (portraits), and ~70-200mm (zoom).
Can someone explain this to me? The point of an SLR camera is that when you look through the viewfinder you see what the lens sees. But with a digital camera you have a screen on the back which shows the view through the lens anyway. So what is the point of all that extra complicated, expensive, heavy mechanism to give you something you already have?
I have been doing photography since I was 12 years old. By "photography" I mean that I actually go take pictures, develop film and do my own prints. Recently it has been hard to do so due to do so because I haven't seen one bedroom apartments with dark rooms. Therefore, I decided to get a digital SLR instead. After months of investigation, I decided to go with Nikon D70.
Digital SLRs are not created equal. If you are into new things, take a look at cameras with 4:3 ration (Olympus E1 and Evolot). They have an ability to dust off the sensor before taking every shot, thus pics stay dust free. If you want to get a pro-sumer DSLR, take a look at Nikon D70 and Canon (although I recommend Nikon better due to its low noise). Why spend all $$$ on these cameras if you can find a point-and-shoot for cheaper? Here are my pointers:
Lenses.You are not creaing pictures with a camera. You create pictures with a lens. If you can exchange lenses, you give yourself more flexibility. This is a must if you want to take pictures of animals, close up shots, wide-angle shots, etc.
Color. Digital SLRs tend to have larger sensors with larger photosites. When you take pictures, you work with light and it is essential that you get enough light in order to process it correctly. Larger photosites do a better job, hence they have less noise. If you take a look at pictures produced by standard digital SLRS (based on 35mm cameras) vs. pictrures made by Olympus cameras that implement 4:3 technology (the latter have smaller sensors) you will see the difference.
No LCD monitor. Despite whatever you may think, this is a plus. First of all, your camera does not suck batteries for what you can actually see through a lens, secondly, your view is unaltered. You see colors and objects as they appear.
Depth of field. This one gets me everytime somebody says that DSLRs lack depth of field. In fact, if you have more than two brain cells, you will be able to vary the depth of field by adjusting your shutter speed and aperture. Most of cameras come with a "depth of field preview" button that will let you judge the picture that is going to be recorded.
There are several things that you must remember about digital SLRs (and digital cameras in general):
Run away from any person who tries to sell you a more expensive camera by saying "Well, it has more megapixels." Megapixel is a number that is related to the area of the sensor in terms of the number of pixels. Thus, a small linear enlargement (like adding a few megapixels to the horizontal side of the sensor) will affect the number. If a sales person tells you that a 6MP camera will give you much larger prints than a 5MP camera at the same sharpness, slap them in the face: the difference in size will be rather small. In order to increase the size of the print by 2, you'll have to increase the megapixel count by 4 in order to maintain the same image quality.
There are two different types of censors. CMOS and CCD. CMOS sensors are smaller than CCD. It appears (from my tests) that cameras with CCDs produce less noise; however, CMOS will soon improve. CCD technology is rather old. You can learn more about it by googling :)
Flash-sync speeds are really important for fill-in flashes. Typically, you want somethin above 1/250 in a pro-sumer camera. If you have no idea what a fill-in technique is, you'll learn it once you start taking pics during nice sunny weather.
Dust on sensors is pain in the rear. I have a lense that I use primary with my D70; thus, I haven't experienced it yet. You can clean it off yourself or take it to a shop. If you are concerned, take a look at Olympus cameras. E1 and Evolt use ultra-sound to take dust off the sensor before taking a shot.
Night photography sucks.... Yes. You heard me right. With a film camera, this is a pretty easy due to the lack of noise and purple frinding. With digital SLRs it requires more training, but can be done. I do not like high
I got a Nikon D70 earlier this year. It's proven to be one of the best purchases I've ever made. One of the strongest examples of how it's improved my photography is shooting at night with slow shutter speeds.
With my film cameras, I was never willing to invest the time and wasted film to experiment with tricky lighting and night shots. I always wanted to be sure I got the moment, so I'd always use a flash.
With the D70, I could see immediately how my shots were turning out and adjust settings to dial in exactly what I wanted. It was a real breakthrough moment in photography for me.
$5 / month hosted VPS on linux = awesome!
Am I the only person to have been misled by 2x and 3x Zoom. I bought my first digital camera after using an SLR for years. I was looking for a small portable camera capable of taking quick snapshots and vacation shots. At the time 2x optical zoom was common on ultraportables, and I bought a Canon S200. What I didn't know was that 2x meant 2 times the widest angle of the lense, not 2x real life size. The S200 has a zoom range equivalent to 35mm to 70mm lenses. But, when looking through an SLR lense, life size is about 50mm, so my camera really only zooms to 1.4x life size.
Overall, I have been very happy with my camera, but eventually I will replace it with one capable of at least 100mm equivalent.
-the Hun
I'm a Tasty-vore. If it's Tasty, I'll eat it.
These are all subject to improvement with time, the EVF's available after a few more generations of development will be at least as usable as today's reflex viewfinders.
Some photographers will continue to insist on a viewfinder that is held close to the eye, as opposed to the large screen on the back of the camera. That way, you do fine camera pointing by moving your head, instead of wobbling the camera around at arm's length.
Caution: Do not stare into laser with remaining eye.
In graphic design (including web) clear white space is a powerful tool.
I couldn't agree more.
Article wouldn't open for me--told me to go get Flash. (I'm running Firefox .9.3)
Blech.
Great men are almost always bad men--Lord Acton's Corollary
PJRC: Electronic Projects, 8051 Microcontroller Tools
I found this site to be extremely helpful while shopping for my own camera - http://www.imaging-resource.com/WB/WB.HTM.
I have a pretty good basic digital camera but am about to go to digital SLR, mainly because taking good shots of a moving object (like my kid) is about impossible with a standard digital camera. They have an ISO of about 50 .. you can push it up but image quality will rapidly suffer. Digital SLRs apparently do much better here, and can take reasonably low-noise images up to ISO 800 or better (ISO is a measure of film "speed" - of course there is no film here, but higher is faster, and means less light needed to capture an image, so the shutter can be open a smaller length of time and capture a moving object more precisely).
The article's discussion of current benefits and limitations of digital SLRs vs. non-SLRs is accurate in the situation it depicts but hopelessly inaccurate in explaining the reasons.
The reason you can't reduce depth of field with most non-SLR cameras is that they have cheaply designed lenses that won't open up to large apertures. It would actually be both technically easy and (compared to SLRs) cheap to provide fast lenses which offered low depth of field creative options on non-SLR digital cameras, but the market doesn't seem to want them. Indeed, the 35mm SLR market was already moving to zoom lenses incapable of large apertures (and with commensurately poor low light performance) before digital cameras became competitive.
Two features of digital SLRs are simply legacy.
1) Interchangeable lenses. There remains a significant demand for cameras that can use the lenses originally developed for 35mm photography. There's no reason why cheaper lenses can be developed for smaller format digital cameras. Sony has started offering this option with its DSC-V and DSC-W cameras. You get Carl Zeiss lenses for far less than comparable 35mm lenses, but the camera CCDs so far cannot compete with the larger CCDs in the Canon and Nikon SLRs.
2) No digital preview. This seems to me a horrible and unnecessary flaw in digital SLRs. With a good non-SLR camera I can preview motion blur in my photographs and manually adjust exposure settings for time exposures while seeing the results in real time.
At the moment, we seem to be able to produce nicer CCDs at slightly larger sizes. Thus you can get better pictures from a 6.3MP Digital Rebel than from an 8MP Sony DSC-V3. By the same token if Hasselblad were to produce an even larger format digitial camera it would quite possibly be better still (and cost $100,000). In the end, I suspect the market will create smaller format digital cameras that offer all the benefits anyone much cares about at prices substantially lower than the Digital Rebel et al.
I can pick up an Olympus E1 with a 14-54mm Zuiko lens for $999. The lens goes from f2.8 to f22 and has excellent sharpness and detail.
I bought (and later sold) a Canon pro 1 when it first came out at $999 earlier this year. It has a F2.4-F8 lens.
How much further down do you want to go? And which non-DSLR supports the range you're looking for?
Yes, agreed, whitespace is very important. But don't put all the whitespace around the edges.
Balance and utility are also important.
Image noise, and speed of operation. Compare a consumer type camera at ISO 400 with a DSLR at 1600. The DSLR will almost always give a cleaner image with less noise. Why is that? As the author shows, the consumer cameras have much smaller imaging chips. It doesn't take too much to figure out that cramming 8 million pixels onto the smaller chip will give much smaller pixel wells than 6 million onto the larger. A smaller pixel well doesn't capture as much light as a larger one. When you up the ISO equivalancy for a faster shutter speed, or working in low light conditions, you're amplifying the signal more. More amplification, more noise. Which looks very much like film grain. I've looked at D70 and 20D images at high ISO settings against almost all of the 8MP all in ones and it's not even close. The DSLRs win hands down. Also DSLRs focus and make their calculations MUCH more quickly than the small cameras. It all depends on what your own individual preferences are. Buy a compact if size and convenience are the most important factors, or if it's the almighty buck that's the biggie. But if image quality and speed are more important, than pony up to the big leagues. tbuck
One topic not mentioned in this article -- and very rarely sited in camera performance specs anywhere -- is the delay between user-click of the button and the actual snapping of the photograph. If you've used a digital camera, you know what I mean. If what you're looking for is a good vacation & party camera, that spec is more important (I think) than either megapixels OR depth-of-field.
I hope that after I die the one word people use to describe me is "resurrected."
Besides Bob Atkins, here is another link that I've used in the past that explains this pretty well: Photo Tidbits Also here is a bonus link to Luminous Landscape where they have a good overview of "bokeh", the quality of that out-of-focus effect: Luminous Landscape - Bokeh
Although you are seeing _just_about_ what you're getting on film (or CCD/CMOS sensor, of course), there is one caveat. That is, depth of field. To give you a bright view through the finder to focus and frame your shot, the camera leaves the lens aperture open until it actually takes the shot, even if it is set to shoot with a stopped-down aperture. This is preferable, of course, but the depth of field you see isn't what you get. You see the scene as if the lens was taken at maximum aperture, which may not be the case. That is why there is a depth of field preview button on just about all SLR cameras. This button temporarily stops down the lens to what it's metered for so you can see the depth of field as it will be when you take the shot. The view is darker if the scene is metered to stop the lens down, but you'll see accurate depth of field.
"I've got to stop masturbating! It makes me too lazy! Stop it, Albert. Stop it." -- Albert Einstein
Pointless use of Flash, yes - but also inaccurate. I have a Canon 300D digital SLR - I love it. Depth of field depends entirely on lens aperture, or the f-stop setting - not on SLR vs. regular digital. An SLR does allow but not require way more control and fine-tuning of depth of field. If you set it at automatic, you have a very heavy, bulky snapshot camera with an expected wide depth of field. But if you want a particular result and are willing to invest in the knowledge of the tool, the SLR camera, this thing can get shots I couldn't touch with any regular SLR. Add a 100-300 zoom lens and I got portraits over the Thanksgiving weekend that had the older ladies in the family slipping me $20 to delete their picture... Sound like this guy had a bad experience with the tool and failed to care enough to learn to use it properly or just set it to auto and forget it.
And for me it was
control of exposure and focus and depth of field
image quality
interchangeable lenses!!!
attachment for a real flash unit
That sold me on it.
Not a very good article at all.
i do some night photography with the "pro-sumer" Canon G5, and i rely on what the built-in LCD shows me to decide whether i've gotten a good shot or not. sometimes i miss a good scene because what looks good on the tiny LCD often ain't so great on a full-sized monitor or print.
it would be great if i could hook up my camera to an lcd that was around 4"x6", which i could adjust to match my monitor and printer at home.
first thought might be "laptop", but i would want something smaller/lighter/cheaper than that for dragging around in the field.
pr0n - keeping monitor glass spotless since 1981.
So, can I assume that if you have a living room, or a bedroom, or a bathroom, that you'd just fill it full of stuff, right up to the walls?
Well, yeah actually--to a point. In my house I tend to put the furniture and stuff "right up to the walls". There is "empty space" but it is towards the centre of the room, in the middle of my stuff.
Space is good! It allows movement.
I see no point in allowing so much movement arount the outside of the room (or a page) when all the useful stuff is crammed in the middle.
Space is only good when appropriately used. If the article was a 20' by 20' living room the furniture would be bunched up in the middle of the room--you could not sit on the chesterfield because the console TV and bookshelf would be shoved right up against the front of it. But hey, there would be six feet of empty space from any given wall so I guess you could sit on the floor.
Overall, the article is hardly worth being posted on Slashdot--editors must've had a brain fart. I'd think the authors would try to present themselves as experts in photography (and as such would know something about presentation). There is nothing there that justifies the use of flash. It is locked to one resolution so on anything 1024 or higher it looks ridiculous. It is not printer friendly. The navigation(paging) controls are INVISIBLE until you hunt down their location with the a mouseover. The content is fairly light, and couldn've been presented in a single HTML file. Basically, wasteful use of bandwidth.
If you are annoyed by flash or want a low-bandwidth summary, here it goes:
* 2 main choices: "regular" or SLR
* SLR has large sensor, "regular" is 1/9th the size
* SLR==expensive, "regular"==cheap
* SLR==hard to use but flexible (depth of field, exposure settings, etc) so good for "artsy" work (portraits, closeups, etc). Lots of accessories.
* "normal"==easy to use but less ability to play with settings--set up to work for general purpose use (snapshots, scenery, etc) but not really well suited to specialty phototgraphy
* SLRs have no LCD viewfinder screen (the ones that have an LCD screen only use it after the pic is taken). "Normal" cameras can use the LCD as a viewfinder.
* conclusion: save your money and don't buy an SLR unless you are a professional or enthusiast. Take a "normal" camera along if you want to take pics quickly and easily.
There. No waiting for flash to load, no paging through tiny screens, etc.
Get a cheaper lens then. Decreasing your aperature and increasing your depth of field is cheap for the lens maker and requries only the twist of a knob for you. Going very far in the other direction is what is hard. High F-stop = large depth of field and low shutter speed. Low F-stop = small depth of field and high shutter speed. Any cheap camera lens will give you a 22+ F stop on the high side. Going the other direction is where the glasss gets expensive. IIRC the stock lens with the Canon Rebel (digital) has an F stop of 3.5 at 18mm. That is okay, but if you *want* a small depth of field (say for something more artisitc than a picture of the kids on Santa's lap) you need to get a better lens or more distance between you and the subject.
There is a three way tug of way betweeh shutter speed, depth of field (F-stop) and noise (ISO.) At least with a D-SLR as opposed to a plain film SLR you can readily choose the later on the fly, giving you somee control on the amount of blur in your photo.
Any DSLR can be set to act just like its cheaper counterpart. Please understand that when a reviewer is saying "this SLR camera has a smaller depth of field than its non-SLR counterpart" you should append "and I don't have a clue about what knob to turn to make it look different; damn it I told my boss I'm not qualified to write this review." to the end of their sentence.
If you are really on a tight budget and want the small field of view of an expensive lens, step back and zoom in. Get a cheap telephoto if you can afford it. A low F stop is one contributing factor to a small field of view; a high focal length is the other. The focal length can outweight the F-stop rather quickly in this matter giving you some rather nice fuzzy backgrounds from even the cheapest of lenses. Of course the zoom will conspire against your already paltry shutter speed by magnifing camera shake, so get a tripod too.
The combination of features is great, build quality leaves something to desire, like the flimsy battery cover and the zoom 'button' that broke off after a few months of heavy use.
I do see the noise in low light pictures but it does not bother me greatly considering the price of the camera (345 Euro). Half a year ago the camera was stolen and I did not hesitate to buy the Z2.
The APO lens of the Z2 is clearly the biggest improvement and the new availability of optical zoom while in the movie mode is a great bonus as well.
Before I got the Z1 I was never a great fan of movies but it works so well on these cameras, especially the low light movies come out remarkably well plus the sound quality is excelent.
I have recommended the camera to several people and those who bought it are all real happy.
And when I can find someone that'll take the Z2 off my hands I'll be in the market for the Z3 because of it's stabilisation system, something important on a camera with a 12x zoom.
(Yes when I win the lottery I'll take the Nikon D70 'cause then I can use all the lenses of my F90...)
"The likes of Facebook and WhatsApp are free to those whose privacy is of zero value."
Of course, if you're really keen, you can get one of the high end Canon SLRs...
Most importantly, I don't think you should scrimp on your camera. Those cameras step up in price, according to features more than anything else, but within a particular category there can be quite a spread of prices. I'm not trying to be elitist here (like people who claim you should never use anything less than 256kbps in OGG format for music...) but the efficiency and quality of your camera will really grate after a while if they're not up to scratch.
-
Illuminating Science
Physicist, consultant, science communicator
" If you need a digital SLR you KNOW you need one from the start. DSLR's are simly for pro's/ experienced (and rich) amatures "
No, I'm not buying this at all.
There have always been people who were happy with a Kodak 126, and those who wanted an SLR. I don't remember how much I paid for my F2, in 1977, but it must have been $600 for the body. And that was for just about the best 35mm camera available. I could not afford medium format.
There are $50-100 cameras to fill the same niche today, as the $50-100 snapshot 110 cameras of those days. There are $200 to $500 cameras, just like there were back then also. Then there are the SLRs, more or less in the same price ranges as in 1980. Pretty much in 1980 dollars. Without film and processing costs. With a color darkroom replaced by a midrange PC and Photoshop. (Compare the cost of Photoshop with adding a room to your house, with plumbing, with a separate, filtered air ventilation system, with temperature control...)
So, while you have a point, that the SLR's are marketed to a higher-end consumer, I don't see how they are necessarily aimed at rich amateurs or pros. They are aimed at precisely the same niche that SLRs were in the 1970s, and selling for approximately the same prices as then -- which makes them *cheap*.
-fb Everything not expressly forbidden is now mandatory.
1) The only acceptable removable media option is Compact Flash.
2) The only acceptable power source is AA cells.
CF: why? highest capacity at the lowest cost. It's "small enough" and WTF do we need with 5 different, incompatible memory formats. If only people had rejected the newcomers as they arrived, we wouldn't be in this mess. It's not too late, boycott lame memory card formats!
AAs. LiOn echargable batteries are great until something happens when the battery has been in the drawer for a month - hey hang there for an hour 'till the batterie's charged! Or you're on vacation - just let me bring the charger for each device I carry! Or the battery runs out after 110 minutes - sure I'll just buy a few extra - at $100 each! Or your out in some foreign country: good luck finding that random LiOn at the local market, just dig through that bin of AA's, I'm sure there's one in there somewhere.
AA/CF.
After reading the article, it seems more like an infomercial than anything else. Sparse and incorrect info, lots of flash, then the links to amazon so you can make your holiday purchase.
Brilliant! We've been SLASHSPAMMED.
...except when you have to swap batteries, and your wife throws out the "alkalines" you gave her to hold...
Ooh, a sarcasm detector. Oh, that's a real useful invention.
Yep, my Dad threw out my Nimh "alkalines" once
The ISO range on a "prosumer" camera is usually 50-400. DSLRs go to ISO 1600 (some to 3200). The main issue here is noise - the noise of a DSLR at ISO 400 eclipses the best a "prosumer" can do at its minimum ISO with the best lighting. The images are just much cleaner and you can see more detail.
Most of this is due to the difference in sensor, and thus pixel, size - where the largest prosumer sensor is 2/3" diagonal, DSLRs use APS-C (22x15mm), and some, like Sigma I think, have a full 35mm sensor.
What sorts of tirades? The statement, "It's a 200mm lens, but on my Digital Rebel it's equivalent to a 300mm lens on a full-frame 35mm camera" is true. The statement you wrote seems to be a slightly more ambiguous version of that. What's the issue?
--grendel drago
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
I spent time using Canon's SLR Technology education web-site and also read through the book. I also picked up one of those $5 pocket books filled with tips.
I still have much more to learn, in order to master the camera. However, at this time I am currently good enough to take a decent number of images.
If you ignore the other uses of a tool, does that make the tool less useful, or you less useful?
I recommend you to read All This, and They Take Pictures, Too, an interesting article by David Pogue. He compares twelve digital cameras with a street price under $300. In case you need to register, there you go.
It IS nice to be able to go to 1.8 sometimes, for those narrow depth of field shots... Makes for great portraits sometimes. I almost exclusively use a $70 lens for what I do (portraits), but if you want to do wedding photography, landscape, etc, be prepared to spend ALOT more. The $70 Canon 50mm prime 1.8 is an anomaly-- a great, cheap lens. You won't find many of those... http://www.rupertphotography.com/
[FromTheMorning]
You are a f*cking moron.
You just are presenting yourself as part of a mythical smaller hive (those that "think for themselves").
Thinking for yourself has become in many quarters synonimous to "be a contrarian", one is suppossed to find a small alitist niche regarding everything in order "not to be part of the lemmings".
And what about if the lemmings are correct?
I can hell of think for myself, thank you very much, and I fully agree with the poster you derided regarding the lame ass use of flash, and my knees did not jerk in case you were wondering.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
I definitely agree with you about the AA batteries. One of the great things about my Olympus digital camera is that it takes 4 AA batteries---rechargeable (when I have the set charged in advance) or alkaline (as a spare set and in the camera when I'm not using it---because rechargeable batteries discharge when not in use and I hate having to set the customizations and the clock again).
http://floyd.firingsquad.com/pfucata_digicam_guide _04/dofexample.html
I only write the articles, I don't write the anti-leech code.
http://www.firingsquad.com/pfucata_digicam_guide_0 4/dofexample.html
The distance between the sensor and lens on a D-SLR is greater than that on a small-sensor digicam. That affects the depth of field. The problem is that sometimes the slow shutter speed from stopping down is impractical without a tripod.
http://www.firingsquad.com/pfucata_digicam_guide_0 4/dofexample.html
Depth of field is affected by sensor-to-lens distance and hence DSLRs with a larger sensor have less depth of field.
Please do your research before you claim that others are wrong.
http://www.firingsquad.com/pfucata_digicam_guide_0 4/dofexample.html
I, too, don't use flash. Ever. I don't remember the last time I did. (Same camera.) I got a fast lens (EF 50mm f/1.8, under a hundred bucks, my only major purchase for the Digital Rebel since buying it this summer) so I wouldn't have all of my shots coming out either blurry or noisy, and I pretty much never take it off now. Makes pretty nice portraits, too.
--grendel drago
Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. --Seneca
Definately offtopic, but I didn't see any way of reaching you except by replying to an older posting.
I'm interested in getting into electronic/chip design and would like to get a few pointers. Please drop me a line.
/* TODO: Spawn child process, interest child in technology, have child write a new sig */