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. :-(
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"/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".
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
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.
http://www.steves-digicams.com
http://www.dpreview.com
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.
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."
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.
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.
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.
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
#
A camera without flash would be pretty useless.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
Short answer: They don't, technically. Epson just came out with a digital rangefinder with an APS sized sensor (like most DSLR's have).
Long answer: The reason you don't want to use an LCD screen on a DSLR for most things is for creative control. Try manually focusing... with the current displays, this is very difficult because everything looks reasonably sharp unless its VERY out of focus. Another reason is the hardware autofocus modules on DSLR's use the mirror to reflect light into them. Your P&S cameras use an algorithm that calculates focus through the camera's CPU. Dedicated hardware is much faster than that.
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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.
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.
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?
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?
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'.
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!
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.
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.
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Find out more about the impending downfall o
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.
I can imagine. I got my first camera when I was closer to 7 or 8 (9?). My brother and I each got a Kodak disc camera for christmas. I used up most of my first two discs (15 exposures each!) just photographing my presents. I calmed down a bit after that :) They went into the closet after a few years because of the inconvenience of only 15 exposures and the trouble of getting new film. If there was anything important to photograph then we used my mums' much better 35mm compact. Now with the extreme convenience of digital photography, I can't imagine going back to such a world. Well, except for semi-serious photography.
So what sort of things does a 4.5 y/o with a digicam photograph? How does she handle transferring the photos to a PC? And/or does she use the composite video out?
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.
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.
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.
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!
In graphic design (including web) clear white space is a powerful tool.
I couldn't agree more.
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.
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
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.
In a word - responsiveness.
When you hit the shutter on a digital SLR you take the picture immediately. On a compact it takes about 0.5 seconds. This is because the sensor is only used taking a picture on an SLR. On a compact it is continually in use, so when you hit the shutter what actually happens is the the sensor the shutter is closed, the sensor reset electronically, and then the picture is taken.
It is also completely impossible to focus manually with a compact camera. Then you get to depth of field preview, focus points, different metering modes.
Then there is the interchangable lenses - everything from super-wides to super telephotos. The Canon EF(-S) range now goes from 10mm to 1200mm - add some extenders and you get a focal length range of (in compact camera terms), of 300X.
The digital SLR lenses generally make much better use of light (i.e. they have bigger apertures). This is turn allows more flexibility when shooting.
But horses for courses - if you just want snaps then a compact is the camera to buy. Digital SLRs aren't any better or worse - just a different tool for a different job.
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.