Digital heresy advice needed

[robertdfeinman]

My adult daughter wants to buy a digital camera. She has an Olympus film P&S that's she's satisfied with, but has gotten tired of buying film and getting it processed.

I think she will mostly use it for snapshots of friends and family as well as the occasional picture to post on ebay or the like.

She wants a viewfinder. I think she also should stick with a small camera as she will be more likely to take it with her rather than one of the SLR-shaped things being offered.

It seems that actual viewfinders are rapidly disappearing. I've only been able to find a couple of models of Canon Powershot (A570 and A720) and a Nikon P50.

The features that I think should be important seem to not be what the marketers have decided on. To my mind 6-8 Mpix is adequate. Other things are a zoom that goes wide rather than the game to increase the long end of the range. Most people take snaps of groups from close up, not eagles at 500 yards. I think anti-shake is probably a good idea as well. Being able to focus to under one foot would be nice for flowers or details of craft projects.

So, any comments or suggestions would be welcomed.

[Personally I wonder how many people have the discipline to download and print digital images, or do they take the chips in for processing?]

 

[GeneW]

I tote around a Canon SD800 IS, an ultracompact I find very useful. It's zoom equivalent is 28-105mm and it has image stabilization. I think it's a 6 megapixel cam. It has a small optical finder as well as LCD monitor. Good battery life and very lightweight. Image quality is quite decent, for its class of camera, and macro mode is excellent. Fairly good movie mode too, if that's important to her. It uses SD cards.

I think this model is now discontinued and you may be able to find it at a bargain price. There's a replacement model that's newer and probably has more megapixels, but I'm afraid I don't know the model number other than it's 800-something.

Gene

 

[plummerl]

I would have to second the choice of the Canon SD800 IS. I purchased one for my wife, who loves it (I like it also! 🙂 ). It is actually a 7.1 Megapixel, with image stabilization that is very effective. The really nice feature is having the wide end at 28mm equivalent. As stated, the battery life is phenomenal, not to mention the size.

 

[Tuolumne]

Ricoh GX-100. Effective zoom range is 25mm-75mm (35mm format). Great image quality at low ISOs. So-so at high, but fixable with Noise Ninja. Small and very lightweight. Includes an LCD finder, but not an optical finder.

/T

 

[Ducky]

The Nikon P50 is a nice camera, as is the Canon A570. My little Sony dsc-s40 is also nice and has a viewfinder but it's old now. I was surprised how often I use the LCD rather than the viewfinder. I think now I have to remember the viewfinder is there. Try for a hands-on with one or two before buying. As far a megapixs, they all have lower settings. It's easier to find a 7-8 meg camera at a good price and just set it at 3 or 4. Most have zooms but again, you don't have to use them.
Good luck, let us know what you decide.

 

[kuzano]

You didn't mention one particular issue (or 2)

You didn't mention one particular issue (or 2)

Low Light situations. Many young people want to shoot indoor events. Here is a link to a reigning champion in this area. Best small lowlight camera in the market and hard to find as a result. This is actually a bit older model, replaced by the F31, and then a later. I think the F50, but I recall the F50 lagged back on the noise.

The higher the megapixel count is getting, the more the noise is creeping back in and ruining low-light results.

Also, does not have the viewfinder, but a lot of people are getting used to this as a tradeoff for the innards needing all the space for all those features.

Also, fujis tend toward good battery life and fast startup.

Shutter lag? any kind of an issue.

I presume you know about the review sites. If not:

www.dpreview.com
www.steves-digicams.com
www.dcresource.com

I think your idea to cut the megapixels at 6-8 is wise on these tiny tiny sensor compacts. I do happen to be a fuji fan, and have blown fuji 6 Mp pictures up to 13X19 with little difference from a Jpeg from my Olympus DSLR, and close to the results from the RAW in my Olympus. In both cases, that's right out of the camera with no edits.

You won't find any RAW in the majority of these small camera's, but there is a temporary download patch that will give some of the lesser priced canon's a similar RAW capability to the $500 G9. I think the one's you mention in Canon w viewfinders fall in this range.

Your viewfinder requirement is a serious limitation. I let that one go quite some time ago. The batteries are fairly refined and handle a lot of shots using the LCD.

 

[kuzano]

oops forgot the link

oops forgot the link

http://www.dpreview.com/news/0602/06021403fujif30.asp

 

[rpsawin]

Canon G9. Give her something to grow into.

Bob

 

[robertdfeinman]

Flame war

Flame war

I don't want to start a flame war over the benefits of digital, especially since I don't have such a camera, but...

I've tried a few digital cameras owned by friends and relatives (as well as tourists who ask me to take their picture) and I find I can't use the screen on the back effectively.

I find several things wrong, I have to hold it too far away so that I can see it clearly (presbyopia even with my bifocals). Holding so far away (18") makes it hard to see details like a person's expression or whether they have their eyes closed and also makes the camera unstable. This is a two point support vs the three point one gets from pressing the camera against one's face.

The issue of the screen washing out in bright light seems to be a concern to many as well. Even George Eastman understood the need for stability, his box cameras allowed one to hold them close to the body and look down into the finder.

Speaking of finders, why is it that the P&S cameras can include a zoom finder while the "sophisticated" rangefinder cameras make us look at a fixed sized image with crop marks to denote each lens? I don't find the 90mm frame very user friendly...

 

[BillP]

Canon G9. Give her something to grow into.

Bob

Seconded.

Regards,

Bill

 

[visiondr]

The "finder" on my wife's Canon SD710IS is all but useless. It's very dim, suffers from gross distortion and after testing it out, has only vaguely accurate framing. It would be nice to have a decent finder in a point and shoot, but frankly, I haven't seen one. I did a lot of market research before I bought the camera for my wife last X-mas and there wasn't then, and I doubt there is now, much choice. As much as I hate to, I often find myself holding the camera up in front of me and using the LCD to frame and compose. It's a goofy way to hold a camera, but that's all the manufacturers allow us to do now. That is, of course, what the average user wants. They don't want viewfinders. If they did, companies would bend over backwards to give them one that was better than their competitors'. That said - and out of my system, thank you - the tiny Canon P&Ss are really great. Just don't punch the ISO beyond 200. The noise will be deafening.

Oh, and I'll third the notion that the G9 is a very nice camera.

 

[OldNick]

I'll second the recommendation of the Fuji Finepix line of small digitals. I have the F10, bought at a bargain price after the F11 came out. There are now several later models in this series.

One of the problems that I see in providing finders is that, in order to match a finder to a zoom lens, which most small digicams provide, one must introduce some complex method of matching the finder and lens. Since most digicam users seem to prefer the LCD display for framing, the manufacturers go that way. I have adapted to that approach, and it now seems second nature.

Jim N.

 

[ampguy]

My daughter uses an A550. It is about her 3rd or 4th digital camera. Works great, cost only $129 or so, uses AA batteries and an SD card, has a viewfinder (squinty), but most importantly, has excellent image quality. We save all images, then sometimes print at home, or more likely find favorites and take them to a drug store or Costco for cheap prints, or an occasional 8x10. I keep it set on -2/3 EV comp., It may not have full manual mode, if this is a priority, you may want to check. Also, ISO above 200/400 gets noisy, though there is an ISO 800.

 

[Eric T]

Try the Canon G9. Noise is high above 200 and the viewfinder should show more but the images are terrific and it does allow you to set controls manually if you so desire. I particularly like the ability to set the ISO in any mode on the fly with the wheel on the top left of the camera.
Eric

 

[robertdfeinman]

User

User

One thing to keep in mind when suggesting equipment for people is that the choice has to match their needs. While the G9 may be a fine performer it is not clear that the added functionality has any practical value to my daughter.

She's not going to "grow" into it, she's been taking pictures for a long time and isn't about to move from a snap shooter to a hobbyist. There is really no possibility that she will suddenly want to print something bigger than 8x10, so what would the extra resolution do for her?

I just had a similar situation with my wife. She wanted to buy a new sewing machine. The modern ones are all afflicted with extra features of doubtful value. Does anyone really need a choice of 150 different decorative stitches? Once there is a computer chip in an item the cost of adding a feature is essentially zero while the ability to charge for it seems almost unlimited.

So, to repeat, what's the value of the G9 in this case, especially given the fact that most digital cameras seem to get replaced within five years?

 

[visiondr]

My daughter uses an A550... I keep it set on -2/3 EV comp...

Perfect advice. I do the same with my wife's Canon SD710IS. They seem to like to blow out highlights. Keeping the exposure compensation dialed down makes a difference.

One more thing, set the camera to "M" and set the preference of focusing to omit/avoid face recognition. This "feature" is of dubious value at best. All to frequently it seems to pick out objects other than those in the plane of interest. For the quick point and shooter, this can be a great disappointment to look closely at images later only to discover that people have blurry faces!

You really can't beat the small Canon P&Ss for image quality and small size.

 

[rpsawin]

One thing to keep in mind when suggesting equipment for people is that the choice has to match their needs. While the G9 may be a fine performer it is not clear that the added functionality has any practical value to my daughter.

She's not going to "grow" into it, she's been taking pictures for a long time and isn't about to move from a snap shooter to a hobbyist. There is really no possibility that she will suddenly want to print something bigger than 8x10, so what would the extra resolution do for her?

I just had a similar situation with my wife. She wanted to buy a new sewing machine. The modern ones are all afflicted with extra features of doubtful value. Does anyone really need a choice of 150 different decorative stitches? Once there is a computer chip in an item the cost of adding a feature is essentially zero while the ability to charge for it seems almost unlimited.

So, to repeat, what's the value of the G9 in this case, especially given the fact that most digital cameras seem to get replaced within five years?

Other than it fits most of the criteria you set forth in your original post +++ I suppose not not much.

Bob

 

[kuzano]

I am not sure I agree.

I am not sure I agree.

Other than it fits most of the criteria you set forth in your original post +++ I suppose not not much.Bob

I differ a bit here, but it's my own observation. I feel that the G9 would be a superb camera if it offered everything it does offer, but the sensor capped out at 7 or 8 megapixels. One of the continuing deterrents to a superior low light prosumer camera is the race for pixels. Some would respond simply set the camera at a lower resolution. That does not fix the problem. The process engines are constantly improving, but the improvement of the engine is defeated by the addition of more photosites to an already overcrowded small sensor. Setting the resolution lower does not solve the overcrowding of the photosites.

So, I was ready to pull the trigger on the G9, because of the RAW. But the thing that kept me from buying it was the fact that it is a 12.1 megapixel camera. Too many photosites for the tiny little sensor in the body.

When I found that there is a temporary firmware patch for the lower priced canons that allows RAW capture, the desire for the G9 died right off.

 

[JoeV]

Markus posted this about a recent vacation shoot, and made some relevant observations about the resolution verses noise level performance of his digital point-and-shoot, in this thread.

It seems to me that many of the newer cameras are being marketed with higher resolution - more pixels - because pixel count is a hard, objective data point that can be used as comparison. But image quality is more dependant on pixel area size, as this directly affects the noise level of the resulting image. Big pixels have less noise, and better low-light performance. Big pixels, in a lower-count array (less than 6mp) are uncommon in new cameras, since the way in which camera chips are made is to shrink their size as small as possible; this makes possible higher pixel count cameras in ever smaller form factors, while the cost per chip to manufacture is lower (i.e. more chips per wafer.)

In short, new digital point-and-shoot cameras, in general, are being made to satisfy the pixel count mantra, not the image quality requirements of folks who are used to the results one commonly gets from film. Hopefully, this will change over time as manufacturers figure out that people want image quality other than mere sharp edges: they want low noise and a wider tonal range.

My old Sony DSC-S90 has an optical viewfinder that zooms with the taking lens; one can turn off the LCD screen and use this camera as a discrete street shooter, but there is some parallax correction one would be required to learn in order to get reliable framing. And, just yesterday, I shot several hundred indoor flash shots during a family Christmas get-together. Lots of frustration over shutter delay; but at least I could review (chimp) the results and delete and reshoot.

The biggest problem I personally have with point-and-shoot cameras of all ilks (digital or film) is the slow response under indoor light with flash, where the camera is trying to figure out autofocus and exposure, and ends up firing two or three seconds after the 'decisive moment' has passed. In this respect I'd be happier just sticking with a manual focus, manual exposure film camera with external flash and a fast prime lens, and risk losing a few shots, rather than having a higher number of mediocre results.

~Joe

 

[kuzano]

Yes, and so the marketing hype goes.

Yes, and so the marketing hype goes.

Corporate decisions in the consumer and prosumer units continue to pack pixels on at the expense of image quality. The basis for that decision is the full knowledge that the majority of the people buying the product will never print an image over 4X6 inches and will never send anything but a 200Kb jpeg over the internet.

I remember reading just before Photokina 2005 that we shouldn't expect to see anything outstanding in consumer digital cameras, since sensors were topping out at 6 and 7 megapixels and there wasn't much chance we'd see over that without going to larger sensors.

So much for that. What a dance?