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mindmetoo
Joined: 02 Feb 2004
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 Posted: Wed Dec 22, 2004 4:34 am Post subject: Re: Optical Zoom |
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| danielcraig wrote: |
| Whatever you get, make sure it has an optical zoom (not just a digital zoom). The first time you need it, you'll thank me. |
I agree. Get a good optical zoom before mega pixel ratings. If you're just sharing photos online 5.0 megapixels is overkill deluxe. I have a 2.0 mega pixel camera, I have it set for 1 mega pixel photos, and those I still have to shrink by 20% just to fit on most monitors.
After optical zoom, a smaller camera is better. Ask yourself if you can comfortably keep it in a coat pocket. There's something to be said for a camera that lets you pull out quickly and take spontaneous pictures. My camera is a bit too bulky for that and I really regret all the photos I could have taken but I haven't.
Video ability is good, especially if you have a GF and want to document your love. |
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Zed
Joined: 20 Jan 2003
Location: Shakedown Street
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| Posted: Wed Dec 22, 2004 5:00 am Post subject: |
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| I usually take most pictures while on the road and I don't like carrying around something too obvious in some of the places I go. Small is good. |
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Demophobe
Joined: 17 May 2004
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| Posted: Wed Dec 22, 2004 4:49 pm Post subject: Re: Optical Zoom |
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| mindmetoo wrote: |
I agree. Get a good optical zoom before mega pixel ratings. If you're just sharing photos online 5.0 megapixels is overkill deluxe. I have a 2.0 mega pixel camera, I have it set for 1 mega pixel photos, and those I still have to shrink by 20% just to fit on most monitors.
After optical zoom, a smaller camera is better. Ask yourself if you can comfortably keep it in a coat pocket. There's something to be said for a camera that lets you pull out quickly and take spontaneous pictures. My camera is a bit too bulky for that and I really regret all the photos I could have taken but I haven't.
Video ability is good, especially if you have a GF and want to document your love. |
Don't forget one thing: You are only thinking of size, not quality. A shrunk 3 maga-pixel photo will look much, much better than a 1 mega-pixel photo. Speaking of mega-pixels, one is referring as much to the detail of the picture as they are the overall resolution. A 1 MP photo can't compete with a 3MP photo at all in terms of quality. |
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ulsanchris
Joined: 19 Jun 2003
Location: take a wild guess
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| Posted: Wed Dec 22, 2004 5:38 pm Post subject: |
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| Canon now has the power shot A90. I would go for that. I would give a bit of a warning against getting a very small camera. The smaller the camera is the harder it is to hold steady. YOu've got to worry about camera shake. I would go for a larger, heavier digi cam like the Powershot A series. |
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Demophobe
Joined: 17 May 2004
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| Posted: Wed Dec 22, 2004 8:24 pm Post subject: |
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| ulsanchris wrote: |
| Canon now has the power shot A90. I would go for that. I would give a bit of a warning against getting a very small camera. The smaller the camera is the harder it is to hold steady. YOu've got to worry about camera shake. I would go for a larger, heavier digi cam like the Powershot A series. |
A90 is discontinued for the A95.... |
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Derrek
Joined: 15 Jan 2003
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| Posted: Thu Dec 23, 2004 4:18 am Post subject: |
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I'd like to put a plug in for the Canon S-1IS
http://www.steves-digicams.com/2004_reviews/s1is.html
It has an awesome 10x zoom with excellent Optical image stabilization. The photos look fantastic. It's a 3.2 Megapixel camera with tons of settings, and it's a good medium size for a good fit.
It also can add lenses, which many more expensive Canon cameras can't do.
Canon decided to make a model with a lot of the high-end features but not all of the Megapixel overkill. It also takes 30fps 640x480 video that rivals expensive mini-DV cams -- stomps many of them, actually -- because the lens is high-quality (I believe non-interlaced frames as well). Sure, I use my camcorder for video, but it would be handy to have if I just wanted to capture a quick video of something somewhere for my own reasons. You are limited only by your CF card size, and up to 60 minutes of recording at one time. You have to go to the Japan site to download a sample of the video. Go here and look at the bottom of the page for the video sample:
http://web.canon.jp/Imaging/pss1is/sample-j.html
No, there isn't a RAW mode, but my Canon has it, and I find it worthless. If I was printing in 11x17 size or larger, and the pic was perfect, it could be useful, but in RAW mode you can't edit images in Photoshop. No cropping, tweaking colors or contrast, etc.
I saw a few consumer reviews that complained the images were soft due to having "only 3.2 Megapixels," but they obviously didn't have the camera long enough to figure out that there is a menu to adjust sharpness. Blaming it on the Megapixels was wrong. It defaults at the middle setting, which in my mind is too soft. I always shoot my pics on my Canon at the sharper setting. I love sharp photos, and sometimes tweak with Photoshop "Unsharp Mask" on some photos to add even more clarity. |
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Zed
Joined: 20 Jan 2003
Location: Shakedown Street
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| Posted: Thu Dec 23, 2004 5:24 am Post subject: |
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I'll definitely have to check that one out Derrek. I really want something with a good zoom. That sounds good without being too big.
KoreaNewfie recommended the one that he used in the photo contest to me. It was an L-shaped series Sony. It looks a little bigger than what I want to carry. DSC-F717
http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/sonydscf717/ |
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Derrek
Joined: 15 Jan 2003
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| Posted: Thu Dec 23, 2004 6:39 am Post subject: |
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| Zed wrote: |
I'll definitely have to check that one out Derrek. I really want something with a good zoom. That sounds good without being too big.
KoreaNewfie recommended the one that he used in the photo contest to me. It was an L-shaped series Sony. It looks a little bigger than what I want to carry. DSC-F717
http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/sonydscf717/ |
I never cared for that style of Sony cameras.
I feel like I'm holding/bought a lens with a camera attached to it. |
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Demophobe
Joined: 17 May 2004
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| Posted: Thu Dec 23, 2004 12:27 pm Post subject: |
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| Derrek wrote: |
No, there isn't a RAW mode, but my Canon has it, and I find it worthless. If I was printing in 11x17 size or larger, and the pic was perfect, it could be useful, but in RAW mode you can't edit images in Photoshop. No cropping, tweaking colors or contrast, etc. |
I think this is the most glaring example of misinformation I have ever read on this forum.
RAW mode is a digital negative. You can do anything to the photo in photoshop that you can with film in a darkroom. Photoshop CS (with PhotoRAW 2.4 beta for my S70) supports all RAM formats for Canon and within that program (as did previous versions of photoshop), you can correct all aspects of the photo, without compromising others.
RAW is a savior for people who actually do more than take hip shots of kids or women on the street. I take actual portraits, and RAW allows me a whole range of tweaks that compensate for my shortcomings as a photographer.
It's not an easy format to work with, but if you have ever taken a picture that you wish were better, RAW is the way to go.
http://www.luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/understanding-series/u-raw-files.shtml
This link will help you to understand all you don't know about RAW files Derrek. Please pay close attention to the charts...they plainly illustrate how wrong you are.
If you are too lazy, a cut and paste for you:
_________________________________________
Reasons to Shoot JPG— Files are smaller and therefore more of them fit on a card.
— For many applications image quality is more than sufficient (family snapshots, news images).
— Small files are more easily transmitted wirelessly and online. This is important to newspaper photographers.
— Many photographers don't have the time or inclination to post-process their files.
— Many cameras (especially digicams) can not shoot quickly when working in raw mode. Some lower-end models can't record raw files at all.
Reasons to Shoot Raw— A raw file is comparable to the latent image contained in an exposed but undeveloped piece of film. It holds exactly what the imaging chip recorded. Nothing more. Nothing less. This means that the photographer is able to extract the maximum possible image quality, whether now or in the future. A good analogy with the traditional world of film is that you have the opportunity to use a different type of developer or development time at any point in the future if one comes along that you think might do a better job of processing the image.
— Raw files have not had while balance set. They are tagged with whatever the camera's setting was, (either that which was manually set or via auto-white-balance), but the actual data has not been changed. This allows one to set any colour temperature and white balance one wishes after the fact with no image degradation. It should be understood that once the file has been converted from the linear space and has had a gamma curve applied (such as in a JPG) white balance can no longer be properly done.
— File linearization and colour filter array (Bayer) conversion is done on a computer with a fast and powerful microprocessor. This allows much more sophisticated algorithms to be used than those done in a camera with its slower and less powerful processor and with less space for complex conversion programs.
— The raw file is tagged with contrast and saturation information as set in the camera by the user, but the actual image data has not been changed. The user is free to set these based on a per-image evaluation rather than use one or two generalized settings for all images taken.
— Possibly the biggest advantage of shooting raw is that one has a 16 bit image (post raw conversion) to work with. This means that the file has 65,536 levels to work with. This is opposed to a JPG file's 8 bit space with just 256 brightness levels available. This is important when editing an image, particularly if one is trying to open up shadows or alter brightness in any significant way.
Figures #1 and #2 below shows why. Assuming for this example a 5 stop dynamic range, you can see how much data is found in each of the brightness levels in the image. In other words with a 12 bit file the two darkest levels of the file combined have some 384 brightness levels to work with.
An 8 bit JPG file on the other hand has considerably less. Both the sRGB and Adobe RGB colour spaces use a gamma 2.2 encoding. Gamma encoding reallocates encoding levels from the upper f-stops into the lower f-stops to compensate for the human eye's greater sensitivity to absolute changes in the darker tone range. Therefore an 8 bit JPG file has just 47 brightness levels available in the bottom two stops. (The remaining levels out of 256 are for the f-stops beyond the 5 in this example).
A 12 Bit raw File (Figure #1)
Within the first F/Stop, which contains the Brightest Tones 2048 levels available
Within the second F/Stop, which contains Bright Tones 1024 levels available
Within the third F/Stop, which contains the Mid-Tones 512 levels available
Within the fourth F/Stop, which contains Dark Tones 256 levels available
Within the fifth F/Stop, which contains the Darkest Tones 128 levels available
An 8 Bit JPG File (Figure #2)
Within the first F/Stop, which contains the Brightest Tones 69 levels available
Within the second F/Stop, which contains Bright Tones 50 levels available
Within the third F/Stop, which contains the Mid-Tones 37 levels available
Within the fourth F/Stop, which contains Dark Tones 27 levels available
Within the fifth F/Stop, which contains the Darkest Tones 20 levels available
Now imagine that you want to make a modest adjustment to the file in Photoshop or any other editing program. Which would you rather have to work with, 47 levels or 384 levels? Clearly the 8 bit file will show posterization, which is the effect that one sees when instead of smooth transitions between brightness levels you see abrupt jumps.
— Because a raw file has not been processed in any way, if new and improved methods of linearizing files, applying colour filter array decoding, or other image processing advances are made, you can return to your archived raw files and work on them afresh. A JPG file, on the other hand, is fully baked.
_________________________________________________
I am not trying to start yet another war with you, yet I can't believe you could speak with such authority on a subject that you obviously haven't a clue about.
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tomato
Joined: 31 Jan 2003
Location: I get so little foreign language experience, I must be in Koreatown, Los Angeles.
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| Posted: Thu Dec 23, 2004 1:38 pm Post subject: |
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Hello, rNS!
Do you want an imported camera because of the instruction manual?
I bought a Samsung camera at Carrefour.
I told them that I wanted an English manual.
They asked for my address, ordered an English manual for me, and it arrived the next day. |
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Bulsajo
Joined: 16 Jan 2003
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| Posted: Thu Dec 23, 2004 1:47 pm Post subject: |
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| Derrek wrote: |
I never cared for that style of Sony cameras.
I feel like I'm holding/bought a lens with a camera attached to it. |
Yes, the Sony has a big lens but it's a Zeiss lens with 10x optical zoom.
I used an F505v (earlier model of the dsc717) years ago for work- it's also not my style for a personal digital camera because of its size, but the design does have a really useful feature- the lense can tilt independantly from the body of the camera. |
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Derrek
Joined: 15 Jan 2003
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| Posted: Thu Dec 23, 2004 4:05 pm Post subject: |
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| Demophobe wrote: |
| Derrek wrote: |
No, there isn't a RAW mode, but my Canon has it, and I find it worthless. If I was printing in 11x17 size or larger, and the pic was perfect, it could be useful, but in RAW mode you can't edit images in Photoshop. No cropping, tweaking colors or contrast, etc. |
I think this is the most glaring example of misinformation I have ever read on this forum.
RAW mode is a digital negative. You can do anything to the photo in photoshop that you can with film in a darkroom. Photoshop CS (with PhotoRAW 2.4 beta for my S70) supports all RAM formats for Canon and within that program (as did previous versions of photoshop), you can correct all aspects of the photo, without compromising others.
RAW is a savior for people who actually do more than take hip shots of kids or women on the street. I take actual portraits, and RAW allows me a whole range of tweaks that compensate for my shortcomings as a photographer.
It's not an easy format to work with, but if you have ever taken a picture that you wish were better, RAW is the way to go.
http://www.luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/understanding-series/u-raw-files.shtml
This link will help you to understand all you don't know about RAW files Derrek. Please pay close attention to the charts...they plainly illustrate how wrong you are.
If you are too lazy, a cut and paste for you:
_________________________________________
Reasons to Shoot JPG— Files are smaller and therefore more of them fit on a card.
— For many applications image quality is more than sufficient (family snapshots, news images).
— Small files are more easily transmitted wirelessly and online. This is important to newspaper photographers.
— Many photographers don't have the time or inclination to post-process their files.
— Many cameras (especially digicams) can not shoot quickly when working in raw mode. Some lower-end models can't record raw files at all.
Reasons to Shoot Raw— A raw file is comparable to the latent image contained in an exposed but undeveloped piece of film. It holds exactly what the imaging chip recorded. Nothing more. Nothing less. This means that the photographer is able to extract the maximum possible image quality, whether now or in the future. A good analogy with the traditional world of film is that you have the opportunity to use a different type of developer or development time at any point in the future if one comes along that you think might do a better job of processing the image.
— Raw files have not had while balance set. They are tagged with whatever the camera's setting was, (either that which was manually set or via auto-white-balance), but the actual data has not been changed. This allows one to set any colour temperature and white balance one wishes after the fact with no image degradation. It should be understood that once the file has been converted from the linear space and has had a gamma curve applied (such as in a JPG) white balance can no longer be properly done.
— File linearization and colour filter array (Bayer) conversion is done on a computer with a fast and powerful microprocessor. This allows much more sophisticated algorithms to be used than those done in a camera with its slower and less powerful processor and with less space for complex conversion programs.
— The raw file is tagged with contrast and saturation information as set in the camera by the user, but the actual image data has not been changed. The user is free to set these based on a per-image evaluation rather than use one or two generalized settings for all images taken.
— Possibly the biggest advantage of shooting raw is that one has a 16 bit image (post raw conversion) to work with. This means that the file has 65,536 levels to work with. This is opposed to a JPG file's 8 bit space with just 256 brightness levels available. This is important when editing an image, particularly if one is trying to open up shadows or alter brightness in any significant way.
Figures #1 and #2 below shows why. Assuming for this example a 5 stop dynamic range, you can see how much data is found in each of the brightness levels in the image. In other words with a 12 bit file the two darkest levels of the file combined have some 384 brightness levels to work with.
An 8 bit JPG file on the other hand has considerably less. Both the sRGB and Adobe RGB colour spaces use a gamma 2.2 encoding. Gamma encoding reallocates encoding levels from the upper f-stops into the lower f-stops to compensate for the human eye's greater sensitivity to absolute changes in the darker tone range. Therefore an 8 bit JPG file has just 47 brightness levels available in the bottom two stops. (The remaining levels out of 256 are for the f-stops beyond the 5 in this example).
A 12 Bit raw File (Figure #1)
Within the first F/Stop, which contains the Brightest Tones 2048 levels available
Within the second F/Stop, which contains Bright Tones 1024 levels available
Within the third F/Stop, which contains the Mid-Tones 512 levels available
Within the fourth F/Stop, which contains Dark Tones 256 levels available
Within the fifth F/Stop, which contains the Darkest Tones 128 levels available
An 8 Bit JPG File (Figure #2)
Within the first F/Stop, which contains the Brightest Tones 69 levels available
Within the second F/Stop, which contains Bright Tones 50 levels available
Within the third F/Stop, which contains the Mid-Tones 37 levels available
Within the fourth F/Stop, which contains Dark Tones 27 levels available
Within the fifth F/Stop, which contains the Darkest Tones 20 levels available
Now imagine that you want to make a modest adjustment to the file in Photoshop or any other editing program. Which would you rather have to work with, 47 levels or 384 levels? Clearly the 8 bit file will show posterization, which is the effect that one sees when instead of smooth transitions between brightness levels you see abrupt jumps.
— Because a raw file has not been processed in any way, if new and improved methods of linearizing files, applying colour filter array decoding, or other image processing advances are made, you can return to your archived raw files and work on them afresh. A JPG file, on the other hand, is fully baked.
_________________________________________________
I am not trying to start yet another war with you, yet I can't believe you could speak with such authority on a subject that you obviously haven't a clue about.
. |
Ah, new information. Didn't know they were now manipulatable in newer versions of Photoshop. When I first got my camera, they weren't, and I never saw any difference in the RAW pictures that made me want to bother looking since then.
Plus, the file sizes are HUGE! The highest .jpg setting is 70% smaller than the RAW format.
Do you really need the RAW format?
Please read this article, written by a professional photographer:
http://www.nikondigital.org/dps/dps-v-2-7.htm
And this, one by another, which says:
"3) Image Quality (Myth) – Some may disagree with me, but it is my opinion that RAW saves offer no image quality advantages over JPEG saves when printed. JPEG images scaled just as nicely and I have yet to see any significant image quality advantages in 8 vs. 16 bit images when printed. So, I believe people have been misled if they chose RAW in the belief that they would experience superior image quality results."
One of the sites you suggested the other day says this about RAW,
"Our findings are that up to ISO 400 there's little difference between RAW and JPEG images, obviously if you have the storage (and time to convert the images later) then RAW provides more flexibility, but it also limits the number of frames you can shoot on a single card and the burst abilities of the camera. At ISO 800 and 1600 it appears that the noise introduced into the image generates increased noise when shot in JPEG rather than RAW, this is probably because of the way the JPEG algorithm works, thus in nearly every test there was always less green channel noise in RAW images."
The thing I find interesting about that is they say there is a "little difference" at ISO 400. I shoot most of my images at ISO 50 or 100! I don't like the "grain effect" of anything above 200, which is what is producing some of the barely-noticable greens you have to zoom waaaaaaaaay into the photo to see. If you are shooting at ISO 50 to 100, you don't have that problem.
Who the heck on this forum shoots above ISO 400 on a digital camera? Much less 1000 or 1600? If you're shooting pics of race-cars, then maybe, but the simple fact is that no one would even bother unless they have a top-end camera and know what they're doing with it.
http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/canond30/page14.asp |
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Demophobe
Joined: 17 May 2004
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| Posted: Thu Dec 23, 2004 6:11 pm Post subject: |
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Well, you kind of missed the point. The initial image produced with the RAW format looks worse than a JPEG in many ways. That is, until you convert it back to the correct color space, apply a white balance and correct any exposure problems. Then, it can be exported as a 16-bit TIFF (leaving a massive file size!) or anything under that; even to a JPEG.
The point being that with RAW, until manipulated either in the Canon software or in Photoshop, are for all purposes, unusable.
They are time intensive, labor intensive and not for everyone for these reasons. It's not worth using RAW if you do candids, as for the time needed to process a candid (which often have a low chance of being "perfect" enough to need a re-exposure) it may well not be worth it.
I take time with 80% of my photos. Not posing the kids, but catch them doing some activity which allows me certain liberties such as composition, angle, focus, etc.. and thus, I like to have the "negative" around to tweak and perfect the imperfections.
I do also take a fair few candid shots, and for such endeavors, I may swith to JPEG mode, and just click away, hoping for a good one.
RAW sizes are nuts....I have a 1GB card and can get about 120 photos on it. I fill it up every week, and probably invest 3 or 4 hours in processing time. The Canon software has a nice feature that allows some effects to be batch-applied, so certain tweaks I always do to my photos (sharpening, white balance [if shot in the same space], etc...) can be applied to all photos, saving some time.
Anyways, RAW has always been around for the previously-mentioned reasosn. Why else would it exist? The files are huge, processing time (even a simple JPEG conversion) take forever, the colors are washed out initially and the writes from camera to card are slow, due to file size. Well, they are there for the ability to not have the picture finished after the click of the shutter.
I do thank you for your hardware insights in the digital camera market. As I said before, I have a friend who is now a semi-pro using a Canon EOS 1D, and he gave me my camera as a gift. Therefore, I don't know a lot about the hardware (if I buy, I study. As a gift, I learn to use), but I did take the time to learn about the final outcome from the hardware, and for me, RAW just makes sense, if you can put up with all of the aforementioned drawbacks.
The link you provided is an interesting read, and has many valid points. It simply outlines the major question; What do you take pictures of?
Yeah...if I was trying to capture arctic terns landing, RAW may be impractical (although the new Sandisk "ultra" cards are really fast! My friend can do 8fps burst in RAW for about 6 seconds before the memory buffer is behind; this on a 1D, with 11MB file sizes!) and one may want to take a hundred JPEG, playing the odds for getting a good shot.
Different subjects, different formats. |
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I_Am_Wrong
Joined: 14 Sep 2004
Location: whatever
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| Posted: Thu Dec 23, 2004 7:35 pm Post subject: |
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well...I think I'm going to Yongson tonight to buy myself a digi cam. Right now I think I'm going to go with either a Panasonic Fx7 or fz20(best image stabilization and best optical zoom) or a Canon a 95 or ixus 40.
-Is electro land the best place in Yongson to shop for digi's? |
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Derrek
Joined: 15 Jan 2003
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| Posted: Thu Dec 23, 2004 8:18 pm Post subject: |
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| I_Am_Wrong wrote: |
well...I think I'm going to Yongson tonight to buy myself a digi cam. Right now I think I'm going to go with either a Panasonic Fx7 or fz20(best image stabilization and best optical zoom) or a Canon a 95 or ixus 40.
-Is electro land the best place in Yongson to shop for digi's? |
If you go with a Panasonic, get the FZ20. The FX7 has no viewfinder... only LCD screen. Also thought the FX7's photos looked a little washed-out. The FZ20 has a lot of noise in photos, which I don't like because I sometimes like to crop a lot, but otherwise looks like a nice camera, though. If you're planning to spend that much money, look at the Canon Pro1.
The Canon 95 is a lot less money, but is still a nice camera. A lot of the technology inside isn't the newest, though.
I like the IXUS 40 a lot. It is on my list as a possibility because it's so small but has lots of features. Not sure you can even get that one in the USA yet. |
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