Camera!

[theyellowhobbit]

So my mom just e-mailed me, and said it was fine if I went and bought a new digital camera, so long as it's not too expensive. Meanwhile, due to my super-mashing, I'll have made 124$ by the end of today, and I still have the rest of September to go! Usually I mash 7-8 hours in a month, 12 tops. So I could just buy the camera with my own money, or add that to whatever my parents are contributing.

Now here's the audience/reader participation bit. I'm quite undecided as to what I want. I know I want something small and hobbity, easy to upload, I don't need too many fancy features though if it could hold up in archaeology-land that would be nice.

One option is boroparkpyro's shiny Casio exilim*. Is it just me or does exilim sound like Hebrew?

If I wanted to put the extra money in, I could get the Optio WPI that I originally had before it tragically got lost. Actually, googling it, it seems to have come down in price from the 320$ that I** originally paid in December for it.

And then of course I'm sure there are tons of other cameras. So give me suggestions. (Especially people like maric23 and groovin_reuven who know what they're doing with cameras.) I will be forever thankful.

I'll probably go downtown camera shopping tomorrow, if I have time before Ari's l'chaim. How long does it take to get to Statten Island? Otherwise I'll go Tuesday. And I still have no clue how I'm getting to Ari's l'chaim...

In other news, I'm progressing a lot on the new kippah, since I have all that mashing-time in which to crochet.


*Not his actual camera, but the same model that he has.
**"I" meaning "my parents"

Comments

My current camera

[groovin-reuven.livejournal.com]

My current camera is a Canon A620. ~$230 now. I'd give it about a 7/10; I bought it because I couldn't justify the ~$1300 I would have spent on the camera I really wanted*, given the amount of time I spend using the camera.

I chose the A620 for quality, price, and the use of AA batteries.

My old camera that I liked was the Minolta DImage 7hi- Despite being only 5 MP, it took better quality pictures than the A620, since it had a higher quality lens. There were a few versions of this camera afterwords (Z5, etc), but Minolta is now mostly out of that business.

[*] I wanted a Digital Rebel XT with a long zoom lens an a wide zoom lens. Now that the XTi is around the price is down a little, but not much.

[maric23.livejournal.com]

Hmmm. So, I'm going to toss my $0.20 in primarily just mentioning a few features worth considering.

So, a few features worth focusing on.

Ultrazoom w/Image Stabilizer
One noteworthy mention that a friend of mine recently picked up (taylweaver's bf actually), is the Panasonic TZ1 (http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/panasonictz1/). Small, but with a 10x optical zoom. (For reference, the bulkier cameras attackpenguin and I were carrying around were 12x optical zoom). While the nightmode isn't as good as the larger cousins, the zoom certainly allows for a lot of great shots you'd never otherwise get. Close ups of pets, kids, archaeological photographers trapped on top of ruined towers. Lots of zoom can be really really nice. In general, you want to avoid using the zoom if you can get closer, (zoom = less depth of field = the picture looks flatter), but sometimes its the only way you'll get the pictures. The TZ1, like the larger cousins, has an image stabilizer to help you hold the camera steady, especially important at long zoom or in lower light.

Wideangle.
They're not common, but an alternative to the ultrazoom is sometimes a lens that goes pretty wideangle. While not always that useful, its definitely a function that can be very very cool to play with.

Megapixels.
Ignore the people who say it doesn't matter anymore. It does. Cropping is your friend. Zooming in on tiny details is your friend (especially as an archaeologist). Being able to project images on a 30' screen - and have them look nice, well, thats not bad (and yes, as a grad student you probably will have access to the droolworthy digital projectors). And that means megapixels.

Rotateable LCD.
My current job is photographing bones. Lots of bones. Using a photo stand. That points the camera straight down. And places me right above it.

'nuff said. Its literally a huge pain in the neck.

The rotateable LCD is also of great use for holding the camera over your head (and the heads of others) to see and photograph whats going on, as well as for taking pictures of yourself and the friend next to you.

Manual Settings
So... I didn't know much about cameras before I bought the current toy. Funny thing about manual settings, is it tends to tell you what its choosing when it uses automatic settings, which means that if you're remotely curious you'll pretty quickly start learning what they mean, how to use them... etc. Good way to learn.

Shutter Engine
3 shots in 1.5 seconds. Nowadays memory is pretty cheap. You can go two routes, either pay less and get an okay card, or you can pay a bit more and get a large card. Many cameras have the ability to take 2/3 shots in a row (when not using flash). This is great for both posed pictures (because invariably in 2 out of the 3 someone is looking away, or smirking, etc), as well as when dealing with animals, kids, etc. Its a nice feature, worth looking for and using regularly.
(continued)

[maric23.livejournal.com]

Archaeology
As far as archaeological work goes, you tend to care about Macro focusing above all else. Minimal barrel distortion is also of some import, and colour accuracy is always a nice thing. You'll have a pocket tripod or better, so you won't need the high iso settings, but the image stabilizers still don't hurt. Dustproof is a nice feature, but... well, I've yet to have problems. Just keep it packed away when its not needed, and remember that ziplock bags are your friends.

As far as macro focusing goes... you need to try it out in the store. None of the review sites I've read seem to pay attention to the degree that we care about. (I'm less than thrilled with my camera's macro performance even though it did very very well in the tests. Its good, but is notably weaker than the several year old nikon dsc4500). If you have any lithics lying around, bring them with a piece of dark cloth, try it, make the store people bring the images up on screen and zoom away. Keep zooming. (they will if you pester, bring lithics, explain why, and play the archaeology card, especially if you can explain what the strange lines on the screen are. Especially if you go when they're empty and bored. Don't forget to make an offering in your local harrison ford shrine beforehand.)

Um... yeah. Unfortunately, the best macro I've ever seen is on an outdated no longer produced camera, the Nikon DSC-4500. Its beautiful what the thing can come up with.

Beyond that, dcresource.com, and dpreview.com are good to look through. I'd pay close attention to the reviews when speaking about noise at different ISO levels... If most of the levels are going to print visibly pixelated pictures, well... thats a problem.

Also, don't buy your camera locally. Find places to feel the cameras, try them out, see the macro mode, and then find them online (www.pricegrabber.com), and order it unless by some miracle the local place is cheaper. The price difference should easily buy you a nice memory card (also get online) and case/pouch.

I'd also say to ask attackpenguin. He seemed to know his cameras quite well also.

And thats my $0.20. I'll probably remember other things and post em later. Personally though, I like my megazoom.

PS: For reference, my is the Panasonic DMC-FZ5, attackpenguin's was the comparable Canon S2. Both are larger and bulkier than you seemed to indicate wanting, though still much much smaller than an SLR.
PPS: Find detailed camera site reviews/forums. Look for problems/complaints.

[sen-ichi-rei.livejournal.com]

Did you ask attackpenguin when writing this post what camera he had or did you happen to just remember that? If the latter, then wow. I totally do not have a memory for cameras. Many times I can tell you what kind of kippah someone was wearing (for example- boroparkpyro's was black, but then after you guys left he switched to a Tu B'Av one which was white with flowers. alanscottevil was wearing his usual baseball cap. Without cheating and going to your photos I would guess that you had a small black one, possibly suede, possible srugah. Oh, now I looked, and you can't even see your kippah anyways! Was I right though?) But not cameras. All I remember was that you all had cool cameras, and I didn't.

What kind of camera did taylweaver have?

[maric23.livejournal.com]

No idea on Tayl's camera. I know attackpenguin's cause I almost bought it, and taylweaver's boyfriend's cause he asked me a lot before buying it.

And the kippah is medium black, leather, not suede.

[plus-c.livejournal.com]

platypuses and I both carry Panasonic DMC-FX9s. The FX8 is the closest model available in the US (yay Hong Kong shopping), which is the same camera body and lens, but with 1 less megapixel and a screen that's not as good. However, you're just posing shots with that screen anyways, so it does its job.

Re: My current camera

[sen-ichi-rei.livejournal.com]

Could I take a look at your camera when you get back tonight from the OCP outing (well actually later than that since I'm going to a play)? platypuses and plus_c were over and we were looking at the cameras on-line, and I think I might go with getting the A620.

[sen-ichi-rei.livejournal.com]

Leather, suede- same thing. Or not. But I was close-ish.

We were just looking at cameras now and my friend plus_c called yours a "Japanese tourist camera" (because of the size, that is). (He also set livejournal to Chinese, but that's another story...)

So what would you say about groovin_reuven's Canon A620 (http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/specs/Canon/canon_a620.asp)?

[maric23.livejournal.com]

Eh. Its still smaller than the classic japanese tourist camera. :-p This said, yeah, vaguely, but the functionality more than makes up for it to my mind. Curiously, its actually not a much bigger profile than the A620, just thicker.

Um. The Canon A620. The A95 was a still a widely regarded favourite when I was shopping, this is basically the markup. Its got the swivel lcd, 7 mp, canon optics... all very nice. A good engine. Macro focuses on 1 cm and out... not quite the S2's 0 cm focus, but still, cute. Barrel distortion is adequately painful on that macro though, and the tests don't give you a sense how it'll do with its zoom in macro. Too much noise for my tastes at iso 200, which translates into things looking a bit too ragged and pixelated when you take shots indoors, or at night or otherwise in less than ideal lighting conditions. Video is nice but it still has that damned canon insistence on a 1 gig video limit... 8 minutes is frustratingly low especially with SD cards being as cheap as they are these days.

Hmm, what else. Manual modes, very nice. Manual focus, I'm jealous.

Batteries... tack on an extra 30-50 dollars. You'll want two sets of 2500 nimh AA batteries, and ideally a 30 minute charger to go with em. Thats pricy. If possible, find one which works 110-240 V, even if it costs extra. I blew my non universal out during my 2nd week in israel.

I'm actually not really in agreement on the whole AA vs. custom batteries. As I see it, theres two arguments running in favour of the AAs.

1) If you run out of juice, any corner store will sell AAs. Even alkalines will get you through the afternoon, especially if you buy a few.

2) If they ever stop supporting your camera, and stop making the batteries, you're out of luck.

So... carry a spare battery and your charger. Chargers are pretty small these days, a good case should have a pouch space. Given the price for a good AA recharger and batteries, the $$ saved vs. the spare isn't that much. (I can buy lenmar versions of my battery in the US for $14.00 per... For a long trek, bring four).

As to 2... well, its a tech item. You'll probably be replacing it within 5 years, one way or another. Also, between buying a major name company camera (Canon, Panasonic, etc), and the number of other battery makers, well.. it'll work as long as you need.

And the AAs are heavier and four of em makes the camera much heavier. 6 of 1, half a dozen of another.

What do I think? Not a bad camera. I like the zoom on the TZ1 a lot more, but the manual features and battery life here are nice. 7 mp is cute too, but it won't allow for the close up shots, although you will be able to get those strange angle shots with that LCD. The one thing I'm nervous about is the noise levels at iso 200 and above. Not positive how badly that'll do in lowlight, but I didn't like dcresource's tests. The panasonics (FX9, TZ1 etc) all carry an image stabilizer that seems to make a fair difference for helping in those low light shots. You get away with much slower shutterspeeds. Um... Yeah. Generally, not bad, some nice features. The noise is frustrating. If its there badly on ISO 200 then it starts meaning that many of your night or indoor pics can't get printed without some serious cleanup. Has groovin_reuven tried printing any such pics?

[sen-ichi-rei.livejournal.com]

So how heavy is your FZ5?

Looking it up, it comes in at slightly over 300$...

Back to the A620

What's the deal with the noise?

I don't know if he's tried printing pics. In general he usually just puts them up online.

And the FX9 isn't available in the US. FX8 is only 5mp.

I'm still looking at the exilim (http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/specs/Casio/casio_exz70.asp).

By the way, do you have IM? I feel like that might be easier...

[maric23.livejournal.com]

AIM, maric423
MSN, same as AIM, at hotmail

Check out dcresource for more stats.

More answer to follow.

[sen-ichi-rei.livejournal.com]

Gah. My stupid patchy wireless isn't letting me use IM (though now groovin_reuven is bringing over a wireless modem for me! and his camera. So I'll have DSL in approximately 15-30 minutes. Huzzah!) My AIM is kitten219, whenever Gaim starts working...

[maric23.livejournal.com]

Okay... So then.

Noise.

http://www.dcresource.com/reviews/canon/powershot_a620-review/index.shtml
Scroll down to the 4 night shots in a row, labeled ISO 80, 100, 200, and 400. Pay attention to the differences. Areas of solid colour become blotchier, edges become fragmented, pixelated. This sample doesn't have much curves, but those tend to show it particularly.

http://www.dcresource.com/reviews/panasonic/dmc_tz1-review/
Not night shots this time, rather pictures of a bottle and tea box etc. The 100 is somewhat better than the 620, the 200 is a touch better, the 400 is also more or less useless.

Note that these are zoomed in. If you look at the full picture on screen, it'll look good, but printing doesn't appear as screen at all. Megapixels gives you #s of pixels, (ex: 2560x1920), which, loosely speaking, divided by 300, is your max physical size. But even pixels can't help if the camera lens or sensor is producing noise.

Note that this really isn't that surprising, and one basically needs to get an SLR to overcome it. Even with film, when you shoot iso 400, it can look grainy. This is one of the reasons I like the image stabilizer. As with other things, it can help one get away with a lower ISO, and... well, yeah. That makes a huge difference. Larger lens also means more light gets in, which also means lower iso, but thats only really relevant for the Canon S2/3 and the Panasonic DMC FZ5/7, all of which are designed to let in as much light as the frame can get away with.

But they're bigger than you want.

As to weight... 326 grams, but its probably larger than you want. Sort of. attackpenguin carried his S2 (slightly larger and heavier) around just plain, while I had a bag which had the charger, cables, and some other cute toys for blocking sun glare etc. Without the bag it might be fine, with it... dunno.

Glancing at the exilm

[maric23.livejournal.com]

Which exilm?

For a better example of frustratingly lots of noise in low light settings, check out the z850.
http://www.dcresource.com/reviews/casio/exilim_z850-review/index.shtml

Thats going to be frustrating if one tries to print.

If you read dcresource and dpreview on that model, they both generally seem to dislike the default modes. Dpreview goes so far as to say its a camera which, despite lots of cool modes and bells and whistles is better off in the hands of someone experienced who will disregard those and use the manual settings. Consistent overexposure is frustrating.

Theres also the camera dock, which unless you by cables, or a card reader, is the only way to charge the battery or switch files to a computer. A bit annoying.

This said, theres another set of this years exilm which look a bit nicer, but I can't see specs on, so... yeah. Go check em out.

Above all else, see how the things feel. Shop in stores. Try out. (Test macro).

[sen-ichi-rei.livejournal.com]

hmmm...

Well I got a look at the 620. I'll take a trip out to radio shack and/or ritz camera tomorrow. (Radio shack is right off campus and the nearest Ritz camera is about a 20 block bike ride, which should be fun, provided the weather doesn't suck.) platypuses/plus_c's DMC-FX9 was really cute. (I guess I was wrong about the availability in the US thing. It's just that they were able to get it cheap in hong kong, but it seems like you can do the same online...)

I hate not being able to make a decision. I liked my Optio WPi. It loaded with a cable, not a dock. It was small and cute and had 6.0 megapixels. it didn't have a viewfinder but I was ok with that. Though it's night mode wasn't so good.

I'm really bad at this. Maybe I shouldn't have a camera (though I really need it, especially for all the kippot that I've been making lately (I take pictures and put them online so when someone is thinking of buying a kippah from me I can show them my earlier work. My kippot are quite shiny.) The last one I had to take with my camera phone, but that's not a long-term solution by any means.)

So we can rule out the exilim. We can probably rule out yours and attackpenguin's because of their size and cost. The 620 is still in. The dmc-fx8/9 is still in. The TZ1 is also still in. Hopefully I can find one to look at tomorrow. That narrows it down to 3 cameras unless there are any other worthy candidates you think I should consider...

[maric23.livejournal.com]

For reference, the DMC-FZ7 (step up from mine), runs around $277, and the Canon S3 around $350. Especially the panasonic isn't that much pricier than the others on your list. Size on the other hand, thats probably a valid difference.

[masteraleph.livejournal.com]

Note that the A620 is "last year's model" at the moment, as the new models just (as in a week or two ago) came out. That doesn't mean it's bad at all, but it's possible that it may be cheaper around, you'd have to check.

As has been pointed out though, they'll all have the same limits: not so great at night and probably not incredible with macros, but to get better, you'd need more expensive and bigger.