Digital camera advice

30boat

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I'm off to Hong Kong and Macau coming Saturday.I know all the good spots for elecronics buying having lived there for 8 years and I'll be looking for a digital camera.That's where the problem lies.I need professional quality images because ,being an artist,I like to the photograph my paintings instead of allowing the galleries to use their own photographers when they're putting the catalogues together.
I need all the advice I can get on this matter.From what I've been reading I need a CCD captor and a reputable make of lens.Since the images will have to be blown up sometimes to A4 size I'll also need at least 6million pixels.Being an SLR is not important as long as I get the quality.
I am tempted by the Konica Minolta A2000.Does anybody have any experience on this.
All advice greatly apreciated.
Thanks.
 

Santana379

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My limited experience of Digi camera's (I've had an Olympus C750 UZ for 15 months) has made me regret not getting an SLR. The delay from pressing the shutter to the image being captured means that, when photographing boats, they are everywhere but in the centre of the frame. I believe this delay is still common in (all?) non-SLRs.
 

PeterStone

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My first advice to you would be to go to the website www.dpreview.com
There you will find detailed reviews of virtually every camera on the market.

I earn my living taking pictures and I replace my camera every year as the specs change. My main SLR type digital camera is a Canon 20D. Body and 3 lenses come to around £3,500 but you can achieve pretty impressive results spending far less - maybe buying just one decent zoom. Check the Olympus C8080 - a glued on factory installed lens with a reasonable zoom so no worries about dust getting on the chip - a big problem with interchangeable lenses. This camera has around 8million pixels - the same as mine.

Canon use a cemoss sensor giving particularly smooth, noise free, images which is why I favour them. It means that I can resample the pics up to around A3 size at 300dpi without losing quality. Many of the pics on my website were taken with this camera and its forerunner the 10D - check it out if you like - www.peterstone.biz

PM me if you need any more advice.
 

Ships_Cat

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My experience is only as an amateur previously using 35mm SLR's. I decided I would get a non SLR digital when price dropped to what I thought was of worth to me for a 5 Megapixel one. That I did about 1 -1/2 years ago, mainly for work purposes.

Given that prices have fallen further for 8 Megapixel SLR's since then, if buying today I would probably buy an SLR.

John
 

bbilly

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Had agood look and chose the Canon Powershot 85 and with high resolution (buy a big flash card) you can blowup to a4 easy with 4-5mpxl. Choose a big LCD that makes loads of difference.
 

Seven Spades

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Do you want an SLR with interchangeable lenses or a small compact or a high quality camera with a fixed lens?

Personally I bought a Leica Digilux 2, because it has a fantastic fast lens, in low light conditions this really pays off because any hint of underexposure will bring out digital noise which looks like grain. Panasonic have a version of the camera available and it is much cheaper but is essentially the same camera.
 

trouville

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As always which camera depends on what you want to do with it.

I have a very small Casio fixed lens 2megpix but very quick,and discreat noise free images.
Then i have a Canon powershot which while very good program and lend wise,is poorly built and slow.I bought that online before seeing it!

Then i bought a Panasonic with the Leica lens, That has been and is a wonderful camera,well built very fast,reasonalble program range,and excellen lens quality image,and very good macro capture.

Then i bought a Minolta as it was small and lots of megapixels,Its OK but i prefer the bigger panasonic

My next will be another panasonic,as they are a pleasure to use and most models are well laid out,ive also heard good rports of fuji,but never tried one.

I also use a nikonF with a 55mm macro and film!or my film Nikon V for underwater photos.
 

BobGiles

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hi 30 boat

talking as someone whom has sold cameras for a good many years i would like to offer you some advice that you will not here a salesman telling you.

First of all you DO NOT NEED 6 MILLION PIXELS to produce a good image at A4. you can get away with 3.5 happily.

and secondly , you do not have to spend hundreds or even thousands of pounds, the most important part of any camera is the lens. you can buy a great body and end up with cr*p lenses.

i would sugest a cannon 300D or nikon and then buy the lenses to fit.
you can pick the latest canon range on line at a much better rate than in the shops.

i only say canon because i am a profesional photograher and have used canon for most of my work.

have fun
 

Talbot

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Good advice BobGiles. I bought a Sony Cybershot DSC-S70 when they first came out - 3megapixel. You can expand this to A4 without problems. I could upgrade now, but dont feel the need- This camera has a Carl Zeiss lens. I have a 5.5x optical magnifier (equates to 1000mm lens) and I have a proper underwater body so can use this camera everywhere (I have some great underwater shots)
 

aidancoughlan

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If you think you will use the camera on the boat, one point to look out for is a wide angle lens (approx 28mm). 35mm lens on a boat is quite restrictive.
If this is a consideration for you, it will narrow the field considerably - very few 'compact'/mid-range digitial cameras have a wide angle model. I know the Canon range has a wide angle non-slr, other than that the Canon 300D and Nikon D70 SLR's are a good bet.
 

Talbot

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you can get one for mine, but I have never felt the need - perhaps you need to get a bigger boat ! /forums/images/graemlins/laugh.gif
 

trouville

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Was your underwater body for canon or general, how deep can you go? 15/20 meters?

My favorit was the Casio extra slim,which my son now has and is keeping!I have the minolta as my daughter likes the panasonic, the canon hewlet p and Olympus are all left unused,and by now no one will buy a S/H 4megpix camera!

The panasonic is 3.2 megpix and make really good pics!!!Better than the minolta with more, seems to be somthing to do with "noise"

Now what about the under water cover, and is it very expensive??
 

Lakesailor

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I am a commercial photgrapher (mainly retired now)
I have used a top end consumer digi camera (Minolta 7i) for product photography where digital images are required quickly and quality is fine, but the menu systems and lack of manual adjustment (there is some, but limited) affects they way you work.
I also use a Nikon D70 for similar subjects and that is far superior in that you can set the exposure and apperture you want, and adjust the colour temperature (or just capture a RAW image to adjust later). Flash sync is easier to arrange. However, as a result of the way SLRs work there is no facility for a video output to use a small tv to monitor your shot. You can of course use the camera tethered to a computer and get full resolution images on-screen to assess. I think from what you are saying that is more than you wish to do.
I would suggest a digital SLR to get the most facilities. The issue of lens quality is not so critical as the quality of the chip and capture software, most dedicated digital lenses are very capable. Even pixel count is not an accurate guide to picture quality as the way in which the software captures the image can seriously affect the picture quality.
 

PeterStone

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While broadly in agreement with you regarding how many pixels to go for I would add a note of caution.

If you need to blow up a section of the picture or want to crop the image, the more pixels you have the better because you won't just be magnifying the picture but the pixels too.

With the price of 6m or 8m pixel cameras now so attractive, I can't think of a good reason to opt for less. For example, a quick search on Google found the excellent Olympus C8080 for sale at just £433.99.

Another factor to bear in mind is that if photographs are going to be reproduced commercially at 300 dpi, a typical A4 file would be about 25mb - 30mb. A 3.5m pixel camera is less than half that, which means there is a great deal of interpolation going on to resample to A4. Whilst you might achieve great results printing at this size on an inkjet, the fact is that there is a certain amount of information/detail that is missing. It's rather like hearing music on a cheapish hi-fi - sounds ok till you hear it on something much better and then you realise what was missing.
 
G

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We use for Commercial Shipping use ...

Inspectors have to digi-pic various cargoes and ships damage etc.
We used to use Olympus but found the lens-cover doors couldn't take the abuse of the average inspector and also the early ones were non zoom. Good pictures but ate battery's.
We then changed to Fuji-MX range, the most popular of all with our guys being the MX-1500. It has only 1.5m pixels - but it's pictures still today are very presentatble in our work and also do not occupy huge amounts of disk space - they can be e-mailed easily.
We then upped to zoom digi's and now our most popular of the new ones is the FinePic A607 ......

Before anyone starts balling me out for quoting cheaper end camera's - we are a bunch of people who need a good camera without high price and small enough to do the job. It has to fit in the pocket, be ready to shoot quickly and accurately. If we break it - then the card must be compatible with replacement etc. etc.
We are not professional photographers so SLR's and high end camera's are well out of our league !!!!

We like our Fuji's and will be looking at similar replacements when time comes.

/forums/images/graemlins/cool.gif
 

PeterStone

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<The issue of lens quality is not so critical as the quality of the chip and capture software, most dedicated digital lenses are very capable. Even pixel count is not an accurate guide to picture quality as the way in which the software captures the image can seriously affect the picture quality.>

Spot on - a look at a certain extremely well know manufacturer who entered the digital SLR market bears this out - a phenominally high pixel count but the pictures in my opinion unusable because they are both noisy and way off in colour rendering. This is why I favour Canon - very, very smooth painterly images that can be blown up considerably without seeing any signs of pixels. It pained me to switch to Canon - a lifetime as a Nikon user set me against them but I was knocked out by the quality of the images.

I agree with your comment about the lenses - most reasonable lenses can out perform the resolution of the chips. Having said that - I daren't use anything less than Canon's best because of my work.

Big question is what to do with all my large and medium format Camera equipment that is now virtually worthless - Sinar and Hasselblad that cost an arm and a leg when I started out.
 

Talbot

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Re: Underwater camera cover.

My cover for my Sony was made by http://www.ikelite.com/ and it has a full sized strobe on an arm. The flash being triggered by a sensor seeing the cameras flash. The depth capability is at least down to normal compressed air depths (personally never been deeper than 36m). It is a bit on the large size but really looks the business.

My camera has a good battery saving mode, which you have to trick to get fast reaction for getting the moving shots, but does mean that an hours dive can be matched by the camera battery, and it is rechargeable. I have two batteries and use 128mb cards so can take plenty of shots per dive! and be OK for a second dive. /forums/images/graemlins/laugh.gif
 

Lakesailor

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[ QUOTE ]

If you need to blow up a section of the picture or want to crop the image, the more pixels you have the better because you won't just be magnifying the picture but the pixels too.



[/ QUOTE ]

Yes, on a level playing field, more is better. However it's the way on which the pixels are recorded, the colour artefacts and drop-outs, the contrast edge artefacts and other aspects of an less-than pefect digital image that you would be blowing up.
The answer is to read comparative reviews and see if you can determine which camera gives the overall image quality that you are seeking. Some very top end manufacturers have caught a cold on image quality and even pulled their cameras from the market whilst they sort it out.
 

trouville

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Re: Underwater camera cover.

Looks good,ive bookmarked the link.When i next look for a camera,i check first that i can have a cover for it.
Prehaps i should sell my old Nikon?
36 meters! quite deep i went down near that with an instructor,but now if i dive alone i dont go much over 10meters and with someone we try not to go deeper than 20 meters even between 5 and 15 meters theres lots to see!
 

cameronke

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I am hopelessly in love with my Fuji Finepix S5500

Only 4 meg, but some very useful features, great shots and absolutely unbelievable battery life !

Biggest regret is not getting one long before

Regards
Cameron
 
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