My new digital camera! (1 Viewer)

[William_jones]

Just purchased a new didgital camera. After much carefull deliberation and shopping around I decided on the Sony mavica MVC-CD500. My first impressions of this camera are very positve. The 5 mega pixel picture quality is astounding and the features which are more than adequate are quite simple to use. This is a very high quality camera for the price and I would highly recommend it to any of you currently in the market for a new camera.

Bill

 

[Kirk Gunn]

C'mon, you know the "rules".... Where'd ya get it and how much ???

Congrats - start posting some pix !

 

[Rob Gillespie]

I had the DSC-F717 on order from Amazon UK. The first one that arrived (after three weeks) had a fault in the lens. After a few days hassle in getting them to collect it for return (no Amazon, I'm not sending a £550 camera through the post) I've now been waiting a month for a replacement. And low and behold, I got a mail from them yesterday saying a replacement will be a further 4-6 weeks.

Oh no it wont. I've cancelled the order.

The new F828 is out later this year and this sucker has EIGHT MEGAPIXELS. Worth waiting for, methinks.

 

[William_jones]

This camera is also equiped with a Carl Zeis lens which really adds to its value. I purchased the camera on sale from Circuit City for $574.00 after the rebate. The price wasn't bad, but I surely could have beat it online somewhere. Just didn't feel like waiting just to save a few dollars.



That new F828 due out later in the year will be an amazing camera at 8 mega pixels. I wish I could have waited for it, but with my family and I getting ready to move over seas for a few years we needed something high quality right away. let us know how it is once you get it.

Bill

 

[Rob Gillespie]

I think the F828 will have to wait a little while. It's expected to sell for around £1000 here, maybe a little more. The F717 was going for around 750 but Amazon had it for 550, hence my purchase. Just a pity they can't actually get hold of the cameras to deliver to the customers :rolleyes

A grand is a LOT for a camera, by anyone's standards and I need a new bathroom first

 

[Shawn C]

The word on the street is that the picture quality of the 828 isn't quite up to snuff. Apparently, that 8MP sensor is creating some "noisy" pictures....

You can read all the hoopla over at http://www.dpreview.com and go to the Sony Talk forum...

 

[Max Leung]

To heck with the 828...the Canon Digital Rebel, a digital SLR that can be had for $1,000 RIGHT NOW with an 18-55 lens, is a steal!

6.3 MP, and ZERO noise at ISO 400. With a 50mm/f1.8 lens and ISO at 1600 (the noise is about the same as the best prosumer cam at 200 ISO!), I can use this baby without the flash. Excellent in pubs and other dark venues.

This camera kicks ass! Only takes .25 seconds to take a picture, including auto-focus. It's like a downsized Canon 10D. I LOVE this camera.

Now I just have to save up for a Canon 28-135 IS EF lens (with Full-time-manual focus! Booyah!). Or maybe get a 75-300mm telephoto zoom...cha-ching! $$$

 

[MarkHastings]

William, definitely post photos!!!! and congrats!

When this camera ships in mid-September, we think it will be the enthusiast camera to beat, especially since Sony's DSC-F828 won't ship for another couple of months. But stay tuned--there's an evaluation unit en route to us and a review forthcoming.

 

[Patrick Sun]

SLR = Single Lens Reflex. The typical film camera with the camera body that accepts various lenses is usually a SLR camera (and is not one of those simpler point-n-shot film cameras that have very little in manual adjustment features). SLR cameras have a mirror inside that shows the photographer to see what would appear in the film when looking through the viewfinder, and then the shutter is released, the mirror pops up inside, and the image is captured on the film behind it.

 

[MarkHastings]

So is it safe to assume that SLR is something only professionals should be concerned about? As an average user, do I really need an SLR? I'm not looking to take professional photos, I just want the large resolution JPEG's with a little bit of flexibility. Auto focus would probably suit me better than a manual focus.

 

[Patrick Sun]

Yep.

For resolution, 3 megapixel is a minimum rquirement, with higher pixel resolution (4MP-5MP), more detail in the photos if you want to print the larger sized, like 8"x10"s.

 

[Keith Mickunas]

SLR is good if you want to see what exactly you're taking a picture of. If you're more than a few feet from your subject, the advantage of an SLR isn't significant, but it's still nice to have.

SLR cameras like the Canon Digital Rebel and EOS-10D are similar to their standard film cameras in the EOS line and use most of the accessories and all the lenses that fit on EOS (Canon EF) cameras. The same can be said of the Nikon D1 cameras and some of the other major manufacturer's digital SLRs.

I got an EOS-10D a few weeks back. I'm an amatuer, I really barely know anything about photography, but I wanted a bad-ass camera that can do anything I'd ever want to do and will last me for years. This is definitely the one to get if you feel like spending the $1500, plus the hundreds needed for lenses. The biggest drawback to the 10D and Digital Rebel is that the sensor is smaller than a 35mm film frame. As a result it causes all your lenses to zoom more, so you have to multiply them by 1.6 to see what the effective zoom amount is. My 28mm - 135mm zoom lens is effectively a 45mm - 200mm, which is great for long distance stuff, but horrible for close-ups. Good wide angle lenses cost a lot of money, and I'll be needing one soon.

Max, check out B&H Photo for some third party lenses for the Canon. You can save some big bucks that way. I plan to get a 2x extender for around $200 and turn my 28-135 into a 400mm lens. That'll be sweet.

 

[Thomas Newton]

So is it safe to assume that SLR is something only professionals should be concerned about? As an average user, do I really need an SLR?

A SLR with interchangeable lenses will let you use longer telephoto lenses, and wider wide-angle lenses, than you can find on typical point-and-shoot cameras. That's probably in the catgory of a "pro" (or at least "hobbyist") feature.

The "normal" (50mm fixed length) lenses for a SLR will typically be faster than the lenses found on point-and-shoots. A faster lens means that you can shoot in lower light, and that you can do a better job of creatively blurring the background (by deliberately picking a large aperture, e.g. f/1.7) when you want to do so.

Any decent SLR will let you attach a separate bounce/tilt flash unit, whose output the camera controls at exposure time. This makes it much easier to prevent "red eye" in indoor photos. With point-and-shoots (film or digital), you're pretty much stuck with trying to remove "red eye" from the picture after the fact.

 

[Bill Harada]

SLRs are not a pro-only option, but you do need to take the size of the camera into consideration for your anticipated use. I have a Nikon D1 digital SLR (used for work). The body+battery alone weigh in at two pounds! Add in a 28-70 zoom lens and you're lugging around close to three pounds. My full camera bag with camera body, three lens, flash, a spare battery + charger weighs about 15 lbs! Not exactly the rig I'd take on the family trip to the beach.

Now contrast that with my Canon S400 4MP P&S, that weighs mere ounces and fits into my pant front pocket. Not nearly the flexibility of an SLR, but I'm 100x more likely to be willing to carry it with me. And the first rule of photography is that you have to have your camera with you in order to take a picture.

Just my 2¢ on the topic.

 

[Max Leung]

Yep, I'm considering B&H, but probably won't get any new lenses until after xmas.

SLR isn't for everyone...it's like choosing a high-resolution front projector over a simple direct-view 27" television set.

One thing you need to be aware of with digital SLR cameras over the point-and-shoots is the shallow depth of field. With the larger sensor of a DSLR you will get a smaller depth of field, meaning that fewer objects in your shot will be in focus as they move further away from the focus point.

The advantage of a shallow depth of field is that you won't get the post-sticking-out-of-someone's-head effect when you take a candid shot of someone standing in front of a ceiling support beam, because the shallow-depth-of-field will blur out the background. But, with a point-and-shoot, nearly everything in the background will remain in focus, making the picture seem "fake" or "digital".

Think of CG effects in a movie -- the worst CG effect is when nothing is blurred.

 

[Thomas Newton]

Another thing to be aware of with digital SLRs is the focal length multiplier effect.

CCD sensors tend to be smaller than a 35mm negative. Only part of a projected 35mm-size-rectangle of light will fall on a CCD.

So a 50mm lens that produces a normal perspective when attached to a film SLR body will act as a telephoto lens on a typical digital SLR body. To get a "normal" perspective on the digital SLR, you must use what would be, for the film camera, a wide-angle lens.

This is good if you're a fan of telephotos (long telephotos are expensive and heavy; this lets you get away with buying a cheaper, lighter one for the equivalent job). It's bad if you want wide-angle (ultra-wide-angle lenses are costly and produce fisheye effects).

There are some digital SLRs that have sensors that are the same size as a 35mm negative, so the lenses work the same with either kind of camera body. The one I read about was clearly a "pro" toy, as it was priced at $8,000. That may (and probably will) change in a few years' time.

 

[MarkHastings]

Thanks for the info guys, it does sound like an SLR is a bit too much for what I'd be using it for.

 

[Keith Mickunas]

Mark, keep in mind that some of the consumer oriented cameras are SLR, but they don't have the interchangable lenses, external accessories, etc. I know Olympus makes some like that, and being able to see through the main lens is a nice feature. So just because it is SLR doesn't mean it's costly and/or complicated.

 

[Greg_R]

keep in mind that some of the consumer oriented cameras are SLR, but they don't have the interchangable lenses, external accessories, etc.

IMO this is the most important feature. I purchased a Nikon coolpix a few years ago and have been hampered by the availability of lenses (a polarizer and a cheap zoom).

 

[Rob Gillespie]

Amazon UK now have the Sony F828 (8mp) on pre-order at £746. The Canon EOS 300D (6.3mp) with lens is £970.