Be Excellent To Each Other

Been mulling hard over a new camera ever since I had my previous beloved Fujifilm S5600 lost when I was drunk stolen from me in a violent mugging incident half a year back. I'm really feeling the loss. *Blub*

So I was thinking of getting a new camera, budge of around £150 - £250, cheaper the better though. I had toyed with the idea of a full SLR, but frankly I'd feel terrified of dropping it, getting dust in the lens or, er, being violently mugged again. Yes. Er.

What I'm currently leaning towards is the Fujifilm 9600. I borrowed a mate's (he got it obscenely cheaply) and used it for the Green Man fest and was reasonably happy all told. Priorities are low light gig photo-fun, landscape and the occassional macro for insect/arty fun. ("So that's everything then," - ed.)

Any thoughts? Any good places to shop?

I might get shot down for this but I went to Jessops and the staff there seemed actually knowledgeable and enthusiastic about what they were selling. Also you can't really beat actually having the camera in your hand before making up your mind.

True markg, I prefer to shop at stores rather than online for electronics and ergonomicky stuff. Oh, and any future chippers in - a decent lens zoom is toppo important, preferably one of those pleasingly twisty-ones and not one of those whirry electronic ones.

No, you're absolutely right. Then go home and buy it online.

Yeah, when buying a camera (doubly so when it's a SLR camera) you should always go to an actual bricks and mortar store and check it out there, see what the ergonomics are like and whether you're comfortable holding it and using it.

Then go home and buy it online for MASSIVE SAVINGS.

forget fuji and buy either a Canon or Nikon

I like actually buying stuff like that from shops.

Then if it goes wrong you can storm back in there, rather than wait 3 weeks for a return number, 4 weeks for them to look at it, another month for it to actually get repaired....

But yes, all the decent cheapish SLRs I've ever seen are Canons and Nikons.

Jamesoff has a frighteningly superb Nikon but I think that might be out of budget, I'll page him to the thread when I see him.

Indeed. However cheap your online purchases are, they can't compete with having a sales-serf's face to fleck with spittle when something goes wrong.

Given that he's not buying an SLR, I wouldn't agree with this at all. Fuji have some excellent products in the larger compact space.

i was never impressed with any fuji. I have a compact Canon A620 for some time and its excellent.

If you can spare a little more cash, get one of these. I had its predecessor and it was the best sub-SLR I've ever owned.

Or a full DSLR - Nikon D40 with 18-55mm lens for £220.

Then an extra £500 on getting the lenses you want for the broad variety of photography you actually want to do though.

Are there any non-SLR cameras with a twist zoom? They are normally only found on changeable lenses.

Maybe some of the Ricoh ones, but some of those cost a lot more than entry level SLRs.

In the long run maybe, but 18-55mm isn't a bad start. If you really want to learn photography the advice I've always read is to buy a 55mm prime lens and concentrate on composition.

Not to my knowledge. I think the long-lens compacts like the 18x zoom ones from Fuji, Olympus, etc don't. The one we have certainly doesn't (Lumix DMC-FZ18).

It is a trade off, but even a cheap dslr is going to be several leagues better than the best compact. I know the lens range is a bit of a problem, but bear in mind most cheap dslr's don't have full frame sensors so the lens will in actual fact be at least 50% longer in real terms, focal length wise. Also, I think you can get silly zoom lenses that do 18 - 200mm which on a cheap dslr equates to 27-300mm which should pretty much cover all bases. It'll be a pretty shoddy lens, but still better than anything stuck to the front of a compact.

I think I've had this conversation with RichG before about how the lens manufacturers could make a 24 - 300mm lens that was an F2.8, but it would cost tens of thousands of pounds to make the optics high enough grade to meet pro standards.

I know you can get really silly movie camera zooms - angieneux make a 4mm to 300mm zoom that I know of, but then those lenses do cost a small fortune. And even now cameraman are sniffy about zooms. Truth of the matter is that there are excellent zooms out there, but they cost upwards of a grand a piece, but they're almost if not as good as a decent prime. Anyway, that's another conversation.

I don't know a great deal about this end of the market, but I think there are some very good fixed lens dslr style cameras that have silly zooms on them, and Fuji is a name that frequently comes up. However, as RIchard says, I don't know of any that work on twist barrels for those zooms for obvious reasons.

Most of the Canon and Nikon stuff in this sector tends to review quite poorly, last time I checked.

http://www.dpreview.com is the place to check.

What the fuck did DBSnappa just say?

I'd have thought Rocko, Peter North and Jenna Jameson would have got at least 9/10. Colour me surprised.

Allow me to paraphrase;

FTFY

Now you know how I feel when you lot start talking about computers, or worse, fantasy fiction.

I received today this: http://www.ebuyer.com/product/148748 to replace my FujiFinepix S9600 which was a fine camera indeed.

Obviously not as good as a DSLR but plenty of settings you can fiddle with along with enormo-zoom and the lenses Panasonic use are meant to be decent.

It is sat in the box waiting for me to get home. Currently today appears to have lasted 2 years.

I will let you know if it's any good - the reviews I read seemed to indicate so but you never know until you start snapping away.

I can't really help but entirely echo DBSnappa on this one.

I did have a lot of fun, learned lots, and took some fairly decent shots with my Canon S5 IS though. But I only used it as a step up to a proper DSLR. You just don't get the optical or sensor quality in these compact cameras, especially with such broad zoom ranges. I'm not sure I'd ever really buy a lens with a zoom factor above about 3-4x on my camera (not without spending a fortune, anyway), so imagine the trade-offs for 18x zooms.

I will say one thing though: don't let Megapixels sway your decision. More != Better. Even slightly.

Hmm, some good answers there. I've spotted a 9600 for £200, and a Cannon 400 with 18-51mm (I think) lens for £300. What think you?

Cheers for the hefty post, DBSnappa! Bear in mind cost is a factor, which worries about the DSLR. Do the cheapest SLR's toptrump the Fujifilm bridge-of-allegedly-champions-9600 range? And can you therefore recommend me one? Or for my all-round point-n-shoot gig/landscape photography will the bridge be enough?



9600, 9500 and 6500 Fujis have twist zooms I have discovered. I fancy a decent zoom but not a stupid 18x level one as that high without proper image stabilisation I'd get blurring. Are you saying all zooms are silly, btw, or just some zooms?



Er, don't quite get you there. What does that mean in... *presenter's pause*... real terms?

What's a 'prime' by the way?

And I thought Cannon were supposed to be all round topsies? Anyway, ta for the link. I shall check online for the MASSIVE SAVINGS as well. And ta for the chuckle RichardGaywood and Grim...!

Craster, think that £355 bit out of my price range. But agree with you on the Fuji front.

RichardGaywood - that Nikon D40 looks interesting, I'll check reviews!

Nynfortoo - don't worry. I do at least know the marketing ploy of megapixels - equivilent to the old shitty GFX cards that'd boast stupidobig-ram! Again, I shall investigate your previous choice. But maybe I should save longer for that Cannon 400 £300 bargain. Nggh. Tricky!

Pretty much any digital SLR will beat a point-n-shoot camera in picture quality any day of the week. Given that most DSLRs come with kit lenses 18-55mm, you should be fine.

I don't like zoom lenses anyway, I prefer zooming with my feet wherever possible.

As DBSnappa once memorable said to me, "use zoom to control depth of field. Don't use zoom to make things bigger. GET FUCKING CLOSER."

Because that's always possible.

If he doesn't have permission he's never going to get in with a 200-400mm zoom

Look at those bridge DSLRs (if that's what they're called) and look at the bottom end DSLRs. Size and having to carry extra lenses may be a factor. Only you know if you're going to get more interested in taking pictures or not - if you are then that's another plus in favour of a proper DSLR.

Basically I can't recommend anythign other than look at some reviews on that site - they're about as exhaustive as you can get. Then go and play in a store.

I have a number of photos of lions and leopards and other animals that I wouldn't have fancied taking without the zoom.

This, for example:

Hmm. Ta for that.

Regarding gigs, I can in general get permission. I go to lots of local gigs in Cardiff, and the only festival I go to is the lovable Green Man fest, and I'm on good terms with a few of the movers and mopers of the indie scene in South Wales. As long as the gig is taking place in the Norwegian Church, Welsh Club, Dempseys, Fuel or Ten Feet Tall I'm deffo okay - and those are the places I usually see bands anyway. In addition, I don't need much zoom at all because the gigs I go to are hardly stadium gigs. A four times zoom would be more than enough.

But I also like taking photos of curious distant features, such as weather-cocks on tops of buildings, distant stormy cliffs and dangerous escaped tigers - I imagine zooms come in handy for those.

A kindly friend at work is nudging me towards:

http://www.trustedreviews.com/digital-c ... tal-SLR/p1

... and is going to lend me his for a few days so I can gauge the difference an SLR makes. It remains to be seen if I shall fall hopelessly in love.

Amazing pic by the way, Craster.

This very definitely for me. I like to take my camera most places just in case a good pic opportunity to comes up and I like the flexibility of a whopping great lens and the ability to faff with settings combined with a simple but effective point and shoot option.

If I'm honest the video shooting aspect of it I find very useful as well. Without it I wouldn't have been able to grab http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bDxOAGismB0 as by the time I had dug the video camera out of the drawer and fired it up then checked I wasn't overwriting something she would have been asleep in bed. (I realise that's not the most overly interesting video but when it's your kid it's 10x more great and when you have a cheese fetish like mine then add another multiple of 10.)

Ooh, did you take them on your Honeymoon?
Tell us, Cras, how many photos did you take of your new wife on that holiday?

Hard drive camcorders are your friend. Sooo much quicker.

One. Out of over 800. Posing with a large Kenyan with a large gun.

I may be completely confused but I am unsure as to the pricing logic behind the 'bargains' on the front page of Jacob Digital's website:

What the Flip?

Inevitably I will be missing the point and DBSnappa will explain.

EDIT AGAIN: Ahh, I see. It's just listing the 'bonus' feature price.

I think the 'Worth $339.99' refers to the free accessory they're bundling.

Hmm. *Click*





"Huaaah! Ahh! AAAAAGH!" (Flees room)

They're reviews are anally exhaustive and far more info than most mortal snappers would ever need.

I got DrG to dig this out from an old IM conversation we had - this is the lens you need for shooting weather vanes
compact lens

A prime lens is one of a fixed focal length. So you can't zoom. They are generally of better optical quality than their zoom counterparts because the optics are engineered to give the best results for that fixed focal length, instead of having to trade some off for variation; zoom lenses tend to become softer either side of their sweet spot, introduce vignetting and chromatic aberrations and distortion; primes are much simpler, cheaper and easier to get right.

What DBSnappa is on about is roughly thus: imagine the cone of light hitting the camera's sensor and how the outer portions relate to the edges of your framed scene. Now shrink the sensor, and note how the light at the edges now misses the sensor. This will give the impression, in perspective terms, of being zoomed in further, even though all you've done is shrank the sensor.

The cheaper DSLRs have slightly smaller sensors, so give the impression, perspective-wise again, of being zoomed in further than their Full Frame counterparts. Compact cameras have even smaller sensors, so the effect is even more magnified.

So a smaller sensor is a good thing? No, not particularly, apart from getting a narrower perspective from lenses of shorter focal length. The cropped sensors negatively affect the wider end of lenses' focal lengths, giving a narrower perspective. And I can already assume you know how smaller photosites on a sensor give poorer image quality, especially in low light — the crux of the megapixel myth.

Ahh, yes. I know the end bit you said about the megapixel myth. *Nods sagely* The rest of that handy description answers many questions. Ta.

Okay, so currently I'm still dithering between the £220 Nikon D40 DSLR and the Fujifilm Finepix 9600. Frankly, the only thing putting me off the D40 is the lens price.

Say I want to take pics at gigs. Would the kit lens be enough? And if I wanted to take good landscape shots, maybe with zoom, what should I get?

Essentially, what lens should I get, how much would they be, and would I miss 'em if I stuck with the kit set a whiles?

And finally - what's the best online photo site in your opinion? A friend of mine uses Flickr Pro but I've no idea how much that's an improvement on basic Flickr. I'm currently just using the Facebook photo thing but I want something faster and swishier and with bigger images and more storage and a feeling of greater lastingness and erm... cheery elitism.

Thankee so much for the help here.

The S9600 wouldn't be much good at gigs either as like someone has said previously it's difficult to sneak a camera in at the best of times and the S9600 is a hefty beast and depending on how far back you are the built in flash is going to do fuck all so you'll need a hot shoe flash which will make the camera even more of a bouncer magnet.

Is the Hot Shoe Flash anything like the Soft Shoe Shuffle?

Again, gig permission is an okay issue for me as long as I don't use it out of town. I have four places I go to for gigs regularily and the management have been cool before, and I know the DJ's and organisers. I don't like using flashes either due to colour wash out or overexposure or blanching or whatever you call it, so I used to just take a fair load and a few usually came out well. I'll post some I got with the 9600 I borrowed from a friend for the Green Man festival tonight and show you what I managed in low-light distance.

Wahey!

I found this 'Manager Special' deal in Jessops for a mere £209, it's a Nikon D40x - here are the specs!



So looks like I can afford an SLR after all. It's second hand but comes with 12 months guarantee, I got to use it and liked, and it comes with battery recharger, manual and the kit lens. Just need a memory card and a bag for it. I've not bought it yet, but they've put it aside for me for Wednesday payday. Do you approve DBSnappa? Be it a good entry level DSLR? Pray tell.

Ta for putting me on the Nikon D40 track, recommendations-famous RichardGaywood!

/me dashes off to Cardiff Jessops with a bag of cash.

Ahem. What were you saying?

The D40X is a great camera, but you are restricted in the lenses you can buy in future because the D40X does not have an autofocus motor in the body itself, so unless you're content with manual focussing you need to buy autofocus lenses.

http://www.flickr.com/search/?w=all&q=gig+50mm&m=text

Might be handy to look at- these should mostly be pics taken with a DSLR and a 50mm lens (the cheap option).

In fact it might be handy to do flickr searches for whatever camera you're interested plus "gig" as search words.

I'm after a good second hand compact, getting fed up lugging the SLR about.

Criteria:
Around £100 max
Must take good photos.
Nice to use
At least 3x optical zoom, and at least 3 mpix.
Prefer viewfinder as well as screen
If it takes AAs that'd be nice


Anyone had something like this, perhaps even upgraded and still have the old one?