The FZ40 certainly looks awesome. Giant, beefy camera with full camera features. But I’m really looking for something I can pocket and carry around 24/7.
I’ve read in reviews that AVCHD has a nice compression but is very hard to edit - any truth to that?
I recently bought a refurbished Nikon Coolpix P100 for almost exactly $250. It does have a manual mode allowing you to select aperture and exposure time. It also has a 23X zoom. It was Consumer Reports’ favorite in their “superzoom” category. However, the photo forums are a bit less positive. Considering the price I’m happy, but I am still learning how to use it (as well as just learning how to take good photos).
As I said upthread, Consumer Reports camera reviews are worth the pixels it takes to display them. They really know nothing about cameras.
Nikon hasn’t had a really good P&S camera in a decade. They are better then they were 5 years ago, but every manufacturer has improved as much if not more.
The Fuji looks great on paper but doesn’t deliver image quality. I’d skip that one. The reviews I read were pretty brutal.
The Sony isn’t bad, and has some nice features (like 10 FPS burst mode) but doesn’t quite have the image quality of the Canon SX230. If you need to choose between those, I’d take the Canon.
One cool thing about Canon is that people eventually hack new firmware (CHDK) that unlocks new features in the camera, like RAW in a lot of their cameras or time lapse or various other functions. Are there firmware hacks like that for other cameras or is that a Canon thing?
I have a Canon SX110 IS which is a 9MP camera. You can also get an SX120 IS and the SX130IS which are 10MP and 12.1 MP.
I have been nothing but blown away by the quality of the pictures this little camera takes.
When I was the service manager of a car dealership we had an inspector for an insurance company that would come around and take pictures. His other job was a pro photographer on the weekends. When he saw the results I got from my Canon, he bought one, and stopped carrying his DSLRs for his insurance work. He loves that camera.
It looks to me like the best solution to this is a smartphone that has a camera that doesn’t suck. I start a SDMB discussion about and it turns out there are a couple of smartphones on the market with acceptable sensors and optics. The iPhone isn’t one of them, but the camera Apps you can buy are pretty awesome.
I use Sony Vegas which edits AVCHD natively. I noticed that when I copied AVCHD lite files from my friend’s FZ35 camera to his windows 7 computer they would play natively without any special software. You do need a pretty fast computer to deal with AVCHD files. My dual core laptop had problems playing back 1080p, but my quad core desktop is fine. I usually render as DVDs or WMV720p or upload to youtube in high definition.
Not really. They are acceptable for very basic use, but they are not yet a substitute for a dedicated camera, especially if you want manual controls and some basic ergonomics.
Yeah, a smartphone camera wouldn’t meet my needs. There are some that approach half-decent, but they’re way behind an actual camera. And now that there are pretty good cameras smaller than cell phones, I definitely want one to carry around with me.
I think I may order the SX230 today. Everyone seems to praise it - the only drawbacks are the relatively slow 3.1f lens but that’s to be expected on something with a 28-400mm zoom range (it’d also be nice to have 24mm wide, but oh well). It’s not a super compact like the 300hs, but I could easily pocket it in cargo shorts. It has full manual controls, excellent outdoor and very good indoor photos. Video is pretty good, just not as good as the sony cameras. Anything to caution me against choosing the hx230?
I was specifically thinking of the Nokia N8.
http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/14/nokia-n8-review/
The biggest limitation compared to a standard pocket camera is the lack of an optical zoom.
Samsung Pixon 12
http://www.phonearena.com/reviews/Samsung-Pixon12-M8910-Review_id2283/page/4
Here is the thread.
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=610446
As far as I can tell other smartphone cameras do indeed suck.
Mind if I piggyback onto the thread? I had an SX110 that I thought was great for the price, but it was recently lost/stolen, so I’m looking for a replacement in the range discussed here. Is there much of a difference in image quality between the Canon SX130 and the SX230? I’m not interested in GPS or very high ISO, and not crazy about proprietary batteries. The max aperture on the SX130 is 3.5 compared to 2.8 on the old SX110, which seems like a big enough deficiency to look at other cameras.
If you are shooting outside, I don’t think you’ll notice the difference between f/3.5 and f/2.8; indoors may be another issue but none of these cameras are especially good indoors without the flash. Compared to the SX130, the SX230 has a CMOS sensor, better LCD, better lens, somewhat better low light performance, and a GPS for tagging. You could also look at the Canon SD4500 for another compact ultrazoom in the same lineup.
Thanks, that’s quite helpful. It would be used almost exclusively outdoors, although in lower light conditions (dawn, dusk, forests) most of the time. CMOS sensors take better pictures than the other ones (CCD?), right? The 4500 is, unfortunately, right out because of the lack of manual controls. Are there any compact ultrazooms out there with a viewfinder? The G12 looks really nice, if it had a longer lens, I’d start saving up for one.
Nope, and there probably won’t be one any time soon. Most folks don’t use view finders of any kind other than the LCD so they’ve dropped from nearly all cameras. The electronic view finders are still available on the larger zoom cameras because space isn’t at a premium and it’s really hard to track a moving object or even hold the camera still at over 300mm. The smaller ultrazooms have never had them. If you want optical view finders your choices are down to 3 (!) P&S cameras left on the market, the best of which is the G12.
The Nikon P7000 has a 7x zoom (28mm to 200mm), a very nice LCD, a fairly fast lens, average movie mode, lousy burst mode, and fairly good image quality. It’s problem is that it’s almost impossible to use the manual controls due to some of the worst menus and UI in the industry. And it’s fairly sluggish. If you can live with that it might be just enough zoom to satisfy your needs.
Telemark, you seem pretty knowledgable. Is the SX230 the best choice in its price range for a versatile still/movie cam that can be pocketed and has manual controls? I’m ok with giving up on the 300HS now and its small size because the 230 will be small enough for my purposes and I want manual controls to fiddle with. My only concern is how practical these superzooms are at taking normal indoor pictures, but the samples I’ve seen look adequate - better than my old camera.
I did a ton of research prior to buying my new camera- I wanted something that had the most versatility and utility that I could fit into my pocket. Like you, I like to play with features and pretend I’m a photographer, but I am definitely not fancy enough for a “real” camera.
I ended up settling on the The Canon Power Shot 4000IS (mine’s black). This camera is seriously the most amazing camera I have ever owned- the picture quality is amazing, the feel of the camera is great, the functions are above and beyond what I’d expect in such a small camera, and did I mention the picture quality is awesome? What made this one stand out to me is that it was touted on many reviews to have excellent low light capabilities. . . and boy does it. You can crank the ISO pretty high up on the manual settings to get some neat pictures. For example, here are two photos I took in Fiji of the stars in the sky (something I’ve NEVER been able to accomplish with any camera I own before) a few weeks ago: one and two.
People constantly comment on what great photos my camera takes. Here are a few more sample photos from my trip, so you can see what you’re working with. A few of them involve my favorite little preset on the camera, which is where it highlights just one color, then does the rest in black and white. Oh, the camera also has great macro and infinity settings:
Oh, and here’s one of some tomatoes I’m growing in my yard, to show how well it handles the whole perspective thing: maters.
Long story short: I fucking love my camera and couldn’t suggest it enough. Google it and you’ll see tons of rave reviews, too.
Yeah, I considered grabbing a used one actually. The 4000 is a good camera, more control and better lens than most of the elph line - but the ones I’ve been considering (300/500hs, sx230) are basically the second generation of that new cmos sensor - so more or less the updated versions of the 4000, so they should be as good or better - I’d hope.
Good pictures.
Ah, most excellent. Didn’t realize those were the newer versions. Yeah, I’m definitely very happy with my camera, so I’d imagine the newer ones are even better.
It’s a good choice. The other camera I’d look at in that class is the Sony HX7/9. I used to recommend the Panasonic ZS-series but the most recent models aren’t nearly as good as the older ones.
Have you held the SX230 in your hands? I find it too big for a pocket camera myself.
No, unfortunately, I haven’t had a chance to hold it. It’s a bit big for what people would consider a pocket cam, but I wear cargo shorts a lot, so I think it’s easily pocketable with those.
Also considering the Sony WX10 which seems to have most of the HX7/9 features, without the superzoom (but still a good 7x) zoom, but in a smaller, somewhat cheaper package.
Two more related questions. What speed memory cards do I need to record the 1080p video for the new canons? They use about 4gb every 15 minutes, so that’s 4.4MB/s. What class safely covers that? And are the class ratings consistent? I notice Transcend has the cheapest class 10 cards by far, but I wonder if they get that way by not really being as fast as they advertise.
And third party batteries. You can buy the official canon replacements for $30-40, or just get them for $2-10 off ebay or even amazon. I know generic batteries may not live up to their rating, but are they ever dangerous? Can they damage your camera?
