I am looking to buy my wife a new digicam for Christmas.
We have discussed it, and one of the most important features that she wants she currenty has on her Canon digital camera, it’s a color filter feature. this enables her to make a black and white picture that will have ONE color in it, say green, or blue, or purple… so she takes a picture of a flowering bush wherein the flowers are brightly colored, but the rest of the bush is in BW.
She insists that this feature is only available in the Canon Powershot (I think, might be Colorshot) digital cameras.
I am of the opinion that it’s such a popular thing, most modern digital cameras have to have that feature.
Who is right?
Also, is this something that is found on DSLR camera’s?
I have that on my Canon Powershot S2IS but not on my Canon T1i (DSLR). I think they figure that, if you have a DSLR you will buy something like Photoshop!
I thought it was a cool feature on my S2, but I only think I used it once. But that’s just me, Your wife has a specific application that she likes.
I expect some other people will tell us if it’s on other models soon…
As mentioned, it’s much easier (and better) to perform this feature on the computer than in the camera, but it does exist on some models. You may have to scan the specs of many models to find out which ones have it.
I’m aware that it’s much easier to do in Photoshop, but she is tech averse, and also doesn’t want me tinkering with all her pictures. She and I have gone over this quite a bit, in fact.
I’ll try to dig up the information about the name of the feature. one moment…
Canon calls it “Color Accent” but other camera makers may use different names. But a quick search (this question seems to get asked a lot) is that only Canon has it.
Big optical zoom shouldn’t be the only determining factor for a camera either. Big zoom lenses often come at the cost of bigger size, smaller sensor, worse low light performance, and poor optics. And lack of telephoto is often the easiest thing to correct - you move closer to your subject. A longer lens
And the OP has stated that his wife wants to do this all in camera, not with a computer. If that’s the case, then Canon seems to be the way to go. There are many options in the Canon line that have the feature; what other features are you looking for in the camera? What are you planning on using it for? And what is your budget?
Just to throw my 2 cents in - if you can see your way to $350 the Cannon Powershot s95is one of the best point and shoot camera’s available, possibly the best, and it has the Color Accent feature.
But you should obviously try it before you buy one to see if it’s for you.
And it’s just been replaced by the S100. It’s a great camera, but if she mainly shoots in auto mode it’s probably not worth the extra money. The extra zoom of the SX130 and SX230 are nice. If you don’t need that, the ELPH 100 and 300 are quite nice as well.
Generally a longer zoom = slower lens, i.e. you’ll need a longer shutter speed or higher ISO for the same ambient light. This is generally not a good thing.
If it was me buying a new camera, I’d look for low-light performance (lower f numbers and higher ISO values) and image stabilization first. Once you get below about f3.5 and ISO1600, you can start to take photos indoors without flash in many situations and also use higher shutter speeds in well lit action situations like sports photography.
I’d actually go for the smallest zoom range I could find, with emphasis on the shorter focal length; larger zoom range lenses (28-155 vs 28-55mm for example) have more compromises in the design than the shorter ones, so optical aberrations are relatively less, with a non-zoom camera having the least aberrations.
Finally, I’d look at the battery capacity and the interface method; I’ll be damned if I’m going to use some proprietary cabling on a modern camera.