Photography gurus, Holla at me.

[tman2093]

I want a new digital camera. Here are my wants

point and shoot, dont need SLR
large screen, 2.5" or greater.
SD card compatibility. Going to use an eye-fi card.
optical image stabilization
prefer lithium ion battery, but will settle for nimh batteries.

Price cap at 200 dollars.

Cameras I like in my own research:

Fujifilm S1500 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16830122200

Canon A1100 IS http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16830120335

Samsung SL720 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16830144227

I'm leanign towards the fuji. An event photographer friend suggested it since it takes pictures using octagonal pixels, and had optical, and digital image stabilization.

I'm open to others. Hit me.

[Jesda]

Explain this "octagonal pixels" thing

[tman2093]

I'd love to. As far as I know, pixels are squares. Maybe he got confused and he means its for something to do with the CCD.

[Kick94sts]

I've heard to stay away from fujifilm. I'd personally go with the canon.

[OffThaHorseCEO]

Originally Posted by Effective Pixels By Vincent Bockaert

Fujifilm's Super CCD Sensors

Normally sensor pixels are square. Fujifilm's Super CCD sensors have octagonal pixels, as shown in this diagram. Therefore, the distance "d2" between the centers of two octagonal pixels is smaller than the distance "d1" between two conventional square pixels, resulting in larger (better) pixels.




However, the information has to be converted to a digital image with square pixels. From the diagram you can see that, for a 4 x 4 area of 16 square pixels, only 8 octagonal pixel measurements were used: 2 red pixels, 2 blue pixels, and 4 green pixels (1 full, 4 half, and 4 quarter green pixels). In other words, 6 megapixel Super CCD images are based on the measurement by only 3 million effective pixels, similar to the above interpolated example, but with the advantage of larger pixels. In practice the resulting image quality is equivalent to about 4 megapixel. The drawback is that you have to deal with double the file size (leading to more storage and slower processing), while enjoying a quality improvement equivalent to only 33% more pixels.

i wont act like i understood all of that 100 percent. but i gather theres not much benefit to the whole octagon pixel hype and you end up with larger (on disk) files

[RightTurn]

Canon, FTW.

[CIWS]

Paging Gary88

[ryannel2003]

I've had 2 Canon cameras (Powershot A400 and SD750) and I've gotten great results from both. Take really great pictures and never had issues from either camera. As a matter of fact the only reason I replaced my A400 was because I stupidly broke the screen. My dad has a Powershot SX100 and it takes really great pictures as well.

[dirt_cheap_fleetwood]

Canon A2000. I got my Mom one for Christmas and it is fantastic. These are some of the pictures I have taken with it. Keep in mind that Photobucket decreases image quality when you upload photos. It also takes really good video for a camera. I have some of mine up on Youtube, my user name is Saber2580.

[dirt_cheap_fleetwood]

Some more pictures I have taken with it.

[BRODIENUCHIES]

Great pix!!!

[codewize]

You did say Guru, right?

I stopped reading when you said no SLR.

But I do like the sony higher end cybershots for many reasons.

[Kick94sts]

Originally Posted by codewize

You did say Guru, right?

I stopped reading when you said no SLR.

But I do like the sony higher end cybershots for many reasons.

haha yea, I have no idea when it comes to p&s's, but I know I love my D60.

I would just try to stay within Canon or Nikon or even Kodak isn't bad.

[hardrockcamaro@mac.c]

To be honest any point and shoot from a big name camera company will take great pics.

If you're shooting in auto then just get one that has an image stabiliser, decent build (ideally metal) and that's about it. Seriously.
Rather than worry about how much zoom it has I'd be more inclined to get one that goes as wideangle as possible. I mean, when did you last use and get a good pic using some uber zoom compact?
Don't be swayed by more pixels. The pics get noisier and the file sizes get bigger. Compare the physical size of the sensor not the number of pixels on it. Bigger sensor = better.

Your technique will make 1,000 times more difference to your pictures than which camera you choose.


If you want to play with a few (useful) settings then you need an easy to use menu system and buttons (or one master button) that quickly take you to the most often changed settings.

If you must have a recommendation I'd suggest Canon, followed closely by Casio, followed by Fuji/Olympus/Nikon.

[OffThaHorseCEO]

Originally Posted by hardrockcamaro@mac.c

To be honest any point and shoot from a big name camera company will take great pics.

If you're shooting in auto then just get one that has an image stabiliser, decent build (ideally metal) and that's about it. Seriously.
Rather than worry about how much zoom it has I'd be more inclined to get one that goes as wideangle as possible. I mean, when did you last use and get a good pic using some uber zoom compact?
Don't be swayed by more pixels. The pics get noisier and the file sizes get bigger. Compare the physical size of the sensor not the number of pixels on it. Bigger sensor = better.

Your technique will make 1,000 times more difference to your pictures than which camera you choose.


If you want to play with a few (useful) settings then you need an easy to use menu system and buttons (or one master button) that quickly take you to the most often changed settings.

If you must have a recommendation I'd suggest Canon, followed closely by Casio, followed by Fuji/Olympus/Nikon.

how can you tell the sensor size?