Digital Camera Suggestions?

[Radd]

Under $200.00.

I'm thinking of getting one. I've tried the nikon coolpix and don't care for the picture quality. I'm wondering about the canon SD790. I'd prefer a rechargeable one. Anyone have any suggestions on the best pic quality for the money?

 

[Metaltastic]

I actually just went through a very similar search, and according to Consumerreports.org (those people fucking rule) Canon makes the best stuff for the price. However, all their decent ~$200 models were either too big for my pockets or too small for my hands! So I took a slight hit on picture quality and got the Sony Cybershot DSC W150. It's damn good, but the main issue is there's some visible visual noise, especially at low light levels, but otherwise it works great! However, if size of either of the Canons isn't an issue (the bigger is obviously cheaper but with as good if not better features, cuz you save by not having to make it too small), I'd go for one of them! Also, one of the features that was a make-or-break for me was a viewfinder; it's essential for me to be able to hold the camera up to my face to stabilize when I wanna take a precision shot.

 

[NickL]

be sure to try out a canon before you buy one. The control scheme is a lot different than a Nikon and most people lean one way or the other.

 

[spioraid]

My brother and sister just got CyberShots, and even I dislike most Sony products, these cameras are great. Carl Zeiss lenses which cannot be beaten, really easy to use and great megapixel size. Marcus, does the camera have an exposure lock setting? I can't remember. I know you can't manually change the shutter/aperture/gain settings, but if there's an exposure lock there's a way around that.

 

[Metaltastic]

Haha, you got me man, I'm a total visual n00b; I stick to audio! Mine does indeed have the Zeiss lens though, and pics look great, with the exception of the noise thing in low-light (but it's not that big a deal).

 

[Joematthews]

Make sure it isn't one of the mega high pixel count kodak compacts (non-SLR). I've had 2 of those and they are useless under low light and blurry as hell without the flash. We had an old 5 megapixel Kodak and it easily beat our 11 and 8 megapixel kodaks, so high pixel count is certainly not everything.

Joe

 

[spioraid]

It's not the size of the pixels, it's how you use 'em!

Most digital cameras in this price ranges are blurry without the flash because of it's nature. Everything is automatic for ease of use, not necessarily quality. If you're planning on anything more than flash shots of people flashing and doing shots in a flashy night club serving flashy shots, the more manual control you have the better.

If your camera does have an exposure lock, there's something called the cell phone trick that'll bring down that nasty electronic gain for you. Basically you set the 'exposure' to automatic, then open/turn on your cell phone with a picture of something bright white and stick it right in front of the cameras lens. You don't even have to focus on it, just get the camera to adjust itself so it can bring down the exposure as much as possible. Thankfully gain is the first to go. Once the camera has tried to adjust itself, hit the exposure lock and move your cell phone. You now have a camera that's gotten rid of the gain, leaving you with lots of room for light and higher quality pictures.

If you don't have an exposure lock, hey, you paid $200 for a camera to do all the work for you, stop complaining.

Best of luck mate! Let us know what you decide on.

 

[Metaltastic]

I gotta say, my Dad has a 2 MP Pentax point-and-shoot digicam that my Mom and I got him for XMAS '02, and that thing still takes better looking pics than my current camera, and ANY other point-and-shoot I've used since (including the cameras of other people used to take pics of me). My camera DESTROYS it in terms of low-light shots (especially image stability) and time between shots, but the quality of pics can't measure up (the Pentax has ZERO noise, at least as far as I can see). Check out this shot:

Outdated as far as my current rig is concerned (I've since sold the Hafler, Pod, i5, and JSX ), but I think it's a good one. The point is that Megapixel count really doesn't mean dick as far as I'm concerned!

 

[Radd]

Marcus, I'm assuming that the pics of you in the tattoo thread were with the DSC-W150? They do look pretty good. Would you say that your face is represented very accurately in those shots? Thats the problem I had with the coolpix. The shots always looked weird.

 

[Metaltastic]

Yeah, all the tattoo pics (except for the shoulder/back shot) were the W150, and while I don't think my face is in any of 'em, I did take a shot of it for the facial hair thread

Still, the noise (little red/green/blue dots everywhere) is pretty evident in that shot (esp. on my shirt and the gray bass trap in the background), but it's certainly nothing I can't deal with. Also, here's one of my singer and his girlfriend in their complementary haloween costumes (though I'm pretty sure I used the flash for this, which is never a good way to judge a camera's quality IMO)

 

[Metaltastic]

The good things about the camera, though, are that it responds really fast (small first-shot delay, and small delay between shots), as well as powering on/off - functionally, it's fantastic!

 

[Radd]

I see what you mean about the noise but for the price the shots still look pretty good. That is a crazy haloween pic, looks like a scene from a horror movie, very cool.
Now I'm just wondering about the control scheme on the canons that Broodwich mentioned. I can get used to almost anything as long as its at least fairly easy to operate. If its going to be a pain in the ass then I'd rather not bother.

 

[Metaltastic]

Dunno about Canons, but my Sony is just like my Dad's pentax which is just like any other cam I've used! And their costume was JFK and Jackie-O (post assassination ), btw

 

[Sloan]

I bought a KONICA MINOLTA DiMage z10 a long time ago and took a ton of shots, upped to a refurbished DiMage z20 and have been using it ever since.

for more pix, including zoo animalz:
http://picasaweb.google.com/Sloan.Stewart/

 

[Radd]

SLOAN - Dude. Sold! I like the quality of your pics so much that I just bought one new on ebay for $140.00, free shipping.

Yeah the display is small and it takes batteries but I think I could live with that.
It takes 450+ pics with full battery capacity which tells me its not a battery drainer. I like the big look of it also. I hope I'm happy with it. Thanks SLOAN and everybody for your input. You guys rock!

Hell, I used to work at a Konica photo printing warehouse. Oh, some of the pics I've seen there...

 

[Sloan]

Haha, cool.
I bought a 1gig card and can do 400+ large pictures on it. The battery life is really good since I don't use the flash most of the time.

 

[J the TyranT]

Ive always had Canon's, and likely always will. Solid quality... Im used to the schemes.. and I've dropped and abused the FUCK out of them, even while eating shit down a mountain on the snowboard slopes.. and they've held up just fine.

Check some reviews and opinions on the net... I mean.. more than just ours, lol