[Stealth]

I'm in the market for a new digital camera, since i'm going to be spending the next 3 weeks out of town, including driving up the california coast line.  the camera i HAVE is an olympus c4000,
i'm thinking of this one:
http://www.olympusamerica.com/cpg_section/product.asp?product=1224
an olympus stylus 710.


i'm a big fan of Olympus, and i want something that can be slipped into the pocket really easily (that rules out cameras with big lenses).  this is going to be more of a 'social' camera.

one thing i dislike is that it only takes xD... which has a limit of like 1 GB, or maybe they have 4GB ones out there, but it's not as leet as the 8GB sandisk or SD cards (or whatever they're called), although i suppose it's still more than enough.

reason i picked this over the canon was that i hate cameras that, when you plug them in, show up in my computer as "Scanners and Cameras" or whatever it is... i like them to show up as regular external hard drives that i can navigate, cut/copy/paste to or from.

what do you think? any suggestions? comments?

[Rand al Thor]

I just bought a Fuji FinePix F31fd and I'm pretty happy with it. Did a little bit of net searching before forking out the money and it seemed to be coming up as one of the definative pocket cameras. It's xD though which'll keep you stuck in the same boat but, like I said, good camera so far.

[Tyrian]

I got an Olympus camera recently.  I'm pretty happy with it.  It's shockproof and waterproof, so it can take a beating.  It also doesn't take xD, which I believe a lot of people had trouble with.  (It was memory corruption, I think.)  It's called the Stylus 720 SW.  I'll take a picture of it. 

EDIT:  Hmm...Taking a picture of a camera with said camera...I'm gonna go get more sleep...



Not the greatest picture of it, but it's the best I can do on my way to bed...

[aldo_14]

I bought a Samsung i6 last September; it's not the best camera under low light conditions (at least, if you have shaky hands like me ) and its main selling point iis small size, but I'm very happy with it.  One thing is that I think it's limited to 1GB SD cards. although in my experience that's usually enough if you a) don't go click mad or b) just switch down to 5MP.  Pretty sure there will be a newer, fancier version of it out by now anyways

[Ashrak]

i like the Ixus series ultra small and lightweight, ownage image processor

[Mika]

My Canon camera shows up as a hard drive that you can navigate and copy/paste. It is a digital system camera, though. Here I thought 512 Mb was enough for me - that's some 120 pics - which is four to five times the number of pictures you can take into a single film roll with a kinofilm camera. Have been going for a year with that amount and I haven't seen the need to have a higher storage capacity.

I don't like the adjustability of the pocket sized cameras. They are too complex for me to understand. I never found a pocket camera which would have an easy access to the exposure times or to the F/# or into the ISO sensitivity. Or the color temperature setting for that matter. And not to mention zoom control. Pocket cameras are too automated for my taste.

However, I suppose that if you want a point-and-click camera, then the pocket camera might be the best alternative. For me, the F/3.4 seems to be quick enough, hopefully also for this case. From my experience, it is best to rely on the optical zoom number, and forget the digital one. The real magnification of this camera is 3, no matter what they say. I'd say magnification of 3 is quite low, but it also depends on what you're planning to image. ISO sensitivity seems to be fair in this case. For sequential shooting, 3.7  frames per second seems to be quite good for this case, but this is only applicable with sufficient illumination (daylight I suppose). 7.1 Megapixel system will give you plenty of pixels to toy around in Photoshop.

I'd take a look on the lenses also, they are probably plastic ones because the price seems to be very low for (that's four aspherics for gods sake!). A bright object can cause some strange artifacts in the image if imaged through a cheap plastic lens.

Also, it seems to have a LCD panel which I suppose can be used to aid taking pictures. Does it have an optical equivalent so that you don't need to use LCD if camera is low on battery? Also, is it expected that you experience weather where the temperature will go below zero degrees of Celsius? If so, I'd advise again not to rely on LCD...

All in all, it seems to be reasonable, I'd try toying with it before buying it, especially to test if it fits well to your hands and if you can find all the necessary adjustments easily. I'd also think how rugged the system feels, does it feel like there would be something loose inside or if it is obvious that it wont withstand the test of time. Also if you have the chance, try taking pictures with the optical zoom fully extended and then consider the image quality. Then you can see how badly edges and corners are blurred in that configuration.

A couple of thoughts,

Mika

[CP5670]

On the subject of cameras, does anyone know what the various ISO settings do? I don't know much about this stuff, but I'm wondering if they have something to do with the color balance. I find that although the pictures I take generally come out well, blue hues often look too bright.

[Mika]

ISO setting is for the sensitivity of the film. The higher the number, the more sensitive film you have. For taking pictures in darker regions, use higher setting. I think I can go up to 4000 or something. However, the higher the sensitivity, the faster you saturate the film so exposure time must be adjusted differently with each film type. Unfortunately, quick shutter times lead to noise in the pictures, for me the most practical ISO numbers are between 100-800, 400 being the most common. You can find information here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Film_speed

Color balance is another thing. The problem you describe is probably related to the color temperature setting of your camera. Usually it is set for bright daylight (around 5200 K I suppose) and DOES NOT automatically change when you change environments. Then match the color temperature setting to the illumination present in the area. There should be information how to do this in the camera manual.

Mika

[Stealth]

710 effing sucks.  sending it back.

terrible image quality

[Mika]

A couple of thoughts before you send it back - or am I already late?

In any case, using low F numbers will decrease the depth of focus (seen as a blur around the object where the camera was focused), but enables high speed imaging. High F numbers will increase the depth of focus (thus the image will be sharper around the focused object), but then you need longer exposure time.

Also, 7.1 Mpixels is already enough to really show this effect in the image. However, remember that all small areas in the image will look blurred if viewed close enough. This effect might not be visible in the post card size print (a real photo).

My suggestion would be:
Try using higher aperture values (F/11 to F/20 or even higher) and adjust exposure time accordingly. Make sure the camera is focused to the object! If necessary, find a support for your camera, anything above 40 ms exposure time will blurred if the camera is held in hand while taking the picture. Then take a look if you can see the blur effect again. Do this while the zoom is not extended at all and when the zoom is totally extended. This will tell you if you have been using low F/# and the camera has focused to something else from what you wanted to photograph.

Usually, plastic lenses are not of very high quality and the manufacturer might not have optimized the extended zoom from the boundaries. They might be blurred also. This would be indication of sloppy design work or is the reason for the cheap price of the camera. Also, be advised that extending the zoom will decrease the hand held camera exposure times and will also blur image if not taken into account. My maximum times where of order 40 ms for standard position and 10 ms for extended position.

However, you cannot expect high performance from pocket cameras.

Then decide for yourself if you want to keep it.

Best Regards,
Mika

[CP5670]

ISO setting is for the sensitivity of the film. The higher the number, the more sensitive film you have. For taking pictures in darker regions, use higher setting. I think I can go up to 4000 or something. However, the higher the sensitivity, the faster you saturate the film so exposure time must be adjusted differently with each film type. Unfortunately, quick shutter times lead to noise in the pictures, for me the most practical ISO numbers are between 100-800, 400 being the most common. You can find information here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Film_speed

Color balance is another thing. The problem you describe is probably related to the color temperature setting of your camera. Usually it is set for bright daylight (around 5200 K I suppose) and DOES NOT automatically change when you change environments. Then match the color temperature setting to the illumination present in the area. There should be information how to do this in the camera manual.

Mika

Thanks for the explanation. I do in fact take indoor pictures, mostly of my Lego stuff. I thought the flash is enough to compensate for the lower ambient light, but it looks like something more is needed. I'll need to check how to access that color temperature setting.

[Herra Tohtori]

For pocket cameras, optical and electronical quality is much more important than the amount of raw resolution. I've got a 4.0 Mpixel Minolta DiMage G400, and it can produce pretty good pictures, at least in my opinion...

My camera's 4-0 MPixel has been more than adequate for all situations I've been in that required taking photos... The images are larger then PC monitors anyway, in terms of resolution. And you likely won't print them as accurate as they are either, so 7.1 Mpixels is in my opinion rather redundant for a pocket camera. Of course larger resolution offers more possibilities - like, for example, you don't need to use zoom when you can crop the appropriate part of the image later, which makes it possible to use shorter exposure times and higher focal ratio (longer focus/smaller aperture), which both generally result in better images.

But for the most part - if you want really high-quality images (printworth, that is), don't buy a pocket camera. Simple physical size limits the ability of a pocket camera versus that of larger objectives - they simply don't gather light as much as bigger ones. If you want a pocket camera, go for high quality components and optics, not raw pixel power. High resolution images are worth nothing if the optics suck or cheap electronics produces huge amounts of noise into pictures, or if the images are compressed to mutilated mess...

[Mika]

Quote from CP5670

Thanks for the explanation. I do in fact take indoor pictures, mostly of my Lego stuff. I thought the flash is enough to compensate for the lower ambient light, but it looks like something more is needed. I'll need to check how to access that color temperature setting.

Ah, that explains a bit. You might have a flash light in which the spectrum of the light has a high spike in the blue end, and that would effectively render everything more bluish. For comparasion, take a look at the page http://www.polytec-pi.fr/EGG/Lampes%20Flash/Xenon%20The%20Full%20Spectrum%20vs_%20Deuterium%20Plus%20Tungsten,%20Page%201.htm

There is a chart which shows the ideal black body radiator curve - peaking at 5200 K or 5500 K, (I forgot which one it was), just as the sun does and it is compared to the xenon flash curve. You can see that there is wavelength difference between the peaks, which results in more blue light when using the flash.

If you are really unlucky, you have LED flashlight in your camera. Refer to this page for the spectrum:
http://shakelight.notanumberinc.com/flashlight/techspecs.shtml

Now there are two separate peaks, far from the typical blackbody radiation curve that the eye sees as most pleasant and most natural.

I see that there are three possible solutions:

1) Weighting color channels separately in Photoshop.
2) Try to adjust the color temperature and hope like hell that you have a Xenon flash which at least somehow looks like blackbody curve in visible spectrum.
3) Buy a special longpass filter for camera, which would decrease the amount of blue light that would enter the camera.

Quote from Herr Doktor

Simple physical size limits the ability of a pocket camera versus that of larger objectives - they simply don't gather light as much as bigger ones.

Must... resist... commenting...

Mika

[Knight Templar]

Get the camera with the most pixels for the least money and you'll do well in life.

[Stealth]

yeah i did that.  but i guess that just wasn't enough

look at the below picture. 

by the way, i tried every setting there was.  from 'automatic' (which they SUGGEST actually), to adjusting every manual operation there was.

this is on my new camera. all pictures like this... regardless which mode i used.


this was my 3 year old camera.  4MP. automatic.

[Windrunner]

The one that you are thinking of buying (Olympus 710) got pretty good grades in tech magazine i read.

[Stealth]

that's actually the one i already sent back cause it was terrible.

[Knight Templar]

That's an odd amount of noise / discoloration. Is your lense ****ed or something? Lighting?

[Stealth]

well the camera was literally brand new.  as in, i took it out of the box that night, put in the battery and 2GB xD card, and started snapping pictures.

funny thing is that it only happens indoors, in low-light environments.

but what's worse, is i specifically selected "Indoor" from the selection list...

[Herra Tohtori]

Sounds like you just happened to have a specimen that was prone to generating noise at higher sensitivity/longer exposure times involved in indoor photography.