Digital Camera

[monte_carlo97 10+ year member]

Ok, i want to get a lady a digital camera for christmas. Any suggestions on which ones or any pointers when i go out to look for one. I am willing to spend 300-400 so anything in the price range.

Open to all suggestions.

I am new to the digital camera stuff so all help is appreciated. I do understand the megapixels and memory and all that sh!t. I just want to know what to look for when buying one.

-Thanks

Dave

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[Bumpin_Ack 10+ year member]

Ok, i want to get a lady a digital camera for christmas. Any suggestions on which ones or any pointers when i go out to look for one. I am willing to spend 300-400 so anything in the price range.
Open to all suggestions.

I am new to the digital camera stuff so all help is appreciated. I do understand the megapixels and memory and all that sh!t. I just want to know what to look for when buying one.

-Thanks

Dave

Do you really understand megapixels, or do you just know more mp=more memory/better quality. Megapixels really don't impact quality at all, just the actual size of the picture. What that can do to enhance quality, however, is say i take a picture witha 3.2mp and print it at its native resolution. Now say i take a picture with a 5mp camera and shrink it to the same size as the 3mp camera. Almost always the second one will yield better pictures (in my opinon)

With that said, what is most important to you? Quality should be no 1, with size no2. If that is the case i'd suggest the canon s410 (or s500 if you want more mp) I owned a nikon 3100 and the picture quality was mediocre when there was ample lighting, and horrible indoors/dark. I sold it and bought a canon A75. Its amazing, the pictures are beautiful (i have some samples if you want to see, no more comparisons however, since my hd crashed.) It has great manual controls and i got it for a good price ($150 no rebates from circuit city). Only complaint is size, its a little bigger than my nikon. The s410 pretty much has the same controls and its pictures are just ast beautiful (it has to do with the lenses that canon uses)

Check out http://www.steves-digicams.com/hardware_reviews.html to get some good knowledgeble reviews

 

[Rattlebrain 10+ year member]

My wife and I just bought a 5.1 mega pixels. It may not be the best on the market but for the price, we like it a lot better than our old camera. (Kodak 1.3 MP)

http://www.circuitcity.com/ssm/Sony-Cyber-shot--DSC-W1-Digital-Camera/sem/rpsm/oid/93618/rpem/ccd/productDetail.do

 

[monte_carlo97 10+ year member]

My wife and I just bought a 5.1 mega pixels. It may not be the best on the market but for the price, we like it a lot better than our old camera. (Kodak 1.3 MP)
http://www.circuitcity.com/ssm/Sony-Cyber-shot--DSC-W1-Digital-Camera/sem/rpsm/oid/93618/rpem/ccd/productDetail.do

that is the one i was looking at. If you don't mind me asking how much did you pay for it?

 

[Qckrun 10+ year member]

Well if you buy one for xmas for a chick make sure she agrees to having **** pictures taken lol... otherwise its not worth it

 

[monte_carlo97 10+ year member]

Do you really understand megapixels, or do you just know more mp=more memory/better quality. Megapixels really don't impact quality at all, just the actual size of the picture. What that can do to enhance quality, however, is say i take a picture witha 3.2mp and print it at its native resolution. Now say i take a picture with a 5mp camera and shrink it to the same size as the 3mp camera. Almost always the second one will yield better pictures (in my opinon)
With that said, what is most important to you? Quality should be no 1, with size no2. If that is the case i'd suggest the canon s410 (or s500 if you want more mp) I owned a nikon 3100 and the picture quality was mediocre when there was ample lighting, and horrible indoors/dark. I sold it and bought a canon A75. Its amazing, the pictures are beautiful (i have some samples if you want to see, no more comparisons however, since my hd crashed.) It has great manual controls and i got it for a good price ($150 no rebates from circuit city). Only complaint is size, its a little bigger than my nikon. The s410 pretty much has the same controls and its pictures are just ast beautiful (it has to do with the lenses that canon uses)

Check out http://www.steves-digicams.com/hardware_reviews.html to get some good knowledgeble reviews

i do understand megapizels.

What me GF is going to be using this for is to take pictures with her and friends then later going to put them in a scrap book. Then i will be using it to take pictures of installs //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/tongue.gif.6130eb82179565f6db8d26d6001dcd24.gif Win win for everyone. yes quality is very important. Yes size is also a factor as she/me will be carry this in our pockets. Maybe her purse.

 

[bonesninja 5,000+ posts]

sup dave--i got a 3.2 mp sony cybershot from wally world. i think the same model i got is like 140-150 now but you'll definately want to upgrade the memory stick to at least a 64 mb one.

 

[Bumpin_Ack 10+ year member]

^I didn't mean to insult you with the MP question, i misunderstood its meaning when i got my first camera, i just hear a lot of people buy a camera then whine when the pictures look like shiat they say "but its a 5mp camera". Really, when your 5mp camera just took 5mp worth of junk.

How do you like your sony camera? My friend has one. I have heard that there lenses aren't nearly as good as others and they have very few manual controls. One thing that would keep me away from them is the lack of memory support. Nikons/canons use compact flash cards which ALWAYS have some sort of deal. Sony's memory sticks's rarely go on sale and there isn't as much competition=higher price. Something to consider

 

[monte_carlo97 10+ year member]

sup dave--i got a 3.2 mp sony cybershot from wally world. i think the same model i got is like 140-150 now but you'll definately want to upgrade the memory stick to at least a 64 mb one.

That is also the one i was looking at. How do you like it?

i was going to get her the camera and a few accessories(case, some photo paper, etc.) and my parents were going to get her a 256 er.

 

[monte_carlo97 10+ year member]

^I didn't mean to insult you with the MP question, i misunderstood its meaning when i got my first camera, i just hear a lot of people buy a camera then whine when the pictures look like shiat they say "but its a 5mp camera". Really, when your 5mp camera just took 5mp worth of junk.
How do you like your sony camera? My friend has one. I have heard that there lenses aren't nearly as good as others and they have very few manual controls. One thing that would keep me away from them is the lack of memory support. Nikons/canons use compact flash cards which ALWAYS have some sort of deal. Sony's memory sticks's rarely go on sale and there isn't as much competition=higher price. Something to consider

no offense taken, its all good.

Oh yea action shots are going to be taken with this camera such as people running or when i get a hold of it excursion ****.

 

[bonesninja 5,000+ posts]

^I didn't mean to insult you with the MP question, i misunderstood its meaning when i got my first camera, i just hear a lot of people buy a camera then whine when the pictures look like shiat they say "but its a 5mp camera". Really, when your 5mp camera just took 5mp worth of junk.
How do you like your sony camera? My friend has one. I have heard that there lenses aren't nearly as good as others and they have very few manual controls. One thing that would keep me away from them is the lack of memory support. Nikons/canons use compact flash cards which ALWAYS have some sort of deal. Sony's memory sticks's rarely go on sale and there isn't as much competition=higher price. Something to consider

i love mine--i've taken about 1000 pics only had a few come out bad(usually a moving target)as far as the memory stick goes--i bought a 128 mb one at wally world for 59 bucks. i normally use like the 1.2mp setting which takes awesome photos and when i was at a car show earlier this year i took close to 500 picss on that memory card. the only bad thing i've found about digi cams is that they put a serious strain on batteries--don't even think of putting regular batteries in it or you'll go broke..

edit: plus i have a sony vaio desktop and notebook and they have built in memory stick ports so that made my choice easier.

 

[monte_carlo97 10+ year member]

i love mine--i've taken about 1000 pics only had a few come out bad(usually a moving target)as far as the memory stick goes--i bought a 128 mb one at wally world for 59 bucks. i normally use like the 1.2mp setting which takes awesome photos and when i was at a car show earlier this year i took close to 500 picss on that memory card. the only bad thing i've found about digi cams is that they put a serious strain on batteries--don't even think of putting regular batteries in it or you'll go broke..


edit: plus i have a sony vaio desktop and notebook and they have built in memory stick ports so that made my choice easier.

like what kind of moving shots a car doing a 100 mph or a person running.

I was going to get her one of these in her computer that i built for her.

 

[bonesninja 5,000+ posts]

like what kind of moving shots a car doing a 100 mph or a person running.
I was going to get her one of these in her computer that i built for her.

i mean like me walking in this direction. but that was just 2 or 3 times out of 300 cars i took pics of with me standing still.

 

[Bumpin_Ack 10+ year member]

i mean like me walking in this direction. but that was just 2 or 3 times out of 300 cars i took pics of with me standing still.

Ohh ALL digital cameras are HORRIBLE at catching action, esp in low light. The low light problem is obvious, it compensates by exposing longer=blurred images. The other problem is the time it take from when you hit the button (expecting it to take the picture) and when it actually does. This varies from camera to camera, so try them out in the store. Try taking pictures really fast (like turn around and try to snap something, it's hard) The only digital cameras that can do this are the HIGH end digital slrs (we have (2) Nikon D70's for yearbook and those things can do some awesom stuff) But Just about every point and shoot will struggle.

 

[Aurorav8 10+ year member]

For that price range, Canon takes the cake over anything else. They own the point and shoot market easily.