Digital Cameras
- Thread starter Saem
- Start date
I believe this is due to interpolation. I'm not sure if a lot of cameras use it, but it's an easy way to increase pixel counts.
I didn't think it'd be that big an issue, but I'll definately make sure. Is it usually done with x number of shots before you need a charge?
If I'm not totally confused. I believe this has to do with how the camera handles various apertures. If I have everything straight in my head -- I crash coursed -- it's more expensive ot make a mechanical mechanism that will do variable apertures. Instead, they might increase the gain which not only increases the signal but the noise with it.
I realise that recycle times are high for some cameras. THey can head upto 30 seconds. But they ended up coming up with buffers and speeding things up. THis being the case, I was wondering what's a reasonable buffer (for taking pictures in quick successions by holding the button down) and standard recycle time between shots?
I'm looking for more a point and shoot which produces good quality images for most cases.
Saem said:
Almost all digital cameras use some sort of interpolation (with only one exception, the Sigma SD9). A 5 MP DC has 5 million sensors (red/green/blue or cyan/green/magenta/yellow combined). So two color components of every pixel are interpolated from other pixels.
There are even some DCs claimed to have high resolution even without the high resolution CCD. For example, some so-called 3MP DCs have only 2MP CCD.
I think the best way to find out the image quality of a DC is, to look at its captured pictures
. Pixel counts and others are just for reference.Fruitfrenzy
Newcomer
The noise issue is not related to aperture.
My Olympus C2020Z takes great pictures most of the time but if I use the ISO400 setting or do any kind of long exposure (greater than 1 second) the image is swamped with noise. Quite a few pixels turn solid green. That makes it kind of useless for the astrophotography that I like to do. The camera will let you set exposure times of up to 16 seconds but it isn't a useful feature.
On the subject of apertures, their function isn't only to reduce the amount of light hitting the CCD or film. They also narrow the light path resulting in a greater depth of field (ie more range of distances in focus). You can't get the same result by messing with CCD gain.
Fruitfrenzy said:
I've recently got the Olympus C5050Z and thankfully it has an excellent noise reduction algorithm for long exposure (>1s).
Overall - I can recommend this camera. Great optics (1,8F, ok - "only" 3x zoom), a big load of useful options and a great user interface, fast response, great battery time (with AA!), quite robust and uses CF, SmartMedia and xD-Card. The only downsides are an above average noise on high ISOs and some chromatic aberration in very high contrast shots on big aperture. If they had a better CCD this camera would be perfect in the 3xzoom-class.
I just bought a Canon EOS 10D for a trip to Alberta which has the best noise-free CCD I've seen. Hell, on the D60, dpreview.com they took a 4 minute exposure http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/canoneosd60/page13.asp with zero noise. I have to go to ISO 1600 or ISO 3200 to start seeing CCD noise, and so far, no stuck pixels (in their 10D review, they got some stuck on the 4 minute test, which I credit to getting an unlucky CCD).
One thing for beginners to watch out for is the cropping. The vast majority of digital cameras do not have a CCD as large as a 35mm frame, thus, most of your lenses will have a field of view crop, so a wide angle 28mm lens gives an FOV more like a 40mm and a 50mm is more like a 75mm. This doesn't matter if you've got a consumer point-and-shoot model, but if you're buying digital SLRs and investing in expensive lens, you should keep in mind the cropping that's occuring.
If you've got about $8000 to blow, you can get a digital SLR with a full 35mm sized CCD and eliminate the crop.
One thing for beginners to watch out for is the cropping. The vast majority of digital cameras do not have a CCD as large as a 35mm frame, thus, most of your lenses will have a field of view crop, so a wide angle 28mm lens gives an FOV more like a 40mm and a 50mm is more like a 75mm. This doesn't matter if you've got a consumer point-and-shoot model, but if you're buying digital SLRs and investing in expensive lens, you should keep in mind the cropping that's occuring.
If you've got about $8000 to blow, you can get a digital SLR with a full 35mm sized CCD and eliminate the crop.
Yes, and it varies depending on LCD/flash use as well. The Canon G3 can last a few hundreds shots with some LCD/flash use.Saem said:
It's not a feature I'm heavily using.. usually you have a number of shots per second up to a maximum of n shots total before you have to wait for the buffers to be written on the card.
Like me, but indoors often require higher iso if you don't want to abuse of flash, and white balance with artificial light require manual switching as automatic most of the time fails.
Some lenses do exhibit some, and others don't. You better check before buying to avoid nasty surprises.
I'd say yes, but they are not on entry level cams, only mid and semi pro.
Nowadays I think it becomes harder to hit a really bad camera that will disapoint you. Most of the time the goal is to minimize the impact of the likely annoyances you will get; for my G3 it is:
-optical viewfinder severely cropping the true captured image, and it's not even exactly centered (it crops more on the left side)
-optical viewfinder is obscured by the filter/lens additionnal adapter, you don't see half of the pic at wide angle
-the grass is sometimes a bit too flashy green (too much yellow in it i suppose)
-outdoors shot are sometimes a tad over exposed, you have to correct with -0.3EV or -0.6 to get something good.
-G5 is out for the same price I paid the G3 not even a year ago, argl! i should be used to this with display adapters
<- I just read the (dp)review(.com), and I'm happy with my G3 (less noise and purple fringing that G5)When I bought the PowerShot G1 when it first came out, it was $900 and an amazing camera. Even more amazing is that today for $1400, you can get a digital SLR. I bet in another year, they will fall below $1000.
The biggest immediately noticable thing about the Canon 10D (and the D30, D60, and I assume Nikon equivalents) is the "instant on" functionality vs the Powershot G and S models.
The cameras with the built-in zoom lenses take like 5 seconds to come on, adjust the lens, and boot up the microdrive. The higher end SLR cameras pop-on in less than a second allowing you to get a shot you may miss on the prosumer models. (I assume they can do this for 2 reasons: 1) no servo calibration needed for the cheapo builtin lens and 2) lots of RAM for buffering before the CF card comes up) The other side benefit is the ability to take shots at roughly 3fps up to 9 exposures before a brief delay. I used both of these two features recently to snap a picture of a falcon in flight against the sunset. I shot like 7 frames, but only one of them was good, but I never would have got it in the first place if I had to switch on my Powershot and wait for the boot sequence, or put up with the frustratingly slow shutter delay. I can't tell you the number of times I missed a shot on my PowerShot because of the huge delay between pressing the shutter button and the time it takes the shot (yes, even with autofocus off).
My recommendation is, if you want to seriously get into photography, get an SLR equivalent, so you can invest in some good lenses. If you want a point-and-shoot tourist camera, get one of those tiny flat pocket sized ones like the Elph. If you're going to have something heavy hanging around your neck, or something that requires a camera back, spend a few hundred more to get something that can carry you a long way. (in the case of SLR equivalents, you can buy lenses which you can reuse even as you continually upgrade your camera. I have a few thousand worth of lenses from my film camera that I got to reuse on the 10D)
The biggest immediately noticable thing about the Canon 10D (and the D30, D60, and I assume Nikon equivalents) is the "instant on" functionality vs the Powershot G and S models.
The cameras with the built-in zoom lenses take like 5 seconds to come on, adjust the lens, and boot up the microdrive. The higher end SLR cameras pop-on in less than a second allowing you to get a shot you may miss on the prosumer models. (I assume they can do this for 2 reasons: 1) no servo calibration needed for the cheapo builtin lens and 2) lots of RAM for buffering before the CF card comes up) The other side benefit is the ability to take shots at roughly 3fps up to 9 exposures before a brief delay. I used both of these two features recently to snap a picture of a falcon in flight against the sunset. I shot like 7 frames, but only one of them was good, but I never would have got it in the first place if I had to switch on my Powershot and wait for the boot sequence, or put up with the frustratingly slow shutter delay. I can't tell you the number of times I missed a shot on my PowerShot because of the huge delay between pressing the shutter button and the time it takes the shot (yes, even with autofocus off).
My recommendation is, if you want to seriously get into photography, get an SLR equivalent, so you can invest in some good lenses. If you want a point-and-shoot tourist camera, get one of those tiny flat pocket sized ones like the Elph. If you're going to have something heavy hanging around your neck, or something that requires a camera back, spend a few hundred more to get something that can carry you a long way. (in the case of SLR equivalents, you can buy lenses which you can reuse even as you continually upgrade your camera. I have a few thousand worth of lenses from my film camera that I got to reuse on the 10D)
DemoCoder said:
/me turns distinctly green with Envy.
I've got an EOS 10 with a few different lenses and I've wanted a digital back for it for ages. In the end we settled on getting a simple Fuji S304 - mainly because it had a reasonable optical Zoom (6x) and a decent "number" of pixels ("~3.2M"), but also because it worked with (rechargable) AAs. I didn't fancy trying to get hold of exotic (a.k.a. expensive) replacements in the "back of beyond" should they got flat at an inopportune moment.
Sigh...I can't see 'my accountant' giving me permission for one of those
Did you use full automatic mode ot shoot that?
1. the sky is very over exposed (and other white hightlight areas)
2. the aperture is open by a few stops (notice the background isn't in focus, that is, your depth of field is small)
3. the exposure time is too long for that aperture, notice her hand motion is blurry
4. the noise in the foto looks like what happens on digital cameras when the ISO is set too high. Since you appear to be shooting in very bright conditions, you can roll that back to ISO 100.
So try this in manual mode:
1. shoot in similar light conditions
2. set camera to lowest ISO you can
3. leave aperture wide open (1.4, 1.8, 2.8, whatever your camera's lowest is, this will give you the blurry background portrait effect)
4. point your camera at the sky and "meter" it, usually by pressing the camera button half way, adjust shutter speed until it isn't over exposed
5. point it at you daughter, and adjust the exposure time by 1-2 stops slower. try metering again off of her
6. if everything looks fine, try a shot
7. if daughter is underexposed, or sky is still overexposed, the range is too great to capture and you need to shoot from a different place or use some external lighting (yes, even on a sunny day)
8. scale that image down a little bit, some of the noise will go away
1. the sky is very over exposed (and other white hightlight areas)
2. the aperture is open by a few stops (notice the background isn't in focus, that is, your depth of field is small)
3. the exposure time is too long for that aperture, notice her hand motion is blurry
4. the noise in the foto looks like what happens on digital cameras when the ISO is set too high. Since you appear to be shooting in very bright conditions, you can roll that back to ISO 100.
So try this in manual mode:
1. shoot in similar light conditions
2. set camera to lowest ISO you can
3. leave aperture wide open (1.4, 1.8, 2.8, whatever your camera's lowest is, this will give you the blurry background portrait effect)
4. point your camera at the sky and "meter" it, usually by pressing the camera button half way, adjust shutter speed until it isn't over exposed
5. point it at you daughter, and adjust the exposure time by 1-2 stops slower. try metering again off of her
6. if everything looks fine, try a shot
7. if daughter is underexposed, or sky is still overexposed, the range is too great to capture and you need to shoot from a different place or use some external lighting (yes, even on a sunny day)
8. scale that image down a little bit, some of the noise will go away
I just bought an s400 a month ago, my first camera. Here are some of my better shots with it for anyone interested, although a few are still works in progress. I'm currently figuring out how to use Photoshop to edit green-eye out of animal pictures, for one.
http://www.pbase.com/fbg111
micron, try using SharpControl for your picture. It's a powerful program with a simple interface and one of the cleaner sharpening algorithms out there:
http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1021&message=4086845
http://www.pbase.com/fbg111
micron, try using SharpControl for your picture. It's a powerful program with a simple interface and one of the cleaner sharpening algorithms out there:
http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1021&message=4086845
micron, what does that pic look like after you sharpen it?
later,
later,
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