Choosing a Digital Camera for nights out
11/04/08 09:32 Filed in: Personal
Often times when I've been out on a night out I've
wanted to take photographs of the event, however I've
normally shied away from taking my Canon DSLR with
because of the bulk and risk of damage or loss to
equipment as the night goes on. What I really needed
was a small, compact digital camera that can fit in a
pocket without being too obtrusive.
My budget was somewhere around £150 and for that I wanted to find a camera that had the following features;
• Excellent picture quality
• Image stabilisation
• Decent zoom range, as in at least 3x optical zoom
• USB Connectivity
• Support for high capacity memory cards
• Good flash performance
• Face detection
• HD movie mode (at least 720p) capture
After looking at what was available, I narrowed down my search to the following cameras;
• Kodak V1253
• Canon Ixus 75
• Sony T200
• Panasonic Lumix FX35
I was hugely impressed with the Kodak V1253 capabilities and features, however in order to charge the battery you were supplied with a USB cable that required a connection to a PC. Not that much of a problem as USB is universal these days, however a mains charger seems to be an optional extra.
My personal experience of charging devices via USB is a bit hit and miss, some devices work better then others. My iPod for example seems to work fine when charged by a USB connection on a PC, I've had several phones however that give the appearance of being fully charged from a PC but that actually run down faster then when charged from the mains. This means that USB isn't, for me at least, isn't a suitable method for charging high current drain devices (which is what phones and camera are) as the only charging option. I would prefer to have a mains charger included with the option to use the USB method if I want/need to.
The Canon Ixus 75 camera is also a very good camera and has a large 3.0" LCD screen on the rear that acts as both a viewfinder and a review screen. Reading reviews of the camera on Amazon, it appears that the vast majority of people rate it very highly.
There were two features however that it lacked however, the first was any form of image stabilisation and the second was the fact that it didn't have an HD movie mode, the best it could do was 640x480 at 30fps which is good but it's not HD standard.
The Sony T70 is again a great camera, however a couple of things struck me with this camera. First off, the zoom is internal, i.e. there are no moving parts of the lens that protrude outside of the camera casing when you zoom in or out. I know this technology has been around for a while now in cameras but I'm concerned about the mechanism getting stuck or damaged and ending up with an expensive paper weight. I feel that at least with a normal protruding zoom lens there's less chance of it becoming stuck and that repairs (if needed would be easier to action).
The other issue I have with the T70, although this is more an issue with Sony in general, is their insistence on using their own proprietary memory cards rather then the more standard SD/SDHC, Compact Flash or xD cards.
The FX-35 is one of a long line of successful compact cameras in the Lumix range from Panasonic. It's very easy to use, comes with a wealth of scene modes as well as partial manual control, optical image stabilisation and best of all a 4x zoom range that features 25mm at the wide end. The 25mm wide angle gives this camera a definite advantage when taking landscapes, quite simply, because you can get more into the picture from the same spot compared to a camera with a 28mm or 30mm wide angle lens.
It is also capable of capturing HD (720p) video with sound, although as with all of these cameras, the video quality won't ever be as good as a dedicated HD camcorder.
In the end, I couldn't bring myself to buy another Sony camera as past history with Sony Cameras means that the camera will usually suffer from some sort of excessive battery discharge problem which goes through a full set of batteries in less then a day. The Kodak camera looked and felt great and took decent images, however I refuse to buy a camera that requires additional cables and docking stations to get the full use out of it. As a Canon DSLR user you would think that the Canon Compact would have been the ideal camera to go for, however it lacked image stabilisation which left the Lumix FX-35. Yes, the Panasonic Lumix FX-35 won the day. For me at least, it had the best balance of features, size and image quality out of all of the cameras listed.
The order has been placed with a well known online retailed (no not Amazon) and should be here in a couple of days.
My budget was somewhere around £150 and for that I wanted to find a camera that had the following features;
• Excellent picture quality
• Image stabilisation
• Decent zoom range, as in at least 3x optical zoom
• USB Connectivity
• Support for high capacity memory cards
• Good flash performance
• Face detection
• HD movie mode (at least 720p) capture
After looking at what was available, I narrowed down my search to the following cameras;
• Kodak V1253
• Canon Ixus 75
• Sony T200
• Panasonic Lumix FX35
Kodak V1253
I was hugely impressed with the Kodak V1253 capabilities and features, however in order to charge the battery you were supplied with a USB cable that required a connection to a PC. Not that much of a problem as USB is universal these days, however a mains charger seems to be an optional extra.
My personal experience of charging devices via USB is a bit hit and miss, some devices work better then others. My iPod for example seems to work fine when charged by a USB connection on a PC, I've had several phones however that give the appearance of being fully charged from a PC but that actually run down faster then when charged from the mains. This means that USB isn't, for me at least, isn't a suitable method for charging high current drain devices (which is what phones and camera are) as the only charging option. I would prefer to have a mains charger included with the option to use the USB method if I want/need to.
Canon Ixus 75
The Canon Ixus 75 camera is also a very good camera and has a large 3.0" LCD screen on the rear that acts as both a viewfinder and a review screen. Reading reviews of the camera on Amazon, it appears that the vast majority of people rate it very highly.
There were two features however that it lacked however, the first was any form of image stabilisation and the second was the fact that it didn't have an HD movie mode, the best it could do was 640x480 at 30fps which is good but it's not HD standard.
Sony T70
The Sony T70 is again a great camera, however a couple of things struck me with this camera. First off, the zoom is internal, i.e. there are no moving parts of the lens that protrude outside of the camera casing when you zoom in or out. I know this technology has been around for a while now in cameras but I'm concerned about the mechanism getting stuck or damaged and ending up with an expensive paper weight. I feel that at least with a normal protruding zoom lens there's less chance of it becoming stuck and that repairs (if needed would be easier to action).
The other issue I have with the T70, although this is more an issue with Sony in general, is their insistence on using their own proprietary memory cards rather then the more standard SD/SDHC, Compact Flash or xD cards.
Panasonic Lumix DMC-FX35
The FX-35 is one of a long line of successful compact cameras in the Lumix range from Panasonic. It's very easy to use, comes with a wealth of scene modes as well as partial manual control, optical image stabilisation and best of all a 4x zoom range that features 25mm at the wide end. The 25mm wide angle gives this camera a definite advantage when taking landscapes, quite simply, because you can get more into the picture from the same spot compared to a camera with a 28mm or 30mm wide angle lens.
It is also capable of capturing HD (720p) video with sound, although as with all of these cameras, the video quality won't ever be as good as a dedicated HD camcorder.
Conclusion
In the end, I couldn't bring myself to buy another Sony camera as past history with Sony Cameras means that the camera will usually suffer from some sort of excessive battery discharge problem which goes through a full set of batteries in less then a day. The Kodak camera looked and felt great and took decent images, however I refuse to buy a camera that requires additional cables and docking stations to get the full use out of it. As a Canon DSLR user you would think that the Canon Compact would have been the ideal camera to go for, however it lacked image stabilisation which left the Lumix FX-35. Yes, the Panasonic Lumix FX-35 won the day. For me at least, it had the best balance of features, size and image quality out of all of the cameras listed.
The order has been placed with a well known online retailed (no not Amazon) and should be here in a couple of days.