OT: 6 megapixels best format for your woodworking pictures?

[jo4hn]

and censors...

[Robatoy]

[Charlie Self]

John, I think the FZ50 is what is called a bridge camera, not a true P&S, yet not a DSLR. The bridge camera is a dying breed because there is more money in DSLRs, even with low end prices skidding as they have. It's now possible to get a very good entry level DSLR and lens for under $500...that is a 6 MP camera, with an 18-55mm lens. By this time next year, low end DSLRs may be as much as $200 under that, and almost certainly will be at least $100 under that $500 mark. If a bridge camera with a tiny P&S sensor costs $550 and an entry level DSLR with an APS-C sensor costs $425, which would you buy, even given the fact that the bridge camera may offer the equivalent of a 35mm-200mm lens, while the DSLR offers 27-75mm or so?

[J. Clarke]

That particular camera offers 35-420 with optical stabilization and macro at both ends. If my budget was 550 bucks then it would be a hard choice--to match the capability would mean spending quite a lot more on the SLR. The FZ18 is actually more capable for $350 but the manual controls are less convenient, there is no hot shoe or PC connector, and using filters requires a screw-in mount extender.

[Robatoy]

[snipped for brevity]

That's a blast from the past. Except, I used a Contax. I pushed the Tri-X to 650 and gave it a bit more time in the old Microdol or D-76. I had a Leitz enlarger with a Nikon EL Nikkor lens ( all the rage back then) Then I printed onto a variety of Ilford papers. I have many of those shots and each and every one means something to this day. Considering many are close to 40 years old, the archival quality is simply amazing.

As a hobby, carving with light was very satisfying and could be intense with the dodging and burning and getting the contrast/mood 'just right'...

I miss it sometimes. The ritual. The mixing of the chemicals, the smells..feeling a bit like The Wizard Of Id.

These days, my HP 9800 13" x 19" borderless with a photo-grey cartridge on watercolour paper, gives me some that back. Costs about $

5.00 per print. Nice paper is expensive.

It reminds me of the machine gunner vs the sniper analogy. Squeezing off 100 shots without consequences isn't the same as that one shot opportunity. Mind you, I have taken group shots and moved heads around between frames to get optimum results..LOL

[Dave in Houston]

Oh how we envied the pros with the trackside photo passes, the bulk film loaders, and motordrives. Anyone can come up with a handful of magazine-worthy photos with that combination (so we thought). I actually fanagled a photographer's pass for the '74 Canadian GP at Mosport through a local short track rag here in Houston. I was still stuck with my SRT-101 (match needle!). The future article never developed and it went nowhere but for just once in my life . . . ah-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h. Somewhere in my attic I might still have those Tri-X proof sheets.

[Charlie Self]

The part I really don't miss. I felt more like a mad scientist.

Epson R1800. Lousy black and white, but gorgeous color. Next time around, the R3800 (hoping my wife isn't looking, because IIRC, it runs about $1,300..refurb probably $900).

The old Canon would give me about a four shot blast, maybe five, while a particular scene was in focus--manual focus, remember? Actually, through about '99, I found manual focus far more effective than autofocus, but Pentax's current version is decent, though it tends to hunt in low light with some lenses. The buffer fills at about nine raw shots, which is twice what the manual Canon would do--nearly 40 years ago.

But there's another point in favor of the DSLR: weight. The camera itself is a tad heavier than the old F1, I think, but overall, whenyou add the motor drive and bulk back, the Canon outweighed the K10D by about four to one. That doesn't count the need for a changing bag and another sealed tin with another 50' of film ready to load. And zooms back then were one step up from useless, at least for publishing, so to be fully equipped, you needed a 28mm, a 50mm, a 100 or 135mm, a

180mm or 200mm, and, if your back would take it, a 300mm.

I am now WAY too old for that. Half the time now, I leave the second camera at home, and keep my fingers crossed. Not really: I leave it on the golf cart, where I can usually reach it in 10 minutes at most. It might get stolen, but so far, not.

[Charlie Self]

You don't need the contacts. You do need the negs. Have some fun and scan them in and fool with them in PSP or another lower cost program. I use PSP 12 right now: it is not as good in some ways as PSP 11, but it does handle the K10D raw files without an itnermediary program. It also locks up about every other time it is used.

I might shoot film again, if someone loans me a camera and loads it for me, and there's someplace to get it all processed, and put on CD or DVD. I sold all my film gear, including darkroom equipment, years ago.

[Swingman]

"Charlie Self" wrote

Another nail in the coffin of value and substance when Corel took over JASC ... I'm using PSP 6 until no OS will run it.

[Andrew Barss]

Charlie Self wrote: :>

:> BTW, how much do you miss film? Or, put another way; do you think :> you'll ever shoot film again?" :> Just kidding.

: You don't need the contacts. You do need the negs. Have some fun and : scan them in and fool with them in PSP or another lower cost program. : I use PSP 12 right now: it is not as good in some ways as PSP 11, but : it does handle the K10D raw files without an itnermediary program. It : also locks up about every other time it is used.

: I might shoot film again, if someone loans me a camera and loads it : for me, and there's someplace to get it all processed, and put on CD : or DVD. I sold all my film gear, including darkroom equipment, years : ago.

Do you do much B&W with digital? What equipment (both camera and printer) do yuo recommend?

-- Andy Barss

[Dave in Houston]

FWIW, "digicam" is the label I see most often for those. Perhaps, hybrid might be a better term. I looked long and hard at the FZs and still would have one if I had need of a backup or grab-it-and-go. As it is I still ride around with the PowerShot G2 under the passenger seat of my truck. At 4 megapixels it still does a respectable job and is handy when I need to have pics of a prospective job.

[J. Clarke]

FWIW, B&H lists the FZ50 as "Advanced Digital Camera". Others in the category are the PowerShot G9 and S5, an infrared capable Fuji that Fuji seems to be making a concerted effort to not sell (among other things they want you to fill out an "authorization form" and show several forms of ID), the Leica M8, the Leica V-Lux (which is a rebadged FZ50 with some firmware tweaks), and the Coolpix 5100.

[Charlie Self]

If I shot JPEG heavily, I'd still be there with you. Unfortunately, shooting raw requires a convertor in the computer, sincne I'm not using the one in the camera. I may change from raw to raw+JPEG, though that means my 8 GB card will hold only about 385 photos.

[Charlie Self]

Almost no black and white. No editor wants much of it these days...my next book will be all color, something that never used to happen...and they can convert if needed. Like most people, I'd recommend what I use, but that doesn't necessarily mean it really is the best for you. I use a Pentax K10D, and an Epson R1800 (buy a refurb from Epson and you can save a remarkable amount, with a one year replacement warranty if it quits working). Given the budget, I'd have opted for the R3800, but that, I hope, is this year's second big purchase. The first will be a K20D (or whatever the model number is), when that comes out.

I can tell you that if you're interested in black and white, you do NOT want the R1800. The R2400 is fine, as is the R3800, but every blinking B&W I've printed, without going to sepia in the computer, has a bluish cast. With a couple of recent deaths in my wife's family (her parents), I've been scanning and printing numerous old photos. I'm going to start sending them to WalMart on a CD instead, I think. Cheaper, for one thing. Better B&W, for another.

The K10D has a filter feature, processing done in camera, that allows you to reproduce JPEGs in B&W, sepia, and a variety of colors, in addiiton to a straight shot. It also has a couple of junk "filters," a slimming filter, and one for softening photos (presumably for shooting faces like mine with plenty of lines: I worked for these damned lines, pits and scars, and I want to see them).

[Charlie Self]

Four MP is usually plenty. I bought my daughter a Canon A460 for Christmas, a 5 MP camera that is quite low in cost, but solidly made. It takes excellent shots...I tried it before passing it along. My wife likes it enough that she'll get one for her birthday or our anniversary (two weeks earlier). IIRC, I paid $110 delivered, and tossed in a 1 GB SD card I had here, plus a 256 MB card a friend gave me. The shutter lag seems awful after you use a DSLR for a few years, but...

[Twayne]

While everything you say is true, you're talking about the extremes of people using them and not the folks on the street. It still holds IMO that the high Megapixels of today's often pretty expensive cameras are wasted on the majority of the population. As each price range begins to drop, higher and better pixel cameras come out for yet more premium pricing, and that is that marketing and advertising freaks are making neophytes want to buy them rather than admitting they're really more for the photo experienced enthusiast or professional photographer; not something most people are after. The lower pixel cameras are good deals right now and work well for the majority of people, especially when they have bothered to do any homework at all to see what pixel numbers actually mean. Pixel numbers are not only misstated and misleading a lot of times but sometimes are so overstated as to be meaningless. The average bear with a photo album, onscreen albums and amateur works are now low priced enough to be avialable to almost anyone and in many ways beat out the SLRs et al hands down.

Some pixel info:

pixel defined One addressable point of color. Pixels can vary in size - see resolution.

is a pixel not a pixel? When it's three.

Each pixel can only be one color at a time. However, since they are so small, pixels often blend together to form various shades and blends of colors. The number of colors each pixel can be is determined by the number of bits used to represent it. For example, 8-bit color allows for

2 to the 8th, or 256 colors to be displayed. At this color depth, you may be able to see "graininess," or spotted colors when one color blends to another. However, at 16, 24, and 32-bit color depths, the color blending is smooth and, unless you have some kind of extra-sensory vision capability, you should not see any graininess

The bottom line: know the final destination of your images. Following is a guide to the amount of megapixels required in the camera:

Destination Minimum Megapixels Web site images 1 MP Computer screen 2 MP

3x5 and 4x6 prints 2 MP 8x10 print 4 MP 11x14 print 6 MP 16x20 print 12 MP Record Modes in the Olympus SP-560UZ Digital Camera Mode Resolutions Still Pictures (JPEG Record Modes) SQ2 1600x1200, 1280x960, 1024x768, 640x480 SQ1 2560x1920, 2304x1728, 2048x1536 HQ 3264x2448, 3264x2176 (more compression) SHQ 3264x2448, 3264x2176 (least compression) Video/Movies (MPEG Record Modes) SQ 160x120 15 fps HQ 320x240 15 fps SHQ 640x480 30 fps

...

[Edwin Pawlowski]

You guys are just a bunch of cheap bastards bitching about a few mexapixels. If you had any interest in taking a decent picture, you'd just get the CF39 on the H2 kit and be done with it.

are here the H3D 'm ordering mine as soon as I can get a coupon for free shipping or something.

[Swingman]

"Charlie Self" wrote

It's funny, the difference in generations ... be it noted that the pendulum may be swinging the other way:

I think of text messaging as a PITA, while my 22 year old daughter prefers it over all other means of communication, including voice ... IOW, these kids twist technology to suit their tastes, and set trends in doing so.

Bought her a Canon Power Shot (don't recall the model) for her birthday last summer and noticed the other day that she ONLY shoots in black and white. Had to insist, as the designated photographer for family Christmas this year, that she shoot in color. Her roommate, the staff photographer for the college rag, does the same, as do the other kids who hang around here during vacation time.

Apparently black and white is far from dead, and seems to be preferable, as far as these youngsters are concerned.

(and if you can't beat'em ... I texted all my "Happy New Years" Last night!)

[Charlie Self]

Nothing dies. Check out flare pants, which came back a few years ago, though in a much goofier form. Extreme seems to be what today's trend setters are all about. Maybe that's what they always were, but we didn't notice, because the trends didn't seem extreme at the time. Today, hot music from the '50s, say Bill Haley and the Comets playing "Skokian", would never make it. There was a recognizable beat and theme and no cussing.

[Charlie Self]

Nikon's interested, too, with the D3 now out, but the fact remains, the market is limited in comparison to entry level DSLRs, which is a limited market compared to P&S cameras which outsell all other kinds by mulitple millions of units. Leica has been a niche camera since its inception, and today's versions remain so. I've never understood the passion, or, in fact, the interest, beyond the fact that it's lightweight. Forty some years ago, I had a little Mamiya rangefinder that gave me results well beyond what many editors wanted, though it wasn't worth squat, just like the Leica, when it came to fast action photos.