camera research

Aug 06, 2005 14:05

Do any of you have digital cameras that don't have viewfinders? If so--do you find that it's really annoying, or that you don't miss your viewfinder at all?

shopping

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jentwo August 7 2005, 04:55:06 UTC
Oh and I would highly recommend investing in rechargeable Nickel metal hydride batteries. They will pay for themselves in the long run if you use your camera with any frequency. I had a total of 8: one set stayed in the camera, and the other stayed in the charger. Well, before my charger toasted one set and blew up, that is. heh. But PLEASE don't take that experience as a warning against these batteries!

Have I recommended the forums at http://www.dpreview.com yet? Some of them are highly technical, but they may come in useful for the information you're looking for.

http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/panasoniclz2/page9.asp
http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/canona520/page9.asp

They also have a buying guide, where you fill in answers to questions and they recommend some cameras...

http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/compare.asp

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purljamber August 7 2005, 05:08:33 UTC
I actually already have a bunch of NiMH batteries--I bought them and a charger when I bought Kyle's old Olympus. That's one reason I'm leaning toward a camera that uses AAs. :) Oh, and I think Kyle has a Canon that uses 2 AAs and he said he gets around 400 pictures on one battery and even got around 600 once. I just don't take that many pictures in a time period where I wouldn't be able to get to a charger again!

I've checked out several review sites but not dpreview yet. I'll look into it. The recommendation option seems cool.

And s for your previous comment, I don't know about the zoom, but I know I'd use the image stabilazation a lot. My biggest complaint about my Olympus is the constant blurriness, and I'm sure it'd be the same for many cameras.

So far, the Canon has more pros; the Panasonic's pros are fewer but are really big. I'm sure you're right about playing around with them some more and seeing which feels better--that will probably be the determining factor. Or maybe the fact that the Canon's on sale right now at Circuit City will be the determining factor. ;)

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purljamber August 7 2005, 15:32:14 UTC
Wow, that "recommendation" feature was LAME. I had to choose "don't mind" on every single setting to get it to pull any cameras up. If I was specific on even one feature, it told me it couldn't find any cameras. :P

But the side-by-side comparisons are nice. I'm still torn between the two cameras, though...

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jentwo August 7 2005, 17:54:48 UTC
Damn, seriously? That's weird. :-/

Well, if you're having trouble with blurriness, the image stabilization should probably help with that. I don't how much, but I would hope it would make some difference.

I had another thought about all of this sometime in the last 12 hours but it has completely escaped me! If it comes back, I'll comment again.

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purljamber August 7 2005, 19:23:56 UTC
Well, this image was posted in the official description of the DMC-LZ1:



I'd say it's a noticable difference...

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jentwo August 7 2005, 19:47:10 UTC
NICE! I wish I had that, it would make taking close-up shots like that soooo much easier.

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purljamber August 7 2005, 19:57:03 UTC
See why I'm torn? This feature is a big, giant plus...

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jentwo August 7 2005, 20:02:38 UTC
Okay, what does the Canon have that is real competition with the image stabilization then? I think the Panasonic might be your best bet...

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purljamber August 7 2005, 20:07:32 UTC
The Canon is a bit cheaper, has a viewfinder, and has manual shooting controls. It also has audio playback on videos, and I can't determine whether the Panasonic does. I am not sure if manual controls would be that big of a deal, as I'm a pretty lazy picture-taker, and I don't know if the audio playback is that big of a deal either. I'm still hanging on to the viewfinder idea, although I honestly don't know how big of a deal it would be not to have one. I do use mine occasionally, but is it something I can live without?

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