Ask MetaFilter posts tagged with digitalcamera

What can I expect from a cheap digital camera?

deeper red — Fri, 19 Dec 2008 10:29:14 -0800

I bought a digital camera yesterday, and am not too pleased with it. But am I being too critical? I got a Fujifilm J110W, a cheap 10 megapixel camera. At 100% viewing on a computer screen, the image looks slightly grainy. Zoom in even more and it starts to look pretty bad -- lots of noise, jaggies, and so on. I can make the quality better by forcing a lower ISO speed, but that isn't always practical.

For my sins, I know a lot about digital cameras, and had hoped to get a cheap point and click this time around. I knew the quality wouldn't be top notch, although I didn't expect it to be quite this bad.

I'm thinking of taking it back and exchanging it for another camera of the same price, but am I likely to be just as disappointed? Are any cameras going to offer decent close-scrutiny picture quality at such a low price level?

Third party camera battery?

R. Mutt — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 10:54:08 -0800

After many years, my Canon PowerShot S20 needs a new Ni-MH battery. Canon sells a replacement battery for $49. Amazon sells a third party replacement made by Hi Capacity for about half the price. There are no user reviews for the cheaper batteries. Is the $49 Canon battery a waste of money?

compact digital camera

MrMoonPie — Sat, 22 Nov 2008 18:10:24 -0800

Wishlist time--what's a good small, cheap digital camera these days? I got great recommendations last time, so I'm trying again. Primary considerations are small size and under $150--I'm not looking for something fancy. 3X optical zoom, and I don't need super-duper megapixels, just enough to get good snapshots for the grandmother. And size is really important; I'd like something I'll be likely to carry around. As a friend said, the best camera is the one you have with you.

What should I get?

How can I make my camera take pictures faster?

Twicketface — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 07:17:57 -0800

How can I make my camera take pictures faster? I have a Canon PowerShot A720 (8 megapixel). We've had the camera for about a year and love it.

The camera has a setting for pets/children, which is supposed to allow you to take pictures in rapid succession. But, there's a 6 or 7 second lag between when I take a picture and when I can take the next one.

I have the camera set to take photos at 800x600, so they aren't huge images to be saved. Plus, we download the pictures off the camera every few days, so it's not as if the card has a lot on it (15-20 pictures at a clip).

My Googling is inferior, so I'm wondering if it has to do with the memory card. We have a 1GB ScanDisk. Would a larger capacity card make a difference? Or a different brand?

Appreciate any info to help me get cuter shots of my son actually facing me instead of my rapidly growing collection of photos of the back of his head.

The Button's Stuck and So Am I

foxy_hedgehog — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 10:17:49 -0800

Election Night Emergency AskMefi- the on/off button on my Canon PowerShot A60 digital camera seems to be stuck, and the camera won't function. Any ideas? Yes, I changed the batteries....Thanks comrades!

Digital Pocket Camera with RAW?

horseblind — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 14:09:30 -0800

I am looking for a pocket digital camera (point and shoot) that will store the files in RAW. I am looking for a pocket digital camera (point and shoot) that will store the files in RAW. Hopefully it will have a JPEG+RAW mode. I am interested in the Panasonic Lumix LX3 (as mentioned previously.) While I like this camera I thought it might be nice to have something just a little smaller. As for recommendations, you can recommend current or older models as I'm fine with hunting down used cameras if I must.

I have looked at previous posts, but thought it smart to ask since it has been a while since a similar question was asked.

In addition to a RAW mode, I would like it to store photos on CF cards, or SD cards. I also prefer that it has a pretty decent optical zoom and built-in flash. As for size, I would like it to easily fit into the pocket of an under seat bag on a bike, or in the pocket of my camelback water backpack. Preferably, it will fit into the pocket of my jeans.

Personal experience is preferred. I'd like to know what it is about your recommendation that makes it so awesome above and beyond my requirements (RAW being the most important one.)

Thanks in advance. I'll post back after I make a decision.

Can I charge a digital camera battery from America in a different country?

supercrayon — Tue, 23 Sep 2008 15:51:44 -0800

Can I charge a digital camera battery from America in a different country? I'm thinking of buying this camera from Amazon and having it shipped to me in New Zealand. However one thing I can't figure out (as I know next to nothing about digital cameras) is whether I would be able to use the battery charger for it here in New Zealand, as the voltage is different between the USA and NZ. Does anyone know offhand if this is a problem, and if so a workaround for it? Thanks!

Are Sony lenses really all that bad?

stewiethegreat — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 16:16:11 -0800

Buying my girlfriend a Sony Alpha A350-DSLR; what kind of lenses should I buy? I've read bad reviews for Sony lenses. I'm buying my girlfriend a Sony Alpha A350-DSLR as a gift for a very special occasion. Until now, she's had a Nikon D100 and we were caught between getting a D200 or 300 or going for the Sony Alpha A350, mostly because she loves her Nikkor AF 28-105mm D IF 1:0.5 Macro lens, which is the only lens she has.

She wants a waist-level viewfinder which the A350 has, so I think I'm going to get her that (though any final thoughts on that would be appreciated) however now I'm torn over what kind of lenses would best replace her Nikkor AF 28-105mm macro lens.

I've read that Sony lenses are not that great, and the one that I handled in the camera store felt cheap and plastic-y. Anyone have any lens-related advice? Are the older Minolta lenses the only others that would fit on the A350? Thanks in advance!

Replacing a D100 with another pro-sumer digital SLR

stewiethegreat — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 12:01:37 -0800

Looking for a new digital SLR to replace my girlfriend's Nikon D100. She loved her D100 but is ready for a new one, price range up to $2000 new/refurb/used. Any advice? So following up on my most recent question, my girlfriend's D100 is on its last legs. She's had it since 2003 and really put it through its paces, time for a new digital SLR. She has only one Nikon lens so could stay with the brand or hop to a new one, we've been reading steves digicams reviews for weeks, but as amateurs who like taking pretty pictures, it is hard to really compare and contrast.

She has a budget of up to $2000 for new/refurb/used.

She's looking for 6 mp or more and perhaps a slightly smaller footprint/body weight than the D100 (it typically takes up 1/5 of her suitcase and she takes it everywhere). Ideally it would have an LCD or waist-level viewfinder so she could shoot from the hip, but my previous question suggested that a camera like that doesn't exist in her price range.

Thanks for your advice!

Shooting from the hip.

stewiethegreat — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 08:20:03 -0800

Digital SLR-filter: Looking to replace my girlfriend's Nikon D100 with a new digital SLR body that has a waist-level viewfinder. She only has one lens so she could stay with Nikon or switch brands easily. Any advice? She's had this D100 for five years and it has been a great work-horse for her, but she really really wants a waist-level viewfinder capability which the D100 can't do (the thing where you hold the camera low, look down through the viewfinder and 'shoot from the hip').

Any advice? She'd like to stay in roughly the same price bracket, paying between $500 and $2000 for a new or gently used body and get something that is as good and tough as this body has been.

Thanks.

Where has the sound gone??

globetrotter30 — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 12:23:15 -0800

I'm testing out video clips with my Samsung L100 digital camera. Video quality is great, but the audio sounds like it's a million miles away. Anyone else had this problem? I just bought a Samsung L100 camera, primarily because I wanted something cheap but with better video capabilities than my 4-year old Minolta. The video quality (and everything else) is greatly improved, BUT I've noticed on playback that the audio on video clips is almost inaudible. Even with all volume settings at their highest on my computer, voices that had been recorded even a foot from the camera are extremely faint; by comparison, they're blasting when taken from the same distance with my Minolta. I'm sure I'm not covering the microphone, and that it's not set to "mute" when recording. The strange thing is that I read dozens and dozens of customer and pro reviews before buying, and not a single one that I saw mentioned bad sound on the video clips. Hmmm. I guess I'm just wondering if it's potentially a faulty microphone with this particular camera, or if there's some trick I'm missing, or if this is par for the course with entry-level digicams these days - maybe my Minolta just had super-human powers? Unfortunately the store where I bought it is quite a distance a way, so I can't just pop over to test out another unit. Would appreciate any input that could help me decide whether or not to research a replacement camera before I do trek back to the store!

Me no Leica

WPW — Sat, 10 May 2008 15:27:37 -0800

What is causing the horizonal lines on pictures taken by my digital camera? See picture here - that's a picture of a white wall in my flat, and as you can see there are faint horizontal lines across it. The camera is a Panasonic Lumix DMC-FX30 and has so far given me six months of trouble-free service. The lines started showing up last week. The camera has not suffered any extreme heat or shocks. The lines are still showing up with a clean memory card and a fully charged battery.

I am a total amateur and it is entirely possible I have changed a setting by accident - no obvious error messages are appearing, but there is a red camera-shaped icon in the top left-hand corner of the viewfinder that might indicate trouble of some sort. Or it might not.

Anyway, it's vexing. If anyone can help I'd appreciate it. The camera is within warranty so it can be returned to Panasonic if necessary.

obfuscate error

gnutron — Sat, 10 May 2008 11:00:22 -0800

Canon PowerShot got wet in a rainstorm. I can view pics, but I can't take pics. When switching to record mode, the viewfinder goes black and I get a small error message reading 'E24'. Does anyone know what this means or if it's fixable? Camera is out of warranty.

Help me make my Mac into a Polaroid !

duckus — Sun, 27 Apr 2008 09:53:46 -0800

Can I use my external digital camera while its connected to my Mac? We are having a photo booth at our daughter's birthday party today and I am trying to come up with an alternative to a Polaroid.

I have Photo Booth and a digital camera. I would like to avoid having the kids stand in front of the computer (a la 'iSight').

Ideally, our older kid would sit in front of the computer, tell the kids to pose, snap the picture and print it out. Is this possible? Any solution appreciated.

Help me build a witheboard reading system (for the visualy impared)

kall — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 06:14:38 -0800

Help me find a digital camera with real tv-out I'm visually impared and i'm looking to build my own whiteboard reading system based on a notebook and a digtial camera. Now i'm looking for decent camera (with very high zoom, 10x would be quite nice). The requirement is that the camera passes the live video from the camera to video out (not only pictures and videos taken).
I'm particulary fond of panaonic lumix cameras, my parents own a tz3 which would be good, the tz5 would be even more awsome. But they do only the dumbed down tv-out. Panasonic support told me there was a trick with holding the delete key (sounded weird) but i couldn't get it to work.

I'm not looking for a dlsr, it should be a liittle bit more portable, but price is not important, it can be expensive.

So if anyone can recomend a good camera (or help me with the lumix ting) it would be great.

Digital camera file renaming help

mr. creosote — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 20:39:31 -0800

Is there simple software for a digital camera flash card that will offload my pics -and- change the filename to the date they were taken? I have a Pentax point & shoot digital camera, and offload my pics by putting the flash card in a reader and copying the contents. The camera names its output files imgp0410.jpg, imgp0411.jpg, etc. This isn't very good for long term archival. I've always preferred something based on the filename YYMMDDxxxx.jpg (YY, MM, DD being the numerical year), which makes sorting and organizing much easier for me, especially years later. The pictures do contain EXIF data and file stamps that contain the date, so this theoretically should not be a big deal.

Are there any freeware or shareware programs anyone's whipped up to handle this?

Does Want: Video Camera in Camera

shownomercy — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 06:32:06 -0800

I need a digital camera with support for video. I don't know about cameras OR video, please advise. I desperately need a new digital camera to document my awesome life with pictures of cats, and graffiti, and things I eat for dinner. I would also like to be able to take video clips of this quality.

I am assuming that around $200 will get the job done. Size is kind of a factor (wants small camera) or else I'll never carry the thing anywhere. Decent battery life would be good, as would linux/cross platform support.

Bonus: How do you edit videos and put them online?

Downgrading Megapixels

lullabyofbirdland — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 08:00:27 -0800

Stupid-question-filter: Suppose you have a 10 MP camera and take your pictures at 3 MP. Would the quality be any different than if you were using a 3 MP camera at its top setting? (assuming the two cameras are otherwise identical) Also: Do any image compression formats do a better job of reducing file size while preserving image quality than just taking a picture at lower resolution would?

7.2 mp vs. 8.1 mp Sony Cyber Shot? Where to find the best deal?

caveat empress — Tue, 29 Jan 2008 06:34:02 -0800

7.2 mp vs. 8.1 mp Sony Cyber Shot? Where to find the best deal? I want to buy a new point and shoot digital camera, and my trusty old Cyber Shot (and I mean old!) has been an ultra reliable workhorse, so I plan on sticking with this line.

I am a basic use type of person - I take shots to archive life, so to say. I rarely blow them up farther than 5x7, and take videos infrequently.

I do want to get a model with a Li battery, and I want to find the best deal I can (plan on buying online).

There is about $50 difference on average between the 7.2mp and 8.1mp Cyber Shots.

Any thoughts on if the 8.1 has enough pros that I should spend the extra money? Any thoughts on the other brands out there?

Also: I planned on buying through Dell, does anyone know of a better deal out there and/or coupons?

Thanks!

Help me replace my S3IS with something a little beefier

JonnyRotten — Thu, 24 Jan 2008 07:19:32 -0800

It's time to upgrade my Canon Powershot s3is. I have a specific budget and feature set, and I am looking for some opinions as to where I should go from here. I have a budget of about US $1000 for Camera, and lenses. I would like to get something that takes really good macro photos, and has some DOF control. Reading past digital camera posts, I don't really know if this budget is going to be enough to break into the SLR territory, or if the canon s5is is the tits, and I should just look there.
The features I use the most on the S3 are:
Macro
Program mode
Taking short videos with it occasionally (I know, camera's are for pictures, and camcorders are for video, but the s3 takes pretty decent video)

Features I would like:
Remote shutter control for better macro taking
time lapse without having the use the PC software.

Any advice is welcome. I've been reading reviews on dpreview, but I trust the hive mind to guide me.

How can I get a macintosh to recognize a digital camera again?

humannaire — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 18:19:35 -0800

What can I do to have a Macintosh G4 laptop to recognize a Pentax Optio 33WR digital camera? It once did, but it has since stopped. After downloading photos from a Pentax Optio 33WR into iPhoto on my friend's Macintosh G4 (1.67 GHz PowerPC running 10.4.11), I pulled the USB cord out without properly ejecting the disk. A warning message came up. ("You have improperly ejected a disk...") Now when I plug it in, it's invisible to the computer (iPhoto or otherwise.)

What I have done so far with no success: I zapped pram, re-booted; repaired disk permissions, re-booted; and re-formatted the camera's memory card.

Anyone have any insight? I'm sorry I improperly ejected the disk, and I promise to do better in the future.

Will the PowerShot Meet My New Camera Needs?

schroedinger — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 12:31:59 -0800

I have never owned a digital camera, and am finally ready to get one. I am in love with PowerShots. Except though I'm new and clueless about photography now, I would eventually like to not be and I've heard the lack of zoom in compact cameras will become a problem. So are there any compact cameras out there with sufficient zoom function? I love, love, love the compactness of the Powershots. I love the image stabilization. I love the ability to record movies (I don't need high-quality movies, but I like to be able to record quick movies). But a photographer friend of mine said if I am serious about eventually developing photography skills, I should not get a PowerShot for my first camera as, among other things, it won't have sufficient zoom capabilities.

So are there any compact cameras that will be easy for newbie hands, have image stabilization, and be able to zoom more? If not, what not-compact camera would you recommend (budget is $200-$400)? Or is my cluelessness showing through and zoom not even an issue?

did i just destroy my SLR lens?

hairgelburrito — Sat, 29 Dec 2007 10:03:59 -0800

I just managed to screw up the lens on my Canon D400 and was hoping someone could give me some advice on how much it is likely to cost to fix? Basically, the focus seems to be slightly twisted and appears to come off it's 'thread'. I can turn the lens to focus but the action is stiff and jams rather than pulling the lens back towards the camera. Obviously, I am no expert, but is it likely that the lens can be fixed, or am I looking at throwing down money that I don't have on buying a new one? Thanks in advance!

Help me figure out what I should snap

icarus — Fri, 28 Dec 2007 10:47:05 -0800

I got a new camera for Christmas. I love it and want to do something with it aside from taking photos whenever I'm out somewhere. Since the new year is about to start I'm thinking of trying the 1-photo-per day for a year concept.

What other things can I do with an awesome camera and a lot of time on my hands? Aside from porn.

Thanks!

Is my old digital camera worth anything?

LiveToEat — Tue, 18 Dec 2007 20:42:17 -0800

What should I do with my old digital camera? The flash doesn't work, but otherwise it's fine for taking outdoor or brightly-lit indoor photos. It costs more to fix the flash than it's really worth to me. It's a Canon Powershot SD200 Elph with 3.2 megapixels. I have 2 batteries, the charger, software, computer cord, big memory card.

I feel bad throwing it away. Can I donate it or sell it? I'm not familiar with Ebay, nor do I want to set up an account just to sell this one thing. Any advice?