Digital camera recommendation?

[AlchemyAcres]

Can anyone recommend a good reasonably priced digital camera?
I'd like to start a blog sometime in the near future....I don't need anything super fancy and I'd rather not spend more than $200.00

I did have a Fujifilm DX-10 about 5 years ago, a pretty good camera at the time, but I spilled a beer on it and that was the end of that! ;)

Thanks!

~Martin :)

[bee_pipes]

That's a tough one. Nowadays it's like asking which cd/dvd drive for the computer is the best one. They've really become a commodity item.

What will you be taking pictures of? msta brings up a good point - action pictures? Wildlife or animals? That would make shutter speed important. I'm not sure what the capacities are up to, but the one we have is 8 mexapixels. We have a half gig card (don't forget to add that to the cost) and have never filled it up, even at high resolution. Normally you don't need pictures that big (3264x2448 ) but it lets you crop down to detail with plenty of resolution left. I think I saw a 9 or 10 at wally world, but they may have been on the pricey side. The 8's may be in your range now, with the price of everything coming down as technology pushes the envelope.

The one we got was kind of on the expensive side, 4 years ago. My wife, when I met her, was into photography (35 mm, all that stuff) and she had a Konica/Minolta. The same mfg came out with a digital camera. It had lots of resolution (she usually shoots stills, though sometimes a breeze will move a plant or she will want a shot of the animals) so we focused on resolution and similarity to her film camera. I thought it had interchangeable lenses so she'd be able to keep her telephoto, but I was wrong. interchangeable lenses are an even higher price range. But, the controls worked the same as her film camera, and between the zoom and the resolution, we haven't had too many disappointments. It's holding up fine, and does most everything a 35 mm can do, except change lenses.

This is the original shot, reduced to 600x800 pixels (the size required by photo bucket and this forum):
http://i118.photobucket.com/albums/o120/bee_pipes/sunflowercloseup2.jpg

This is a crop of the original picture, cut down to an image the size of 571x799 - the closest I could get to 600x800 - this is original resolution at 8 mp.
http://i118.photobucket.com/albums/o120/bee_pipes/bee_crop.jpg

You'll notice the bumble bee is blurry - either the camera focused on the blossoms of the sunflower, or the bee was moving. But if you look real close, there is a small black ant on the left, about even with the bee's neck. If you're using mozilla or firefox, right click on the picture and select "view image" from the menu and you should see a slightly larger version - the ant is a little easier to see and is pretty clear. That's with an automatic focus.

The camera has a macro setting, but with resolution like this, we rarely use it - it limits the range of the zoom.

If you're going to do sports or running animals - look at shutter speed. I value resolution over speed. That would be why we don't have many good pictures of the guineas - their heads are constantly moving.

Good image handling software is important too - I can't say enough about XnView - a free program. It lets you crop, rotate and resize. Does a bunch of other things, but those are my limited needs.

Any decent pictures you see on my posts, my wife took. I took the crappy ones. ;D

Regards,
Pat

[12vman]

This was taken with a 2 megapix..

http://img248.imageshack.us/img248/8825/20060725tractorrencat0022ez4.jpg

I have less than $200 in my camera. You don't need to spend mega bucks for general purpose stuff.. ;)

[Deberosa]

My Cannon has worked well and it does short videos and sound too! It has a "stitch" feature where you can make a very wide picture out of multiple shots - it matches them together. It was right at $200 a while ago.

I figured out which one by going to Circuit City (don't know if you have something like that) but they did have a person who knew the features of each and there were lots to pick from.

Debbie

[chloe3388]

This site has a good comparison guide.

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

[MadTripper]

We had an HP that worked well for years. Lately, we've been using an older Sony Mavica and a Canon A410. I'm kind of partial to the Canon's as they have a really nice product with more features than you will use. Particularly the A570 seems to be a great buy and quality unit, well under your price range. Newegg has it for 139 plus shipping right now.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16830120194

Tripper

[humbug]

I just got a Kodak easyshare. I bought it because I was told it was easy to use. I have it difficult to figure out what all the bells and whistles do. Also the download software my antivirus refused to let run, so don't know what is up with that. It does take nice pictures, but there is a definate learning curve and it was around $300.00.

[homesteadingnky]

We use canon rebels and love them. They are worth every penny to us. But my Mother-in- Law just bought a Kodak Easyshare C513 with image stabilization. It's awesome! You can shake it up and down as hard as you can and snap the picture while shaking it and the picture is in perfect focus. :o She paid $80.00 for it but she got it at Wal-mart so you may not want it. ;) Sorry, that was another post. I couldn't help myself. ;D Forgive me please. That was mean. It really is a good camera though!!! :) And I really was just kidding with ya!

Hope that helps.
Homesteading Dad

[gardenfay]

we just bought a canon powershot A 560 last week and are really liking it so far. the reason we bought it is because my niece (photography major in her freshman year) and my daughter's friend have each owned one for the past 2 1/2 years or so and love them. neither has had any complaints or problems.
my sister bought a kodak easy share -she likes it too; but we still decided on the powershot.
you need to buy an extra memory card $17-20 cuz the card it comes with will not hold much.
i think the camera was $135; something like that.
but it uses AA batteries.
my old regular camera batteries were high! so i like the AA batteries.

[AlchemyAcres]

Thanks for all the great info....
I've been eyeing the Canon's...I've always had good luck with Canon stuff.

~Martin :)

[WRTN]

I have a Cannon A560 as well and love it. Takes great picture real easy. Upgraded to a 1Gb memory card and it can hold a LOT of pictures. I have not been able to reach the limit yet on picture storage.

C/Net has a lot of great camera review and info.

http://reviews.cnet.com/digital-cameras/?tag=promo.dc

Reading the reviews on Amazon is very helpful as well.

[AlchemyAcres]

One of my friends bought the Canon PowerShot A570 about a month ago and he's very happy with it...
The A560 and A570 are essentially the same camera, but for $18 more the A570 has image stabilization, which I think may be a good thing for me since I have essential tremor....one of the problems I had with my last camera was blurriness because I couldn't hold the camera perfectly still.

Amazon.com has the best price I've found and free shipping.

http://www.amazon.com/Canon-PowerShot-A570IS-Digital-Stabilized/dp/B000NK3H4S/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=12038197 00&sr=8-1

~Martin :)

[Florida_boy]

We have three Kodak Easyshares in our family and we've yet to break one. I didn't care for the Kodak software so I deleted it. I just use the Windoz stuff that's on the computer and I've been happy with it. One of my sisters bought the little printer with hers and she uses it all the time.

[landshark]

I looked a lot at cameras before we bought our first digital. The thing I found most about the Canon's is that the main complaint was follow up picture speeds (shutter reset) tended to be longer, and with us taking so many pics of kids we wanted something a bit faster. We ended up with the FujiFilm Finepix S700 - which you can get for around $200 at WalMart right now. We have been very happy with this camera. Also bought a 1gb memory card. When buying a memory card make sure you get one that has a high speed....this has a lot to do with how fast you can take follow-up shots...the longer it takes to write a pic to memory the longer it takes for follow-up. Also bought the 2500mh recharge batteries and have been happy with their performance.

[msta999]

One of my friends bought the Canon PowerShot A570 about a month ago and he's very happy with it...
The A560 and A570 are essentially the same camera, but for $18 more the A570 has image stabilization, which I think may be a good thing for me since I have essential tremor....one of the problems I had with my last camera was blurriness because I couldn't hold the camera perfectly still.

Amazon.com has the best price I've found and free shipping.

http://www.amazon.com/Canon-PowerShot-A570IS-Digital-Stabilized/dp/B000NK3H4S/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=12038197 00&sr=8-1

~Martin :)


God! That is a good price, I paid way more for mine and I have big problems with blurry pics. The zoom is great, but it is not always clear, accually, it is seldom clear.

[machinemaker]

We have a Kodak easy share z710 and have been happy with it. I too don't like the kodak software, but we have adobe photoshop that I drop photos into to adjust or print from.
kent

[HockeyFan]

I'd check ebay for prices. You can sometimes get a really nice camera for a really low price.

[AlchemyAcres]

Seems I've degenerated into an extreme tightwad...LOL

I ended up buying a used Fujifilm camera on eBay for $7.00 that's compatible with my old accessories

I don't need a lot of resolution for online pics and just couldn't bring myself to part with the extra cash!

Cash is expensive!! LOL

~Martin . ;)