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seditionarypunk
Dec 30, 2006, 11:21 PM
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Registered: Oct 28, 2005
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Im currently in the market for a good (read:midrange) digital camera with full manual abilities. I'm currently leaning heavily on gettin a canon a series (probably the a630). What i am looking for is anyones personal recomendations in regards to the 630/640 or any similar models with full manual abilities.
cheers,
justin d.
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melekzek
Dec 31, 2006, 1:22 AM
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good manual control, nice macro, clean images upto iso 400, batteries last forever, and the variangle screen is really good for shooting from unreachable POV..
no raw, extremely noise at iso 400 and above, no wideangle but there arent mkany wideangle p&s digitals around anyhow...
(This post was edited by melekzek on Dec 31, 2006, 1:24 AM)
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mosseyoak
Dec 31, 2006, 1:26 AM
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Just got the A640. Great camera. Highly recommended.
Here is a review.
http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/canona640/
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seditionarypunk
Jan 1, 2007, 12:51 AM
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is the noise above iso400 so bad as to not warrant using the higher isos even for smaller prints and digitial copies ?
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melekzek
Jan 1, 2007, 1:07 AM
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In a610 iso400 is completely useless even for web use. Maybe only for b&w work, because the color noise is horrible.
a630/640 should be a bit better, but I am not sure how much
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mtengaio
Jan 5, 2007, 5:30 PM
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I just bought a A640 last month and love it! I was going to buy the Rebel XT but opted for a smaller P&S with manual controls. It does get a bit grainy in very very low light but I hardly ever shoot in those conditions so that doesn't really matter to me. The flip screen is awesome plus it has a viewfinder if it's too bright outside to use the screen. I highly recommend getting the A640.
One option that would be nice would be an image stabilizer like the A710 IS.
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pico23
Jan 5, 2007, 10:45 PM
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This isn't specific to the Canon A series but I've noticed a nice trend. IQ (image quality) is actually on the decline. The small sensors (or even APS-C) with current technology cannot handle the MP race.
those little 5x7mm ish sensors in digital compacts are too small for anything over 4-5 MP. 6-7 the IQ is terrible, or the noise reduction is so obtrusive that it actually wipes out the pixel increase and decreases resolution.
Even with APS-C 6-8MP was sort of a temporary ceiling. And with interpolation (genuine fractals, or camera raw upsize) actually produces a better image then a 10MP native sensor.
Thats why I opted for the Canon G3 used. The IQ is very nice at ISO 200 and below in RAW (400 is useless) but since the lens is fast iso 50-200 is very usable. I figure if IQ is actually decreasing, I might as well save a few hundred and buy a full featured camera used.
If you have to shoot at the higher ISO, consider when shooting your image that you are shooting on B&W film because the best way to salvage noisy images is to convert to B&W and even add grain in post processing for a more "film like" look.
(This post was edited by pico23 on Jan 5, 2007, 10:47 PM)
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seditionarypunk
Jan 9, 2007, 5:53 PM
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In looking for reviews of the canon models i was interested in i have run across some similarly priced and spec'd olympus models, does anyone got some feedback on them ?
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