which camera for shady environment? (beside F10)

[g4te]

Hi,

i need a new camera for photos in a shady environment. For example deep woods, quarrys, mines.

I don't know if you consider a wood or a shady quarry as low light einvironment, well... i did. Correct me if i'm wrong. At least in a mine it's dark. :)

The only useable camera i found for such fotos is the Fuji F10. However i can't stand the fact that it has no optical viewfinder.
First i thought the Casio Z750 could be a good alternative but it seems that its flash is completly useless. :(

Any suggestions? Price range is up to 350€. (~450$)
Optical Zoom: 3x or 4x, i don't really care... although 4x would be nice. :D
Size: The smaller the better.
Megapixel: I want to print some of the photos on A3 in good quality. Don't know... 4, 5, 6 MP?

Allready red the Fuji E550 and Canon A520 reviews. I'm not impressed. :|

Thanks in advance... :)

[PhilR.]

At this point, you have two alternatives. You can use a point/shoot along with a tripod, and accept the slower shutter speeds mandated by your low light situations, or you can get an F-10.

You can get high ISO with the dslr's, but they won't be in your price range.

PhilR.

[trikster2]

Hi,

i need a new camera for photos in a shady environment. For example deep woods, quarrys, mines.

I don't know if you consider a wood or a shady quarry as low light einvironment, well... i did. Correct me if i'm wrong. At least in a mine it's dark. :)

The only useable camera i found for such fotos is the Fuji F10. However i can't stand the fact that it has no optical viewfinder.
First i thought the Casio Z750 could be a good alternative but it seems that its flash is completly useless. :(

Any suggestions? Price range is up to 350€. (~450$)
Optical Zoom: 3x or 4x, i don't really care... although 4x would be nice. :D
Size: The smaller the better.
Megapixel: I want to print some of the photos on A3 in good quality. Don't know... 4, 5, 6 MP?

Allready red the Fuji E550 and Canon A520 reviews. I'm not impressed. :|

Thanks in advance... :)

I've got the Z750. Do you have the camera? Why do you consider the flash "completely useless"? While I dislike all flashes and avoid them whenever possible the flash picts on my wife's Z750 are no better or worse than any other P&S I have used (this is our 5th P&S digicam).

[PhilR.]

I've got the Z750. Do you have the camera? Why do you consider the flash "completely useless"? While I dislike all flashes and avoid them whenever possible the flash picts on my wife's Z750 are no better or worse than any other P&S I have used (this is our 5th P&S digicam).

I have found that when someone complains of underexposed flash shots, or just bad flash shots in general, that those persons have no idea as to what the effective flash range of their camera is. Because they don't know this, they continually shoot outside of the effective range, and then blame the camera when their shots come out poorly. Like you, I have found that as long as you stay within the flash range of any decent camera, the shots come out just fine....

PhilR.

[g4te]

No, I don't have it.
I'm just refering to http://www.dcresource.com/reviews/casio/exilim_z750-review/

"This is a pretty weak flash, with a working range of 0.4 - 2.9 m at wide-angle and 0.4 - 1.6 m at telephoto. The competition from Canon, Nikon, and Sony all beat the Exilim in this department. You cannot attach an external flash to the Z750."

"Flash is pretty weak, though Flash Assist helps"

"The Z750's flash is on the weak side when compared to other cameras in its class."

See, I'm a geologist. Often I have to make photos of larger rockformations, walls or ceilings (in mines). As long as I'm outside the range of the flash is not a problem. I'm outside during the day not at night. Guess I don't need a flash then.

The problems are the mines, tunnels, caves. It's dark there. Same small lamps, maybe just a spotlight on the helmet.
So the reviews says "with a working range of 0.4 - 2.9 m". Often it's just not possible to get that close to the "target".

The F10 review says "The working range of the flash is 0.6 - 6.5 m at wide-angle and 0.6 - 4.0 m at telephoto."

That range should be enough.

I have to admit I'm not that often in mines. Maybe two times a year. But when I'm there i want to do good photos. ;)

[John_Reed]

You say you can't stand the fact that it doesn't have an optical viewfinder, but consider the fact that optical viewfinders come with problems of their own, like parallax error, like not presenting 100% of the image field for framing, etc. And, for cheaper compact cameras, they're rarely adjustable. You could benefit greatly and "come in on budget" with the Fuji F10, which will give you the 100% view every time, at all focal lengths, and its LCD will be viewable, especially well under low-light conditions.

[aussie_rob]

f10's screen in bright daylight is not unusable, you just can't see as much fine detail, you can still frame the shot etc.

p200 ive read is fine too.

[ucdcrush]

The Olympus Stylus 800 is slated to come out in July, 8 megapixel up to 400 ISO. Can shoot at 800 and 1600 ISO at 5 megapixel. It also has some type of weather resistant design which might be of interest to someone in wet caves.

It looks like a small camera.

From the pictures I've seen of the camera, it doesn't have an optical viewfinder either. Don't know why these manufacturers are leaving those out.. I only rarely use the screen on digicams I've used to save battery life.

[trikster2]

> but it seems that its flash is completly useless.

So by that you meant the Z750 flash is completely useless for shooting pictures of rock formations in mines/caves?

Ok....... Still works fine on the baby, so for me it is pretty darn useful. But I'll remember that the next time I am looking at rock formations in an mine....

[g4te]

Well mines are quite often in large rock formations, no?

And send me the photos. Made in a distance of about 5m or more. I would appreciate it. :)