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Need camera choice advice

Hi evryone. I would just like to pick the photo geniuses brains for a quick second. I am looking for a good, albeit low price, 5mp+ digital camera which is great at macro, but can be OK at regular shots. If anyone has some models I can look at/avoid, I would be very happy. A few wish list items for the camera would be option for external power(AC brick), remote shutter control, and SD card.
 
If I'm not mistaken I believe Canon and Olympus are the only manufacturers still using the SD card storage media (a foolish decision IMHO). I love my Canon SD630 but I only wish it had Image Stabilization--it was a choice between a larger LCD and IS, I went with the large LCD.

Personally I've never had a problem with Canons. I will not purchase another Olympus due to their repair department's flakiness.

Newegg.com usually has great reviews of cameras and you can see what potential negatives are. The latest Canons are highly regarded on the site, also check here once you've narrowed your choices down.

Hope this helps--If you want specific model recommendations you should provide more details as to what you will be shooting.

-M
 
I bought the Oly C-2100UZ years ago. Affectionately known (or remembered,) by its users as the UZI; don't ask my why.

My UZI only has 3 focus points which, at the time was the lowest of any camera on the market. It may still be true today. I don't know.

That said, I've gotten compliments on how amazing the Olympus lens is on the Uzi.

After all, that's what you're buying when you buy a camera. The lens. That's probably more true of the D-SLR family of cameras than your typical point and shoot.

If you go for the D-SLR remember Murphy's law...The lens you need, is going to be the one you left at home. That's your fault. With a point and shoot it's not your fault. (only one lens to choose from.)

You might find it helpful to actually write down the features you are looking for in a camera. The features you must have; and the ones you can live without. That way, you won't spend an inordinate amount of time looking for the "perfect" camera. It doesn't exist. If it did, everybody would have one.

Hope this helped.
 
Ditto on the dpreview.com for good reports. I like my Nikon D40 DSLR and it uses SD cards. Haven't tried the macro function, yet. It's 6 MP and I paid around $400 used on Amazon.
 
Radar,

a few questions:

Do you want interchangable lenses?

What's your budget?

Are you really married to SD cards? (Nothing wrong with that. If ONLY Canon use them, they're still huge...)

Describe what you mean by macro photography, please.

Paul
 
I have a Canon Power Shot A95 myself, and it's pretty nice. I do some macro with it, and it turns out pretty well. It's a few years old, and I'm pretty sure Canon doesn't make that exact model anymore, but the same line is still going. I think the A630 is the current model in the line, and a quick google search shows it around $300 online.

If you want something that will fit into a pocket, it's a little bulky, but do-able. It's also nice because it has full manual control, so you can control exposure and other stuff like that. However, check the latest model to make sure all the features you want are there, and as always YMMV
 
Ok, I didn't realize I exactly how many features are out there, so in hindsight, i was kind of vauge.

I'm looking for a camera that doesn't have interchangeable lenses. For macro photos, I'm looking for something that could take photos of any razors I may get that I would like to photo for my own "sick" pleasure. Since I may "cull" my razor herd soon, I want something that could take favorable closeups for B/S/T or eBay. While not married to SD, I have a SD reader, so it would make life simpler. If the camera had a external power supply available/dock, I would switch formats very happily as I am a battery miser. I also like the external power supply so I can leave the LCD on when I take photos for review. As for budget, I'm looking for possibly around $100, and am happy w/ not having the highest tech. I would also like to be able to use it to take pictures at parties/events, mostly for the memories, not to print out and display, so I don't need studio quality. I'm adept at Photoshop, so post editing isn't to much of a pain for me if I ever NEED to.

Right now I have an Olympus 1.3mp D-340R. I also have been tinkering w/ a camera from work that someone dropped, but unfortunately, it broke a piece off in the lens mechanism, so when you focus, there is side to side movement in addition to back and forth. There is also a warning when you turn it off, because the broken piece stops the lens from fully retracting. The camera is a 6.2mp HP camera, and new is like 80 from HP. Since I don't know how it shoots/shot before the damage, I'm adverse to buying one untested. I just wanted to pick the brains of anyone who uses a "simple" digital camera for shooting. Since I want to photo some razors, where better to ask than people who share my burgeoning RAD? Hope this helps w/ the additional info.
 
Radar,

I have a Canon Powershot S50 (takes CF cards, but a wonderful camera, about 100 bucks on ebay right now), and an xti.

(There are two other Canon cameras in our home, but I'm not permitted to touch them.:lol:)

I think if I were you, I'd look at the Canon SD series, and try to get a used one on the web.

Here's a new one that might work very well for you:

http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/specs/Canon/canon_sd850is.asp

(My wife has an SD650. It's great.)

Paul
 
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