Re: Off topic - Choosing a digital camara
- To: Multiple recipients of list <i*@rt66.com>
- Subject: Re: Off topic - Choosing a digital camara
- From: J* B* <h*@tricon.net>
- Date: Fri, 7 Mar 1997 06:50:21 -0700 (MST)
At 02:12 PM 3/6/97 -0700, you wrote:
>Hi everybody!
>
>Before the blooming season I would like to buy a digital camara to take
>thousands of pictures of my irises without going broke. Since I know some of
>you have already done it, I would like to ask you your advise/opinions/feed
>back on whatever camara you have or on what to look for and what to avoid.
>>From what I have seen in a couple of stores, the selection is not that great.
>I would like to spend less than $1000, preferable closer to $500 than to 1k.
>Thanks!
>Cheers,
>Elena Laborde in Santa Cruz, CA
>ELaborde@aol.com
I've used the Casio with the Macro-telephoto option, costing about $700 last
spring to do some photo features for the www.tricon.net home page. My
opinion in terms of buying one of these things is a resounding NOT YET! For
one thing, the image you use to compose on the screen-type viewfinder is
zapped by sunlight, a pretty constant phenomenon when doing garden
photography. You'd need to go back to the old-fashioned (and hot) black head
cloth. This state of technology with no control really over use of alternate
lighting effects doesn't justify the prices for cameras that will be priced
like butane matches when the next, and hopefully improved generation comes
along.
Unfortunately, the new generation of photographers apparently intends to
achieve its effects by using Photoshop software (another $700) to bring
so-so digital images up to snuff, so I don't see any movement to improving,
or lowering cost of the cameras.
This year my choice will continue to be a used Nikon body (FE or FG), 50mm
Nikkor Macro lens, tripod, Fuji 50 or 100 print film, slave strobe and some
sky blue backdrop paper tacked to a 4x4 board. There are certainly more
expensive ways to do it. But if you are a photographer who can see what
you're looking at through the lens, and who can compose and use light, this
will get you better photos than at least 50% of what you see published, and
do so at a cost that holds out remote hope of making a profit from sales, or
at least will save enough for me to buy the flat bed scanner.
James Brooks
Jonesborough, TN
hirundo@tricon.net
"If we can accept that God created the earth, why can we not accept the
earth that he created?"