Going digital, what to buy?

[bholbertii]

Roman,
Clarify for me ... I looked at your pics. You say (if I understand correctly) that you used the LEDs for your dive light. Were these pics also lit with the LEDs only or did you have a flash as well. They appear to be very colorful. If my LEDs give me that kind of color for my video footage, I'll be pleased.
Thanks for the info.

 

[notabob]

LEDs were always on. The built-in flash was firing as well, and likely overpowering the LED light, at least in close quarters. One thing that I noticed, is that the built-in flash was able to penetrate a bit further (or at least so it seemed) than it does during the day, without losing as many reds. I think LEDs may have helped with that. During the day, however, I can't imagine the LED lights being as effective due to too much natural light. Then again, I haven't tried that yet. If you can borrow the lights from someone, you may want to try them.. Overall, I'd still suggest that you get a good strobe, at least for stills. No LED light will beat a good strobe. That became painfully obvious to me very quickly. As for video, naturally you can't use a strobe, so LEDs may be your only alternative, at least as far as low cost solutions go.

-Roman.

 

[bholbertii]

Roman,
Yeah, that's what I anticipated you'd say. Well, that's the problem with the solutions, there's a big jump in video lighting. I'm hopeful that the LED's will do the trick inside the 10' range. Acutally, my hope is even closer than that ... say 3' to 8'. If I stick the video camera with a dual light head system up to within 5' of really colorful coral, I'm hoping to get much better color. I shot last years video in Cozumel without lights at all and still got OK video. So these otta be much better than that. The 130' dive at the Blue Hole will be the ultimate test of how well the lights do. Also, even at only 50 to 80 ft depth, the leds should bring out the color at close range, 3' -8'. Will let you know. Thanks again for the info.
Bill

 

[raxafarian]

bholbertii once bubbled...
Guess I created a great debate over my recommending the G2. But, I'd like to digress to "What I Actually Said". "No Nikon or Olympus will beat it". Allow me to clarify ... I didn't say it was better or the best but that none of the others would beat it ... meaning performance. And as my backup I'd like to refer (as one source) to "Digital Photography Review" http://www.dpreview.com Like someone has said ... we all have our preferences on what we like. I've had and tried Canons, Nikons, and Sonys. When I was in the market for the new digital camera I read every review I could find and talked to at least 5 camera stores, including Wolf, Pro Camera and others and the G2 got top marks from all of them. DPReview gave the G3/G2 higher marks than the Olympus 5050 and so did every camera shop I talked to. However, my final decision came down to what I liked in my own two hands ... and that was the G2 (G3 not out yet when I bought the G2). Again I'd like to emphasize that I did not say it was the best but that it can't be beat by the others in overall performance ... in or out of the water. My regards to those of you who get so excited.

not excited... just wondering about some of your above statements. Dpreview just reviewed the 5050, so if you got your G2 before this month then how did you compare the 5050 and G2? And if you just got your G2, then you should have gone with the G3...oopppsss... just saw that you said the G3 wasn't out yet.

Don't get me wrong. I agree that the G2 is a good camera. But it does get beat by the sony as far as resolution. It gets beat by the nikon for macro use (as do all cameras). It lacks many manual controls (which they fixed with the G3). Some noise issues. Its ergonomics leave a lot to be desired.

If you want to average all features, then yes, it does everything, on average, as well as the others in it's class. Beats them? In a few areas, maybe.

I didn't want a camera that averaged a better score. I wanted a camera with complete manual control. I wanted a camera that fit my hand. And I wanted a camera that had good macro capability. The G2 was lacking in all these areas, and as soon as I picked one up, I knew it wasn't what I wanted.

So, It does get beat by other cameras in certain areas. It is overall a great camera... but depending on what you want, it certainly can be beat.

PS. The above statements can be applied to ALL cameras. That's why I say you need to decide what is important to you. The G2 had little to no appeal to me. My camera probably has little to no appeal to you. That's fine. Decide what you want to accomplish, and pick the tool that will best allow you to reach that goal.

PPS. The reviews that you are quoting compare all cameras to the sony dsc-717, which is, as they put it, "the king of resolution" in the 4-5mp range.

I'm sorry if it seems like I'm knocking your choice of camera. I'm not. It is a very good camera. I'm knocking your statement that the G2 can't be beat. It's almost like the statement that bp/wings can't be beat. Oh wait, that statement is correct , so it's not like that.


The G3 would bear looking at. They fixed a number of problems with the G2, and added features that were lacking. If you made that statement about the G3 saying it can't be beat, I'd have less of an argument



One other thought. Buy a memory card and take it to various camera shops. Take the cameras that you are interested in, and take test shots onto your memory card. You will be handling the cameras, and be able to see if you like the way they feel, plus you will have test pics to take home and look at/print/etc.


ok. I'm done.

 

[notabob]

I think video cameras are a lot more sensitive to reds than stills. That's why you typically get much better colors with video than photo at the same distance. Just looking at the videos shot underwater, there seems to be a lot more color at larger distances than using still cameras in a similar environment. Then again, video doesn't give you nearly the same res that still cameras do. It's a tradeoff.

-Roman.