Shutter Lag on Point and Shoots

[OE2X]

I'm a professional photographer topside. I have an aquatica housing for my F5's and Ikelite strobes, and use them for the very rare U/W shoot. For me diving is for fun and here I can get away from my work. Dragging around the housing is a PITA.

I want a small digital point and shoot. Canon and Nikon both have 7 meg cameras that fall into this catagory.

One of the things that I will not get used to is shutter lag. I've got a half dozen 35mm bodies that don't have it, so even for recreation I'm unwilling to put up that hassle.

Is there a camera 6+ megs that has a minimal shutter lag?

 

[jlyle]

Look at the Fuji F-810. I've heard that there is no shutter lag. Ikelite makes a nice case for about $300.

 

[alcina]

Yup, the Fuji is supposed to have the least.

I must say that I didn't notice the shutter lag on the Canon (there is some, but I found it very intuitive to work around for some reason) and when I moved the Oly 5050 I thought I was going to cry every time I took a shot. But I learned to work around that, too

 

[RonFrank]

Yup, the Fuji is supposed to have the least.

I must say that I didn't notice the shutter lag on the Canon (there is some, but I found it very intuitive to work around for some reason) and when I moved the Oly 5050 I thought I was going to cry every time I took a shot. But I learned to work around that, too

No shutter lag??

It's also not *shutter lag*, it's focus lag. Actually the Richo camera's have the least amount of focus/shutter lag. These are found in the Sea&Sea housings, and the bodies are next to impossible to find outside of Japan for some reason.

The OLY 8080 has about the fastest focus to shot times I've seen at about .3 seconds. Unfortunatley this is NOT a tiny camera, and it has many of the disadvantages of the DSLR's with few of the real advantages, and runs in the $650-750 range, plus an UW housing.

I hear your pain O2x, I also am NOT accustomed to waiting for focus and shutter delay within reason... DSLR lenses can take time to focus on a difficult subject.

If you want to shoot with one of these little wonders, get ready for more strangness... Composing with the LCD is just weird, and I have a difficult time getting used to it. Also, the lack of information on the LCD (like exposure compensation, and exposure meter) is rather difficult to get used to... More bad news, the usable ISO's on these babys is 400... maybe. To top it off, the are even shower when the lighting is not good, and focus tracking.. forgetaboutit.

The OLY 7070 actually has some focus tracking, but I have not shot that camera, nor do I know anyone that has one, nor has there been much of the way of in depth reviews.

I purchase an S70 (Canon). I'm pleased with the camera topside, and I think it will do OK UW (have not shot it UW, really no reason where I'm diving locally), but it's NOT a DSLR. It does do Canon RAW however, and is about as fast as most anything out there for it's size.

The Ricoh's really seem to be the ONLY camera on the market that has (as advertised) shutter lag that even comes close to a DSLR, and it's hardly close (maybe .1 second) but certainly way ahead of most IF it performs which I can not verify.

Good Luck

 

[ScubaLuke]

The shutter/focus/memory card write lags will for sure drive you nuts. The best source of data I've seen for camera timings is at:
http://www.dpreview.com/

The Timing and Sizes section in the In Depth Reviews have the data you're looking for.

Luke

 

[OE2X]

So what do you do to help out the focusing? The other day Uncle Pug and I were out in low light conditions and he had his point and shoot out. I found myself shining my HID near the subjects that he was photographing to aid his camera.
On my U/W stobes I have model lights that help. I wonder if a mounted Q40 on the housing would take care of this focus - lag problem?

 

[alcina]

It does help - I have a Q40 strapped to my left hand usually. Cheap, versatile and effective.

Knowing the limitations of your rig also helps. As you are already a photographer all those things that help you get action on land will help underwater. And the mighty half press on these cameras works well usually.

It's going to be a huge change from what you are shooting topside

 

[ssra30]

My biggest problem with PnS is not so much focus time or shutterlag. You can work around that. My favourite dSLR lens is 70-180mm macro which is not exactly fast either. However looking through LCD monitor, I could never be completely sure if the focus is actually in the right place, especially for macro shot where DoF is tiny. I think this is where dSLR is a lot more accurate.

 

[RonFrank]

So what do you do to help out the focusing? The other day Uncle Pug and I were out in low light conditions and he had his point and shoot out. I found myself shining my HID near the subjects that he was photographing to aid his camera.
On my U/W stobes I have model lights that help. I wonder if a mounted Q40 on the housing would take care of this focus - lag problem?

In your heart O2x you KNOW the answer...

The focus speeds I quote come directly from DPREVIEW. Phil does an awesome job of rating this type of thing. Unfortunatley he is using IDEAL conditons!! So that .3 focus lag can become never if the lighting is not good.

If you want DSLR type focus and capture, you will have to use a DSLR, no way around it.

Another thing to consider is that I have discovered after tying to do adjustments on a friends UW COZ images, that one can NOT bring back color UW easily. He was NOT using an external strobe. In COZ the light is about as good as one can get on a sunny day, but he was shooting in the 50' range, and the color was just lost, even if the images were actually OK, and I was able to make them a LOT better.

The only images where the color was really jumping were the images where his tiny pathetic flash was able to help (IOW's VERY close).

O2X, if you want pro level images UW, IMO you will have to use a pro level setup. Not to say that a camera like the Oly 8080 can not produce great results with an external flash, but dude, you already have the SLR's/DSLR's needed to do the job, and the 8080 is a far cry from ANY DLSR with it's tiny noise producing limited sensor at higher ISO's, SLOW shutter lag, lockup when storing RAW data, lack of focus tracking.. need i go on?

 

[RonFrank]

My biggest problem with PnS is not so much focus time or shutterlag. You can work around that. My favourite dSLR lens is 70-180mm macro which is not exactly fast either. However looking through LCD monitor, I could never be completely sure if the focus is actually in the right place, especially for macro shot where DoF is tiny. I think this is where dSLR is a lot more accurate.

I'm having a VERY hard time using the LCD to compose and focus after my decades of SLR use. I like LARGE FORMAT better in this regard vs. the LCD.. sheesh..

OK, that may be an exageration, but it's sure easier to verify focus...