How much should I spend?

danlightbulb · 8 Jul 2017 at 19:50

Hi all

I am getting fed up of taking photos on my mobile phone. I don't have any photography knowhow other than point and shoot a phone camera or a small digital camera. But I do know that I can't take photos if the light is too bright, or too dim, or if things in the photo are moving.

I'm going on holiday with the missus in a few weeks and I would like to have something other than my phone to take pictures with. On the one hand, something portable that can go on the beach is desirable. But on the other hand I would like to be able to get some nice pictures too, of the family and scenery. So some wide angle? Some decent zoom for when boy playing in the sea? Decent in low light at the nighttime family meal in bar? Quickly snap the missus when she slips out of bikini. That kind of thing.

No idea where to start. Budget? Well the lower the better really but if it can be justified, could I get something good for £200 to £300?

danlightbulb · 8 Jul 2017 at 22:07

Ok so Ive been reading for the past hour (dangerous lol).

I am really liking the CSC cameras, but not sure I want to pay £300+. Well I don't want to pay it, unless it is justified? I am gravitating towards them because (and please correct me if I'm wrong here):
* I will be able to upgrade to alternative lenses in the future (but not sure if I ever would need to?)
* the bigger sensor makes it better in low light (?) and faster to shoot (?)
* on the whole better and more future proof (?)

I did look at the bridge cameras, but they seem bulky (?) and the lenses are not interchangable (is that good or bad for me?)

The small compacts seem inferior in almost every way. Although that of course doesn't mean that I should discount them, but when browsing I'm drawn to the CSCs.

danlightbulb · 8 Jul 2017 at 23:35

Raymond Lin said:
That is like everything in a box, compromises need to be made somewhere because that is a lot of different focal lengths.

Probably best to get a Sony RX100 or something.

At £350 the RX100 seems very expensive for a point and click digital. What am I getting for that amount of money? When compared to a CSC I seem to be getting much more for the money? I don't really want to spend that kind of money unless Im getting something special for it.

Is it not possible for a CSC camera to be used more general purpose? If Im on holiday, Im going to want to take some pictures of the scenery, some zoomed in picture of scenery, some pictures of the family on beach playing, some photos at night etc. I thought by getting the better spec camera this would all be better?

Ive been looking on MBP and have seen an Olympus OM-D E-M10 for £234. It seems to have very good reviews. It doesn't seem to come with a lens though - what would I need?

The cheapest Olympus lens on MBP seems to be £70? Seems to be pushing the price up quite a bit nearly to new prices when I add the lens on? It is a 14-42mm. Will that range deliver good all round performance?

danlightbulb · 9 Jul 2017 at 00:48

I will do.

My logic though is saying that if I can get an rx100 for £350, which has a 1"sensor and 10-36mm lens. Then why is a csc with a bigger m43 sensor and a similar 14-42 lens, for £300 (albeit used) not better?

I am also wondering whether the zoom on the rx100 will be too small? Only 3.6x zoom doesn't seem to give much room for those scenery/kids at the beach photos. I could spend less than £100 and get something like the Sony Cybershot W830 with 8x zoom. It has a 1/2.3 type sensor, which I think is around the same, maybe a bit bigger, than what is in my Samsung a3 phone.

danlightbulb · 9 Jul 2017 at 02:23

Yeah I did do that. An Olympus EM10 plus lens was coming out at about £300. I'm now backtracking though because of concerns about portability.

I just find £350 for a compact to be too high. But I want to spend more than the basic £50 to £100 for a sensor the same as my phone. Is there anything in the middle, so around £150 to £200?

danlightbulb · 9 Jul 2017 at 13:01

Scam said:
If you were on here talking about how you'd like to learn about photography, how cameras work etc - then it would be a different story perhaps. But for holiday snaps, no. You can bet most hobbyists like myself on here end up taking snaps on their phones on holiday when they can't be bothered to carry gear around, or the girlfriend starts complaining about you swapping lenses etc. Trust me

Sure - I think you are right. But what I do want are very good holiday snaps. Holiday snaps at night that aren't grainy. My phone camera often won't even focus at night. If we are on the beach and there is a mountain backdrop, for example, then I want a good picture of it, and to be able to zoom in to items of interest.

So yes, I have no interesting in taking black and white photos or close ups of flowers, but I do want good quality, detailed holiday snaps.

danlightbulb · 9 Jul 2017 at 13:33

The two I'm looking at now are both Sony. The W830 (£90) which is a 8x zoom and the WX350 (£160) which is a 20x zoom. I don't think I can justify £350 on the RX100 as if I was going to spend that much I'd want a proper CSC. I also don't think 3.6x zoom would be enough.

Any recommendations out of these two?

danlightbulb · 9 Jul 2017 at 13:42

Raymond Lin said:
FYI, a 1200mm lens is a 1x zoom.

a 24-70mm is a 3x zoom.

The former can see the across a football pitch and read what letters on the program some fan is reading, the latter would struggle to see what brand of boots the goalie on your side is wearing.

The magnitude of zoom is just the longest end divide by the short end, it is meaningless.

Fair enough. The W830 is 4.5-36mm and the WX350 is 4.3-86mm. I understand these have to be expressed in full frame equivelents to be comparable to your 1200mm lens example, but not sure on how to do that conversion.

Edit - ah I multiply it by the crop factor which I think is 6 for these cameras?

So the effective lens range would be 27-216mm for the W830 and 26-516mm for the WX350.

By comparison the RX100 is 10.4-37.1mm with a crop factor of 2.7 so 28-100mm effective lens range? Still a lot lower than both of the above.

So what does all of this mean that I need?

danlightbulb · 9 Jul 2017 at 13:58

Raymond Lin said:
To be honest, this will do what you want.

Do you think the night time photos will be good with this camera? And will it 'react' quick if I want to get an action shot of boy on beach?

danlightbulb · 9 Jul 2017 at 14:07

It seems catch22 though. A better camera, like the RX100, doesn't have sufficient zoom to be flexible.

danlightbulb · 9 Jul 2017 at 18:27

Scam said:
Personally I've never owned a point and shoot, but I don't understand the fascination with having epic zoom lenses on them. If people are using them for holiday snaps then that means two things; landscapes and portraits of people. Neither of which require a long zoom.

GTRacer said:
To put things in perspective, most phones have lenses that equate to 24-28mm lenses on full-frame sensors and no optical zoom at all. Most people get by fine with that as their primary camera for holidays. 100mm equiv is a lot tighter than it seems on paper, and with the better sensor+lens combo you can crop afterwards with losing a ton of quality.

I don't agree, when I look at photos my camera phone has taken they are rubbish.

Here is one I took in Wales.

There is no sharpness to the distance area. Can't really make out any features. If I wanted to zoom in to the waterfall I couldn't.

Here is what happened when I tried to get a good photo of my computer build. Its unusable, can't see a thing.

Here is another one of Snowdonia. It looks lifeless, no colour or sharpness, and again all I get is this wide angle and can't get close to any features.

Compare my snowdonia photos to this one:

And thats the kind of photo I want to have.

Thanks!

danlightbulb · 9 Jul 2017 at 18:45

ethan said:
Yeah but that is a landscape which you would get with the RX100 or any other camera with a decent sensor. You could quite possibly tweak the saturation, remove most, if not all of the haze, sharpen and adjust the contrast post with the former (Photo).

Sure but what if want to zoom in to the waterfall, and still be able to make out the detail and the colour? I don't think 3.6x zoom is going to get that water fall in full shot is it?

Here is a photo of a beach in Cyprus I took (my sisters wedding). Its nice, but looks so dull. The sun was just starting to go down here. If I wanted to get a close up of that rock, I couldn't.

danlightbulb · 9 Jul 2017 at 18:59

I don't want the best because I know I can't afford that and its not practical to carry around.

I want something that can take a nice landscape and bring out the colour and detail.

I want something that could zoom into that waterfall as if I was standing 20 meters from it instead of 200.

I want something that can take a better night shot than this blurry mess:

And I'd like to have something that would make people come more to life in photos rather than looking bland against the scenery.

I am sure the RX100 would tick all those boxes at plenty good enough quality, except the zoom issue.

Mr Badger said:
The Sony RX100 is a great camera and it's not as expensive as you seem to think. You're quoting a cost of £350 however it's available brand new from John Lewis for £309 with a 2 year guarantee and it also appears that you can claim £50 cash back.

https://www.johnlewis.com/sony-cybe..._f67d3e87789db192a4fdfc02ffe82995&tmcampid=48

Ah thanks - I was quoting Argos prices. But still, the only thing stopping me is the zoom issue.

Raymond Lin said:
You need to learn how to process photos too.

I will try and learn some stuff. But if Im starting with a low res pixelated mess, can it be improved?

danlightbulb · 9 Jul 2017 at 19:14

Here is a zoom photo that took my eye whilst reading reviews:

Here is the original:

and the zoomed:

Now I think this is great because that beach is miles away in that first photo, barely even able to make it out, and yet its like you are right on top of it in the second. This is from the review of the Sony WX350. Will the RX100 be comparable to this?

danlightbulb · 9 Jul 2017 at 19:29

Raymond Lin said:
I have never ever thought of doing something like that, never mind doing it.

That's not something you do, it's just to show how much detail the senor and lens can render. If you print the resulting image out, it will look terrible.

Hmm. I feel like the first thing I would do when having a nice view like that is to zoom in and find some nice features to photograph.

The same scenario could occur if on the beach and the boy is playing in the sea with the missus 30 meters away. I might want a close up shot, rather than having them as dots in the picture almost.

In a nutshell, the lack of zoom is putting me off the RX100, especially given the price. Wheras the small sensor size is putting me off the WX350 or the W830 as its no better than a modern mobile phone sensor. Shame there isn't something that combines both of these. A good sensor and 8x zoom, for around £300.

danlightbulb · 9 Jul 2017 at 20:03

Raymond Lin said:
Don't take this the wrong way but the need to zoom in for every photo is a trait that almost every beginner photographer goes through. It's why all the compacts aimed at the consumer market uses the 20x zoom marketing sales pitch. When you go to the mid to high end level you don't see this at all. The 24-105 does not say this is a 5x zoom on the box. You'll soon find not many photographer comes out of this wanting to zoom into everything phrase but because very little good photograph comes out of it. There are certain situations that you need it for like birds or sports but for stills objects it's not something people do.

Thanks. I can understand that, that once photographers get more professional that the needs might change. Ive highlighted a bit, these action shots are something I would want the camera for, not just still scenery and family poses. My son plays under 11 football, it would be great to get some close up action shots of him.

danlightbulb · 10 Jul 2017 at 10:43

I have a samsung galaxy a3 currently but some of those pictures would have been from my old s4. Those night shots, and the dark one of the pc build, we're the best I could get. The phone just wouldn't focus properly. All of the settings are on auto at the moment. The phone can take a reasonable picture I guess of a scene in good light.

Maybe I'll just buy the £90 Sony w830 because I haven't been convinced a more expensive camera is justified.

danlightbulb · 10 Jul 2017 at 12:45

Columbo said:
Thats £90 wasted in all honesty, the only difference really would be that you can zoom on the Sony. I very much doubt the image quality is going to much better.

How can it not be better? I know the sensor is the same size but the phone has a tiny lens and the Sony at least has something that resembles a big proper lens?

danlightbulb · 10 Jul 2017 at 14:37

Just out of interest, was an old basic 35mm film camera better image quality than these digitals? If the sensor is key, well an old 35mm camera was full frame wasn't it, something you have to spend many hundreds for now.

danlightbulb · 10 Jul 2017 at 15:51

I'm not suggesting I go back to film, was just wondering really how the resolution of 35mm film compared to the resolution of a full frame digital.

I think I might pop into jessops and have a look at the rx100. If from the shop I can zoom in to see a person on the other side of the mall, then it might be ok?