Point & Shoots: Compensating For Our Small Sensors (Buy the S110/RX100/X20)

The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > Creative Convention > The Dorkroom > Point & Shoots: Compensating For Our Small Sensors (Buy the S110/RX100/X20)

BeastOfExmoor: Aug 19, 2003; I will be gone, but not forever.

Edit 1/6/2011:
It should be noted that that since this thread was created two years ago some stuff has changed in the P&S world.

The Canon S90 mentioned throughout the OP was replaced by the S95 and S100. Both are worthy upgrades.
Fuji released the X100 to rave reviews. The X100 was a less a P&S and more a high end fixed lens camera with a large sensor. It's very well reviewed, but at over $1000 it is out of most people's price ranges. The followed it up with the more affordable, but smaller sensor X10 which has also gotten good reviews.
Many other manufacturers have started introducing better quality point and shoots. While the (best Canon you can afford) advice below will still get you a good camera, reading the last few pages of the thread and posting your needs is probably a good idea.

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The "What P&S should I buy" question has been coming up a ton here so I thought I'd see if we can consolidate P&S discussion here.

Links
DPReview's Side-by-Side Comparison - While not perfect, this is a good tool for comparing similar cameras. Their reviews are also typically very worth reading.
CHDK - Open Source software that can greatly add to the capabilities of many Canon P&S cameras.
Canon Loyalty Program - If you have a broken Canon camera they'll trade it towards a newer and better rerurb model.

Upsides of Point & Shoot Cameras
[list]
Portability - P&S cameras start small and go smaller. A lot of Dorkroom posters with expensive collections of SLR bodies and lenses have purchased P&S cameras like the Canon G11 or S90 because they want something they can bring everywhere.
Price - Even though you can now get a respectable used DSLR setup for under $500 that's still a lot of money to spend on a camera for most people. Bottom line is that whether you have an interest in photography or just want to capture memories there is probably a P&S camera within your budget.

Downsides of Point & Shoot Cameras

Small Sensors - Generally speaking the larger the sensor (as well as the larger the pixels), the better the image quality and the lower the noise. Wikipidia has a good comparison of sensor sizes. Basically your most basic Digital Rebel DSLR camera is going to have a sensor with almost 10x the area of the base model P&S. Additionally, a larger sensor coupled with low aperture lenses gives you the ability to isolate the focus of a subject much more then with a smaller sensor.
Lack Of RAW - This has gotten better over time, but most of your lower end P&S cameras can only shoot JPEG. RAW has a lot of benefits over JPEG and with current flash memory prices there's almost no downsides to shooting RAW+JPEG if your camera offers it.
Slow Lenses - Most P&S camera start off with a mediocre aperture that only gets worse the more you zoom in. This is important to keep in mind if you'll be shooting in a lot of dark locations.

Things to Look For

Manual Controls - While putting the camera into "full manual" mode is a nice feature, I'd say just being able to put it into aperture priority or shutter priority can help you be a lot more creative with your camera.
Minimum Aperture - This is the maximum amount of light the camera can let into the lens and lower is better. As stated above, P&S cameras typically have lenses whose minimum aperture gets worse the more you zoom it in so if you're in bad light consider taking photos zoomed out if possible.

Why You Shouldn't Give a gently caress About Megapixels
This has been rehashed to death over the years, but realistically megapixels stopped mattering a long time ago. Given the quality of the lenses in P&S cameras you really won't notice an increase in sharpness between a 7 megapixel camera and a 12 megapixel camera and noise and low light performance typically get worse the smaller you make the pixels.

Don't Use AUTO
Almost all digital camera users put their camera on auto assuming it knows what's best for them. Sadly, this is the farthest thing from the case. Auto often won't allow you to control simple things like when to use the flash or what ISO you're shooting at which can be very important to the quality of your photo. Most cameras have a mode that chooses things like shutter speed and aperture for you, but allows you to control certain things such as ISO, flash, etc. Canon marks this as "P" on theirs, but other manufacturers may call it other things.

Superzooms

Superzooms are a new market of P&S camera targeted towards people want something a little better than the standard 4x zoom lens. Cameras such as the Canon SX20 offer lenses able to zoom from 28mm to 560mm in 35mm terms. There are some significant optical trade offs with lenses that have this big of range, however so unless you can come up with a lot of situations where you need the range I'd suggest going for something smaller. Additionally cameras like the SX20 are just as hard to transport as a DSLR and almost the same price.

The Canon S90

The S90 is by far the camera most recommended here due to a couple factors. It has larger sensor than many P&S cameras, a lens the starts at a very respectable F/2.0 for great low light performance, the ability to shoot RAW and a little ring around the lens that makes it easy to adjust settings on the fly. Another option is the SD4000 which is a smaller camera with many of the features the S90 has. It won't shoot RAW out of the box, but it will do HD video and captures low resolution slow motion video which could be cool to play around with.

But the S90 is $350, is there anything good that's cheaper?
The general rule of thumb is you should pick the Canon P&S that fits your budget. There are certainly features to be gained the more expensive you get, but ultimately they'll all take a good picture in good light. Many of them also have the ability to run the CHDK software linked to above which can add a ton of cool features.

Let me know if anyone has anything to add to the OP. I know its really Canon focused, but that's all I've really used extensively. Please post your experiences with other brands/models if you have any to share.

Edit 10/1/2010:
I haven't had a chance to rewrite the original post completely, but it should be noted that the S90 has been replaced by the S95. The S95, while being a superior camera, does not have any huge advantages to the S90 so if you can get a really good deal on a S90 you'd still be getting a very great camera.

BeastOfExmoor fucked around with this message at 08:21 on Jan 7, 2012

# ¿ Jun 26, 2010 06:57

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# ¿ Apr 27, 2024 12:49

BeastOfExmoor: Aug 19, 2003; I will be gone, but not forever.

Eldoran posted:

Sampleshots with D10 as promised, theese have no artistic merit whatsoever:

Fullsize abovewater

Fullsize underwater

To be honest, it's good enough for what I'm intending to use it for so I'm happy.

There's actually something about the above water photo that I really like, artistically speaking. I can't quite put my finger on it, but it gives me a retro vibe for some reason. Either way, thanks for posting them. I really would have loved to have a D10 when I went to Maui last year.

HPL posted:

I think the OP is a bit harsh about using auto mode. Cameras are getting better and better all the time at figuring out reasonable settings. I agree that auto mode used to suck badly a few years ago but it has evolved to the point where if you're out and about and the light is okay, auto isn't a bad option.

Fair enough. I honestly haven't used a P&S newer then my wife's Powershot A570IS so my knowledge is a little outdated. The main things that infuriated me with the auto modes have been the inability to control turning off the flash or to control the ISO settings. If they've changed those things it would do a lot to making a better auto mode (although it'd be the same as P mode on the cameras I've used).

BeastOfExmoor fucked around with this message at 17:43 on Jun 29, 2010

# ¿ Jun 29, 2010 17:38

BeastOfExmoor: Aug 19, 2003; I will be gone, but not forever.

Fiannaiocht posted:

Thinking of getting this for the S90 and the little grip. Though I only use a polarizing filter so I'm not sure if this will get used that often? Now I wish there was a viewfinder and I'd be set.

If the S90 does not have an internal filter to remove infared light you could buy an IR filter and take sweet infared photographs. I searched a bit, but couldn't find anything saying if the S90 had an internal IR filter one way or another.

# ¿ Jun 30, 2010 17:24

BeastOfExmoor: Aug 19, 2003; I will be gone, but not forever.

I can't speak to the S95 specifically, but I know when I bought a DSLR I was really concerned about being stuck without batteries. It turned out out that I was completely wrong. Lithium ion batteries not only lasted longer, but also recharged way faster. If you go through Amazon you can buy 4 third party replacements and an extra charger for less than 15 bucks. Just keep them charged when you're around power and I don't think you'll run into any problems.

Edit to qirex: I bought some BP511a's about 9 months ago through Eforcity on Amazon. They were a little lighter than the Canon ones, but they hold there charge for a long time and I have taken almost 1400 shots in a day before having to swap batteries. Sure, it's possible that your experience may vary with smaller batteries, but if I was in your shoes I'd buy them in a second.

BeastOfExmoor fucked around with this message at 22:19 on Nov 2, 2010

# ¿ Nov 2, 2010 22:14

BeastOfExmoor: Aug 19, 2003; I will be gone, but not forever.

It's probably going to cost way more than the S95, but Fuji just announced a P&S that looks absolutely amazing on paper.

# ¿ Sep 1, 2011 16:51

BeastOfExmoor: Aug 19, 2003; I will be gone, but not forever.

Just happened to notice that the Canon refurb site is offering the SD4000 for $175. This camera is somewhat close to the S90/S95 in that it has a lens that shoot F/2.0 wide open. It also has a backlit sensor which improves noise a bit a bit at high ISO. It is certainly missing awesome features like the control wheel and shooting RAW, but for $175 it is the best low light P&S under $200 that I am aware of. DPReview.

# ¿ Sep 1, 2011 22:50

BeastOfExmoor: Aug 19, 2003; I will be gone, but not forever.

I updated the OP a little bit with information that's not two years old. I know most folks don't read the OP of two year old threads. I really haven't kept up on P&S technology very well. My hunch is that there's a lot more competitive options in the price range of the S100 nowdays, but I can't speak very authoritatively. If anyone has anything to add (mini-reviews, etc.) feel free to post it here and I'll try to quote it in the OP.

Thanks to SoundMonkey for updating the subject.

# ¿ Jan 7, 2012 19:14

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# ¿ Apr 27, 2024 12:49

BeastOfExmoor: Aug 19, 2003; I will be gone, but not forever.

ma i married a tuna posted:

I'd be happy to do that, but wouldn't it make just as much sense to start a new thread?

Doesn't matter either way. I like keeping threads like this open so that people can search them in the for useful information (say they're looking at a used S90, etc.), but it could be time for a new thread.

# ¿ Jan 15, 2012 06:14

The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > Creative Convention > The Dorkroom > Point & Shoots: Compensating For Our Small Sensors (Buy the S110/RX100/X20)