Help a photo noob

[dcstep]

Originally Posted by TurboFan

When you zoom those little lenses out to 210, I don't think the results are that good. I think they are very good at 24mm however. You are correct its a matter of personal preference on which end of the zoom one would favor, but if someone is thinking the 210mm zoom on the G9 is going to be anywhere near as good as a 200mm f/2.8 Nikkor, they will be very disappointed. However, the 24mm wide angle is almost as good as my 12-24 f/4, and will yield an outstanding result.

With the 10mp sensor you can crop that the image from that little lens for 95% of the same result, which even at 100% is still far inferior to a DSLR zoom. But at 24mm, I've seen results that are just as good as my DSLR and 24mm lens.

Shooting in Yellowstone a couple weeks ago, I was using my 80-200 f/2.8. My wife was using the point and shoot, at full zoom, and while the composition was similar, the limits of the lens were glaring.

Buying a P&S and planning to use it as a high quality wide angle prime lens just doesn't happen. I just looked through some of my G9 images and about 1/3 were taken full wide, 1/3 were at full tele and the other 1/3 are all over the range, from 50 mm equivalent to 105 mm.

BTW, image quality, is "very good", particularly since I use DxO's Optics Pro to process all my images. Optics Pro has modules for most pro cameras and the Canon G9/G10 that makes camera-specific corrections to all images at any aperature and focal length.

Let's not forget that our OP just bought a sub-$300 P&S. The difference between that and your Nikkor and my Canon L-series is likely not on his radar yet. Our least expensive lens probably costs several times what his camera cost. Anyway, he's likely to be happy, at least in the beginning, with the resolution of any camera we're talking about. If he gets serious, then he'll develop preferences, but there's no way to predict whether he'll lean toward your preferences or mine.

BTW, speaking of the evidence of quality. My 9 and 12 year old grand daughters were looking at some images of the cruise that we took them on last New Years. We were using the AppleTV to show the images on a Sony Bravia 46" HDTV and the kids said that the pictures looked like they came from a magazine. Quality IS readily apparent to kids, but lots of adults have gotten conditioned to P&S softness and limited dynamic range.

I wonder about your claims that the 10mp images from those tiny P&S sensors result in acceptable crops. When the G9 was my main camera I used only the highest resolution. I would do some minor cropping, but cropping to extend tele range never really satisfied. The small sensor size trumped the relatively high MP count, IME. I think that anyone planning to extend its tele length will be very disappointed.

Dave

[TurboFan]

Originally Posted by dcstep

...I wonder about your claims that the 10mp images from those tiny P&S sensors result in acceptable crops. When the G9 was my main camera I used only the highest resolution. I would do some minor cropping, but cropping to extend tele range never really satisfied. The small sensor size trumped the relatively high MP count, IME. I think that anyone planning to extend its tele length will be very disappointed.

Dave

All I'm saying between the G9 and the G10, or any PoS of equal substance where the only difference is the focal length of the lens, and quality is paramount, then the wide angle lens is more able to deliver quality than the longer tele. I would choose the wider angle option, knowing that I can zoom to the max and then crop a bit (on 10MP you can easily crop in a 30% zoom with quality software for a 4x6 print). A zoomed PoS lens just doesn't permit sufficient light through, and the design of them produces excessive softness. Furthermore, 200mm is about the max zoom I've seen on a PoS, and that's just getting into real telephoto lengths. However, you can get very short focal lengths, under 24mm, which allow for a lot of creative options at high quality.

In my observation on group outings, where someone always ends up pulling out a point and shoot, they are quickly disappointed with the results of a tele shot, but they almost always get great wide angle shots.

[dcstep]

The 210 mm effective focal length of the G9 is REAL telephoto. Discounting that is misleading to the noob. I've got a 200mm tele for my DSLR along with a 1.4x extender. I usually use it without the extender except for nature shots. Yeah, I'd like to have a 400mm for birds and such, but that's a lot of money for something that isn't my primary interest.

I've taken thousands of images with the G8 and G9 and they have very good (not excellent, but very good) image quality at almost all focal lengths in good light. This is especially true when processed with DxO's Optics Pro. Your assertion that they're no better than the average P&S (not PoS, which is a derogatory term) is very misleading to noobies.

Just because you're in love with wide angle, you're not really the norm. If people couldn't have a zoom and could chose only one prime lens, it would be a "normal" lens around 50mm. You can argue all you want, but in the old days when high quality zooms were rare and very costly, the most popular primes lens for 35mm cameras were around 50mm. I suspect that would hold today if circumstances were similar.

Thanksfully they're not. Most people don't buy a P&S to only use it at its wide end of the zoom range.

Dave

[TurboFan]

We can just agree to disagree. Fwiw, my 400mm is my favorite lens, but horribly impractical for most photographers.

[dcstep]

Originally Posted by TurboFan

We can just agree to disagree. Fwiw, my 400mm is my favorite lens, but horribly impractical for most photographers.

Agreed friend. Do you have a Flickr site or some equivalent where I can see some of your images?

Mine's in my signature.

Dave

[TurboFan]

No, I had some issues with some being downloaded and appearing on the 'net. I don't actively shoot for money, but I do sell some of mine, and it irritated me. So, I have a few on Facebook, that's it.