Hi all!
I'm a newbie photographer who's frustrated by my slow-poke compact PNS which always fails to capture the moment when my puppy's doing something silly or running around in the dog park. I'm also looking to upgrade to get better pictures for travelling to take some casual portraits and scenery.
Size, weight, design and colour is not important to me. The main considerations are fast AF (ie. minimal lag between picking up the camera and actually getting the first shot off), good image quality and value for money. Some video capability would be nice. Budget is under 1k, preferably below 800.
I was considering some of the prosumers like the canon S90 (fast lens, large sensor (by PNS standards anyway), good image quality) and pana LX3 (fast lens, good image quality, but REALLY don't like the fact that a compact comes with a lens cap! ;p). Then I realised that if I pay a little bit more I could get a pentax k-x dSLR with 18-55mm kit lens for ~790 (not sure if that's current market rate now) that is also a highly rated entry-level dSLR.
I like the fact that for $100-200 more I can get a camera with a much larger sensor, superior low light performance, more control over the photographs and potential customization options (although I'm highly unlikely to throw thousands of $$$ into buying whole array of expensive lenses, since I think I've relatively simple needs). But i guess the real question is do I really need to take the plunge and get a SLR which is totally different beast that I've absolutely no experience with? Or is the S90 or LX3 or some other compact PNS good enough for my main purpose - a camera fast enough to get high quality, candid pictures of my puppy?
TIA to all the kind ladies and gentlemen of the forum. I await your responses with bated breath!
p.s. this is my first post on ClubSNAP!
I'm a newbie photographer who's frustrated by my slow-poke compact PNS which always fails to capture the moment when my puppy's doing something silly or running around in the dog park. I'm also looking to upgrade to get better pictures for travelling to take some casual portraits and scenery.
Size, weight, design and colour is not important to me. The main considerations are fast AF (ie. minimal lag between picking up the camera and actually getting the first shot off), good image quality and value for money. Some video capability would be nice. Budget is under 1k, preferably below 800.
I was considering some of the prosumers like the canon S90 (fast lens, large sensor (by PNS standards anyway), good image quality) and pana LX3 (fast lens, good image quality, but REALLY don't like the fact that a compact comes with a lens cap! ;p). Then I realised that if I pay a little bit more I could get a pentax k-x dSLR with 18-55mm kit lens for ~790 (not sure if that's current market rate now) that is also a highly rated entry-level dSLR.
I like the fact that for $100-200 more I can get a camera with a much larger sensor, superior low light performance, more control over the photographs and potential customization options (although I'm highly unlikely to throw thousands of $$$ into buying whole array of expensive lenses, since I think I've relatively simple needs). But i guess the real question is do I really need to take the plunge and get a SLR which is totally different beast that I've absolutely no experience with? Or is the S90 or LX3 or some other compact PNS good enough for my main purpose - a camera fast enough to get high quality, candid pictures of my puppy?
TIA to all the kind ladies and gentlemen of the forum. I await your responses with bated breath!
p.s. this is my first post on ClubSNAP!