DSLR or prosumer / consumer digicam

[Red Dawn]

Hi

someone asked this qn in the Canon Equipment forum. i decided the inability of that forum to post images is not going to make the answer as fun, or educational, so i'm posting my reply here.

1. Consumer digicams have smaller sensors, which lead to more megapixels being crammed into their smaller space leading to higher noise in images at all ISOs.

Your friend's S40 / G2 is not going to have less noise in images at ISO 100 than my D30's ISO 400. Period.

ISO 800 example

2. Your friend's S40 / G2 may have more megapixels, but his / her camera is likely to apply a more aggressive compression alogrithm, not to mention the many in-camera processing done on the image captured, giving a highly JPEG with numerous JPEG artifacts, or a RAW file that is not going to be as smooth and clean as any image from my D30.

Points 1 and 2 combined ensured my D30 will alwyas produce consistently higher quality images than your friend's G2 / S40, regarding of megapixels.

3. Greater post processing options. Due to the D30's lack of in camera processing, i can post process D30 images in any way i want - sharpness, contrast, saturation etc to simulate any film types / look. Post processing options with consuer digicams are often limited because so many variables eg sharpness, contrast, saturation are already predefined in camera.

4. Large scale enlargements. Again, D30 images., due to the lack of in camera processing, simply scales up better, with less noise and less artifacts. Consumer digicams can't take much punishment of that sort.

5. your friend's G2 may have a bright F2-f2.5 aperture, but it is never going to give you the depth of field options that a true SLR can give you. Due to the short inherent focal length (7-21mm), everything in the picture will always appear very sharp, and you're never going to get the kind of nice bokeh effects an SLR can give you.

Bokeh Example - BlueStrike with EOS 300

6. With a usable ISO of only 50, (other ISOs produce far too much noise) at most 100, your friend's G2 / S40 is never going to be able to travel anywhere far without a flash. Which means u're never going to be able to shoot available light, in places where you cannot use a flash. Which means it's going to be stuck on a tripod most of the time for low light situations where flash is not desirable, or even practical.

ISO 1600, handheld, f2 examples

(cont'd)

 

[Red Dawn]

(cont'd)

7. With the impossibly SLOW shutter lag time and long focus times of all consumer digicams (including the G2 and S40) , and without a proper manual focus mechanism, interchangeable lens capability, and a full range of aperture and shutter speeds control, your friend's G2 / S40 will simply have to sit out on a lot of "fleeting moment" shots which the D30 will have no problems handling.

Happy Couple

Fleeting Smile

8. Lastly, the wide range of lenses available allow you to pick and choose equipment that best carry off your preferred style of photography.

50mm f1.4 at f1.4, ISO 800

 

[tomshen]

Red Dawn, excellent shots with explanation. Did u use the noise reduction software?

 

[Zoomer]

Why G2??

Well, D30 is quite expensive too...

 

[AqUaRiU5]

hmm.....if u are waiting to get a DSLR.....get the Nikon D100 coming soon...cheaper den the D60 i heard...

but me haf to stick to my CP885.....no cash now.....(bang wall)

 

[AqUaRiU5]

oh yeah....wat Red Dawn say is really true....DSLR have lesser shutter lag....tat's kinda impt.....and the ISO part...haf to agree wif u.....my CP885...using the standard ISO...which is 100...it's kinda grainy at tt point....cant image how grainy izzit at ISO 400

 

[Red Dawn]

Originally posted by tomshen
Red Dawn, excellent shots with explanation. Did u use the noise reduction software?

Hi

nope....dun use it as much nowadays......cos i use Pekka's actions for linear raw processing almost exclusively now......

 

[Wai]

RD> is it the photo or my monitor?

1st and 6th pic is kinda blue...just like F707's BFS

I agree with your first point, that DSLR prodcue less noise even at higher ISO

wow...and your pic at ISO800 is noise free too, u took it at RAW and process it with Pekka's actions right?

I notice that i can zoom in to the pic from D30 more than from F707, although F707 have higher MP and suppose to capture more details, probably like what u said, the jpg compression is more agressive and distort the photo from consumer DC

I will print some pic on a A0 printer from D30 these few days....and also a few from my old 707 too....probably the distortion will be more obvious when printed.

Most importantly, the shutter lag and AF of DSLR is so much faster than any consumer DC out there...last time i tried to take pic of my active cat with 707, but all the pic is like 1/2 seconds too late....but now with D30, i can really capture the moment that i want.

The cat over turn her bowl and the water was spilling

The cat put in her paw to get food out of the packet (fish inside)

I will never able to catch such action with any consumer DC out there

Also, the start up time of D30 is so much faster, the continuous mode is nice too for action shots, and i dun have to worry that the battery will finsih very fast as the LCD screen is off most of the time.

However, LCD preview will prove to be useful when shooting with optical viewfinder is impossible or inconvinence. eg, when u want to shoot from above your head or when u want to shoot discretely

After upgrade from 707 to D30, i no more have to buy expensive memory stick and flash...(but have to buy expensive lenes) the only thing that i have to get used to is the soft and natural picture from D30...and also the weight of DSLR + lenes, There are so much control (esp Flash photography) and i still have a long way to learn abt SLR

another thing i like abt D30 is the simple menu and control buttons, it is much faster and easier to execute a command on D30. eg. i need to press two buttons to erase a pic with D30, whereas it takes 7 buttons to erase a pic with 707

 

[eadwine]

wah man!! i suppper GIAN DSLR now....sigh
i do agree SLR have super faster shutter reaction(no shutter lag) compared to consumer cams. but i must say certain stuff f707 can do an dslr cant though.

ah wai, how much u bought ur d30 for huh??
how much did the lens cost???

 

[Goose]

Geez....after reading all this stuff, it makes me super gian to get a DSLR man....;p

My G2 wun be able to put off those shots described above...

 

[Jerome]

Thanks Red D for the very informative explanation!! I didn't know about the smaller sensors in prosumer cameras or more aggressive compression they use. In fact, I thot the RAW in G2 is the same as the RAW in D30.

Previously, I did ask a popular shop what are the advantages of the D30 over G2, given that the latter has ISO50 (D30 doesn't have that!), more mp, a good focal length range, etc, the guy said yah true, the G2 is good enough...don't need to buy a D30! Hmm...maybe he himself was not so familiar with digital yet.

I was erroneously thinking in terms of film SLR. An ISO 50 film gives an even smaller grain compared to an ISO 100 film. And was also wondering hmm, f/2.0 on the G2 from 34-103mm (35mm equivalent)!!! Wow! It costs almost a bomb for a 28-70mm L lens which is only f/2.8! Guess I need to think digital...

I have 2 questions to ask:

1. Where can I find information on all these digital jargons, terminologies, etc such as smaller sensors used in prosumer cameras, the pros and cons of CMOS or CCD sensors, etc? It's strange that digital photography seems to be so "IN" in this century but the books I've read so far are disappointingly simply or "on the surface". They cater more for pple who own simple point-and-shoot prosumer cameras but not DSLRs. There are so many books on film SLR phtography but not DSLR.

2. What is Pekka raw processing? Don't you use Canon's Raw Image Converter? What's the advantage of Pekka? Where can I get it?

Thanks so much!

(Kamwai, very adorable cat!!! Yah, I'm disappointed with the D30's soft images. Depending on the lighting, I almost always have to apply some USM in PS. I hope and sure Canon and digital technology will improve soon on this.)

 

[Wai]

Originally posted by eadwine
wah man!! i suppper GIAN DSLR now....sigh
i do agree SLR have super faster shutter reaction(no shutter lag) compared to consumer cams. but i must say certain stuff f707 can do an dslr cant though.

ah wai, how much u bought ur d30 for huh??
how much did the lens cost???

yes...i agree with you...F707 is very good at low light focus...even at no light, F707's AF still works very very well...whereas for D30, u either have to use Manual focus, or get a speedlite and use the flash's AF assist light to focus...but it is still not as fast/accurate as F707

another advantage of F707 will be LCD preview and the fast f2.0 Carl Zeiss lens

for SLR's lens, it can range from a few hundreds to a few thousands....Super high zoom power or Super wider angle lens cost a bomb, and the bigger the max aperture, the more expensive it is.

eg. my 50mm/f1.8 new one is selling $135, but a 50mm/f1.4 USM is $500++, they are prime lens (cannot zoom) but this slight different can cost so much already.

there are cheaper consumer lens too , but dun bother to get those else it will be a waste of D30. Those L-series lens are the best, but even a 2nd hand one also cost 4 digits

 

[rumraisin]

Hey Kamwai/ Red Dawn...
do you know if the D60 remedies the weaknesses of the D30 that you've mentioned? ie the soft picture and the slowness of AF?

 

[Jed]

Apparently, there is little gain in focusing speed. But I'm not a D60 user, or a D30 user for that matter, and the main reason I write is:

The softness is not a weakness! It's an advantage...

 

[ckiang]

Originally posted by Jed
Apparently, there is little gain in focusing speed. But I'm not a D60 user, or a D30 user for that matter, and the main reason I write is:

The softness is not a weakness! It's an advantage...

To give an analogy, you can add chilli/salt/pepper to food which is a bit on the bland side, but you can't "unspice" food that is too spicy.

So, to put things back into perspective, if you have an image which is aggressively sharpened in-camera, you have not much control over it. On the other hand, if the camera has slightly softer images (less in-camera sharpening), you can apply the desired amount of sharpening during post processing, depending on your print size, etc.

Regards
CK

 

[rumraisin]

It really depends on what you're shooting doesn't it? Soft is nice for warm people shots but you wouldn't want it for detailed shots of things. Still lifes I mean.

 

[Jed]

No it doesn't. The D30 can be set to yield sharp images straight out of camera. If not, Photoshop can do exactly the same. The details are not lost, only less apparent.

 

[rumraisin]

But was the detail really captured, or merely generated by unsharp masking?

 

[Red Dawn]

Originally posted by rumraisin
But was the detail really captured, or merely generated by unsharp masking?

unsharp masking can only generate artifacts if overdone, not create detail that wasn't there in the first place.......

 

[Jed]

Originally posted by Jed
The details are not lost, only less apparent.

In reply to rumraisin.