Pics taken with Olympus SP550

[achanth]

I tried taking pictures with this camera, to see if the image is good or okay. Your comments please. Thanks.

These are all taken with wide angle, max zoom, macro, day and night scenes.

Place is Porto Malai Resort, Langkawi, which is popular with Singaporeans.

These are sunrise shots, ...I could be wrong (taken too many).

 

[achanth]

More Pics:

I am not sure why this shot turned out with reflections.

 

[achanth]

These night shots were taken with night scene settings on the camera, without flash. As it was quite dark, it turned out this way:

The two horses are from Datai Bay Resort.

 

[achanth]

More Pics, showing wide angle, medium zoom and maximum zoom (18x)

 

[achanth]

Using Macro:

 

[achanth]

Showing Colour contrast, and power of zoom from Hill top:

In one of these location is Mahathir's bakery shop: called the Loaf, which is hidden from view by the trees. From the hill top, there were some clouds, and hence images were not too clear.

 

[achanth]

I tried to take the eagles as they swopped downfrom the sky. Tried multi-shot method. I was surprised to be able to take this shot.

Tried the zoom. We could not see with the naked eye.

At this point I wished I had brought my DSLR. The birds were flying at great speed. By focusing on the objects, over exposure due to water reflection is seen.

Near Potrait shot with zoom:

 

[achanth]

Overall: not enough sharpness due to the speed of the objects. Need more experience. However, for vacation, looks good using this camera. Exposure on some shots could be improved. Any comments welcome.

If you have other shots taken with the sp550, share it with us. Thanks.

 

[dscans]

Crispness is not there, but perhaps some USM in photoshop might help.

Contrast and colour saturation seems to be a bit bland, especially in your telephoto shots. I wonder if that is a characteristic of those "superzoom" cameras. I got pretty much the same results with my Panasonic TZ1 at maximum zoom.

Also, why are there digital artefacts in that close up macro of the flower? Did you use digital zoom or something?

 

[achanth]

Crispness is not there, but perhaps some USM in photoshop might help.

Contrast and colour saturation seems to be a bit bland, especially in your telephoto shots. I wonder if that is a characteristic of those "superzoom" cameras. I got pretty much the same results with my Panasonic TZ1 at maximum zoom.

Also, why are there digital artefacts in that close up macro of the flower? Did you use digital zoom or something?

Hi, Dscans, thanks for your comments.

I did not want to put through photoshop as I wanted comments on the unedited shots. The contrast and colour saturation were left at default 0. Next time round, I will play with this with more experience now.

The macro was taken with macro and supermacro settings on the camera, with some optical zoom. It did not need any digital zoom as the object was close enough.

I invite more comments.

 

[dscans]

Hmm...I checked your EXIF data on the flower, and it's ISO 250. Assuming that is not a 100% crop, the noise is quite significant at "only" ISO 250.

Oh well, if you learn to work around the limitations, it should be fine. A superzoom is fantastic to have when traveling. I used my Panasonic TZ1 to sneak close up shots of beautiful swimsuit clad ladies in my last vacation :bsmilie:

 

[achanth]

Hmm...I checked your EXIF data on the flower, and it's ISO 250. Assuming that is not a 100% crop, the noise is quite significant at "only" ISO 250.

Oh well, if you learn to work around the limitations, it should be fine. A superzoom is fantastic to have when traveling. I used my Panasonic TZ1 to sneak close up shots of beautiful swimsuit clad ladies in my last vacation :bsmilie:

I did not do any cropping on the macro flower shot. The next close shot I will check on the noise and EXIF data. Oh yes, I remember now, I turned off the noise control setting to get the details.

 

[Clockunder]

Using Macro:

According to the EXIF in your picture, the 3rd pict (i.e. 1st one above) was shot with full optical zoom + 3.87 digital zoom

The 4th pict (2nd one above) was at full optical zoom + full 5.6x digital zoom.

All at ISO 250.

BTW, from your pictures, noise seems very apparent for anything above ISO 100. Looks quite bad at ISO 250 (including those landscape ones), considering the small picture sizes you've posted are already resized down from original size. This is mainly due to a small 1/2.5" sensor and an ordinary CCD sensor. My Fujifilm S6500fd has a larger 1/1.7" Super CCD HR image sesnor and probably a better noise-details in-camera algorithm and therefore the apparent noise level at ISO 400 is even less than yours at ISO 250.

 

[achanth]

According to the EXIF in your picture, the 3rd pict (i.e. 1st one above) was shot with full optical zoom + 3.87 digital zoom

The 4th pict (2nd one above) was at full optical zoom + full 5.6x digital zoom.

All at ISO 250.

BTW, from your pictures, noise seems very apparent for anything above ISO 100. Looks quite bad at ISO 250 (including those landscape ones), considering the small picture sizes you've posted are already resized down from original size. This is mainly due to a small 1/2.5" sensor and an ordinary CCD sensor. My Fujifilm S6500fd has a larger 1/1.7" Super CCD HR image sesnor and probably a better noise-details in-camera algorithm and therefore the apparent noise level at ISO 400 is even less than yours at ISO 250.

Mmm...I am a newbie when it comes to this...I don't even know how to get to the exif data. From what you say, the smaller sensor is contributing to the noise level...by the way, I do not know whether the exif data shows if the noise control is off or on? Thanks by the way. I learned something. Pardon my ignorance...how do I read exif data from the pix?

 

[dscans]

Mmm...I am a newbie when it comes to this...I don't even know how to get to the exif data. From what you say, the smaller sensor is contributing to the noise level...by the way, I do not know whether the exif data shows if the noise control is off or on? Thanks by the way. I learned something. Pardon my ignorance...how do I read exif data from the pix?

You can try downloading the free Exif Reader here: http://www.softpedia.com/progDownload/Exif-Reader-Download-11954.html

Try not to use digital zoom if you can help it. As you can see, it merely "blows up" or extrapolate the pixels....it does not actually capture the extra pixel information as in an true optical zoom. Digital zoom is usually disabled by default, and you might have accidentally activated it. The digital zoom range is usually denoted by a different coloured bar above the optical zoom range in the LCD screen.

 

[Clockunder]

Mmm...I am a newbie when it comes to this...I don't even know how to get to the exif data. From what you say, the smaller sensor is contributing to the noise level...by the way, I do not know whether the exif data shows if the noise control is off or on? Thanks by the way. I learned something. Pardon my ignorance...how do I read exif data from the pix?

A freeware : Opanda IExif

After installing, just right mouse click on the picture and select "View Exif with IExif" to view the info as described below :

http://forums.clubsnap.org/showpost.php?p=2320606&postcount=8

http://www.opanda.com/en/iexif/index.html

 

[achanth]

Tks Dscans and Clockunder. I will try the Exif data viewer. Very helpful.

 

[achanth]

Tks Dscans and Clockunder. I will try the Exif data viewer. Very helpful.

Hi, Dscans and Clockunder, I downloaded both the Exif viewer; now I know what both of you mean. Thanks.

 

[Matt23]

These are great. I really like the sunset ones. The outside/night/no flash ones were a bit blurry, though. I always have that problem with my Olympus.