P&S 10x zoom bridge camera, 10 mp

[oldmama]

Any thoughts on the Olympus SP800UZ? I have not been able to find specifications on the lens. How clear will the pictures be at full 30x zoom shooting wildlife. I have a Nikon D40 with a 70-300vr lens that went with me to Alaska last year & love the pictures, but one can always look at new & smaller cameras. Thanks for the advice.

[chipmaster]

This gives a new meaning to superzoome :eek:

 

• Focal length (equiv. 35mm) 28 - 840mm

• Aperture 2.8 - 5.6

 

In principle you have > 2x more focal length in a small package. This can only be done with the extermely small P&S sensors ( real focal length is 5-150mm ). For taking pictures in bright conditions where lightening fast focus isn't required this likely can't be beat for web sharing and prints up to 5x7 IMHO. There are no exhaustive reviews of the camera yet, but Olympus in general has produced above average cameras both in terms of performance and IQ. If you tire of carring the D40 and 70-300 it will be a huge downsize with superior capability when it comes to zoom and convenience/weigth!

 

Any thoughts on the Olympus SP800UZ? I have not been able to find specifications on the lens. How clear will the pictures be at full 30x zoom shooting wildlife. I have a Nikon D40 with a 70-300vr lens that went with me to Alaska last year & love the pictures, but one can always look at new & smaller cameras. Thanks for the advice.

[ballawana13]

I got to take the HX5V out for a bit of a test drive this weekend/week. First impressions were very good:

 

Sweep Panorama: Wow! It does an amazing job but I need to practice with it a bit. It takes some skill to sweep it steadily at the right speed.

 

Hand-held Twilight: Wow, again! With a steady hand, it gives you clean and crispy images in truly horrible lighting.

 

Back-light HDR: At the risk of being repetitious, wow! Situation: Person with bright scene or sunset behind them - It snaps two shots in rapid succession and merges them to properly expose the person in the foreground and the background.

 

The lens is almost distortion-free at 25mm and it keeps it up all the way out to 250mm (equivalent). Images sharp across the image and it focuses fast and accurately. Good stabilization.

 

Burst mode only does 10 shots before clearing the buffer, but it will shoot at 3fps, 5fps, or 10fps!

 

Good exposure and easy to adjust in tricky situations. Good color. Flash won't win any contests for distance, but it works very well within its limits.

 

Dials and controls are well-places and most of the controls that you would change often aren't buried in the menus.

 

Custom White Balance: Easy to set and really comes in handy since this camera isn't much better at tungsten and CFLs than any other.

 

Movie: Though it will record 1080i AVCHD, I have mine set to 720p/MP4 since I don't have a Blu-Ray recorder. There is a dedicated movie start button that let's you start recording at a moment's notice without spinning any dials and you can zoom (optically) all you want while shooting. The zoom is a little touchy, but with practice it works just fine. The output on our plasma is simply stunning. It won't replace pro HD broadcast cameras anytime soon, but it beats my 6 year-old dedicated camcorder hands-down! I may have to add some video clips to this trip's slide show!

 

I'll add a gallery just for HX5V images when we get back from our cruise. I have high expectations and don't think I'll be disappointed!

 

Dave

 

Dave,

I know you have been busy and have returned from your cruise as I have seen some postings from you in the Photographic Discussion area. This week I even stumbled upon the gem C.C.P.I.C.S. classes of a couple years ago and plan to work my way through the classes. It looks like a great refresher course. I hope to be able to post some pictures soon. I am looking at upgrading my Canon P&S to a DSLR (I miss the interchangeable lenses from my Minolta film SLR from the '70's and think now is a great time to move back to interchangeable lenses).

 

I was set on getting a Canon XSi or a T1i then saw your comments on some Sony cameras and have now looked carefully at those. I may go to an upgrade of the P&S with the HX5V and add a DSLR as I practice with that or just go straight to the DSLR. The point of this post is to see if you can point me to a gallery from your latest cruise or off time when you have run the HX5V through its features. I don't think you have posted it yet, so please put something up either on your website or on CC as well as some additional commentary on how you like it and what challenges you might have found with this new camera.

 

thanks,

Kevin

[setsail]

I bought the canon sx20 is right after it came out. So far very pleased with it. You will need a tri pod with this camera for certain shots. I love the view finder and the fact you can swivel the lcd screen to a closed position and it uses aa batts and a sd card so I did not have to buy anything extra.

 

Canon had the best overall reviews for super zooms (SZ is what I was shopping for)

[pierces]

Dave,

I know you have been busy and have returned from your cruise as I have seen some postings from you in the Photographic Discussion area. This week I even stumbled upon the gem C.C.P.I.C.S. classes of a couple years ago and plan to work my way through the classes. It looks like a great refresher course. I hope to be able to post some pictures soon. I am looking at upgrading my Canon P&S to a DSLR (I miss the interchangeable lenses from my Minolta film SLR from the '70's and think now is a great time to move back to interchangeable lenses).

 

I was set on getting a Canon XSi or a T1i then saw your comments on some Sony cameras and have now looked carefully at those. I may go to an upgrade of the P&S with the HX5V and add a DSLR as I practice with that or just go straight to the DSLR. The point of this post is to see if you can point me to a gallery from your latest cruise or off time when you have run the HX5V through its features. I don't think you have posted it yet, so please put something up either on your website or on CC as well as some additional commentary on how you like it and what challenges you might have found with this new camera.

 

thanks,

Kevin

 

Well, in a nutshell...it isn't a DSLR! That said, I didn't expect it to be and based on my actual expectations, it came through with flying colors!

 

Here is a link to the galleries from the trip. I have the EXIF turned on so you can see which ones were taken with the HX5V.

 

http://galleries.pptphoto.com/summit2010

 

Here's a brief rundown:

 

Appearance and build - The camera is solid with only the battery door as a potential weak spot. It didn't give me any trouble, but I wish it were a little "sturdier". The majority of the body is finished in a satin black that just ignored fingerprints. In almost all the promo pictures, the lens is extended which gives the impression that the camera isn't too compact. In actuality, the HX5V is just about the same size as my SD800, being only about 3/8" longer. It fits in the same belt pouch that was snug on the Canon.

 

Controls - The back and top aren't exactly covered with buttons, but the buttons that are there are very useful and allow easy avvess to all of the functions that I use regularly. One button that will appeal to the video crowd is the dedicated movie button that allows you to immediately start recording video at any time, regardless of whether you're in Movie mode or not. Menus are well organized and did not require a visit to the manual to use them. The zoom lever is a bit touchy, but I found that it was easily manageable with some practice.

 

LCD - The LCD is large, clear and adjustable for brightness to suit your needs. I has no trouble framing shots in even the brightest sun. Keep in mind that framing means "able to identify and compose". In very bright sun, you can still see it well enough to frame, but it is better to shade the LCD with one hand when practical.

 

Lens - The lens was the tipping-point that led me to choose the camera over several other contenders and it looks like I made a good choice. The 25mm equivalent wide end allows for great interiors or interesting perspective shots and the 250mm long end is actually useful! Distortion is minimal (virtually un-noticeable) and if I did my job, the lens delivered great, sharp images. I posted these a bit larger to illustrate the clarity.

 

Wide:

 

Full Zoom:

 

I'll say it... Wow! It also focuses quite quickly and switches automatically to macro when is need to get close.

 

Image modes - I found that I preferred to shoot on "P" most of the time since it allows a lot of creative adjustments. There is a full auto function that seems to handle 90% of the decisions with uncanny accuracy, but I tend to spend a lot of time shooting in the hard-to-automate 10% of the decision tree. The Hand-held Twilight mode is amazing! It snaps a few shots in blindingly rapid succession and blends them together to produce an amazingly sharp image in very bad or difficult light.

 

 

Sweep Panorama is easy to over-use. It is way too cool! You just start at one end, hold down the shutter and sweep across the scene as the camera fires off 100 images and stitches them into a seamless pano that even edits out multiple ghosts of moving objects. Little camera, giant brain!

 

 

 

Image quality - I repeat, it is not a DSLR. It is, however, the best 24x7 do-everything camera I could find and I am very pleased. Great sharpness (not too much), good resolution and color.

 

 

The two-shot HDR for back-light correction was effective and useful, but it was overshadowed by the others. Movie mode is very impressive. I'm not a video guy, but then again, I never had full-HD movie capability this handy before. Rather that use the 1080i AVCHD, I set the camera to do 720p MP4s and it really produces a great picture. It's a memory eater, but offers over an hour on the 16GB card. I really haven't tested it out, but with tremendous resolution and the ability to zoom while recording, it far surpasses the video on my old Canon and (for me) negates the need for a video camera.

 

In conclusion: It offered no more challenges than any P&S...hard to hold steady, small noisy sensor, etc. I will say that the Exmor-R sensor provided very usable ISO 800 images..something that My SD800 couldn't hope to deliver. In a world full of compromises, this camera required fewer than most.

 

Highly Recommended!

 

Dave

[pierces]

...I set the camera to do 720p MP4s and it really produces a great picture. It's a memory eater, but offers over an hour on the 16GB card....

 

My mistake!

 

It shows room for 254 minutes of 720p video with 950 images already on the 16gb card!

 

Dave

[ballawana13]

 

In conclusion: It offered no more challenges than any P&S...hard to hold steady, small noisy sensor, etc. I will say that the Exmor-R sensor provided very usable ISO 800 images..something that My SD800 couldn't hope to deliver. In a world full of compromises, this camera required fewer than most.

 

Highly Recommended!

 

Dave

 

Dave,

You are amazing. Such a quick and detailed response to a request from a follower. I looked at your gallery of photos. Couldn't stop looking at the composition, sharpness and detail, use of light. I love the panoramas which capture interesting detail that several successive shots somehow miss. What I see is a patient experienced photographer who likes what he does with a fun camera with some good features. Great work. When you are done working for a living you should consider having fun and becoming a travel photographer or maybe do photo excursions. It would combine two of your passions -- travel and photography and you could add writing in there too as a photo instructor. I would sign up in a heartbeat.

 

You have a great eye for details in your review yet put everything in terms that most folks can understand and make useful. I will be putting in my order for the Sony HX5V soon and expect to be an expert on its use by the time my cruise rolls around in October. Thanks for sharing your joy of photography.

 

Kevin

[ballawana13]

Dave,

I forgot to comment on the comments/notes. Funny and helpful to weave a story of the journey you took to get to the photos you posted. Made it even more entertaining to view the galleries.

 

I have some follow-up questions for you if you don't mind. I tried to get info on the properties of some of the photos by right-clicking but was unable to get that detail. Is it readily available?

 

GPS/Geotagging. Did you use this feature on the HX5V and what did it do for battery life? Do you generally charge the batteries overnight? Do you have a spare battery? My current Canon Powershot A590 uses AA batteries which are readily available and I can also use rechargeables.

 

Multiple cameras. Did you bring multiple cameras and what additional lenses did you bring with you for the DSLR? The reason I ask was the side-by-side with the comment about the difference with and without a polarizing filter.

 

SD Cards. Now that the prices have come down, I have a bunch of the 2G and 4G size and because they don't take any space, I will be bringing as many as I can with me. How many do you bring and how much were filled with video?

 

Photo processing software. I recently loaded a new version of Photoshop Elements onto my Macbook but have yet to make a lot of progress on the steep learning curve to be able to make full use of its features. How much post processing do you do with your collections and what amount of editing/deleting of photos do you do before you post photos to your website? That is one of the things I love about digital photography. You can shoot 100's of photos and delete or reject any shot that doesn't turn out. It doesn't cost you anything (refer back to the cheap SD cards above) to take more shots the way it did with film.

 

Do you bring a laptop with you on the cruise to download your photos every night during the cruise or download after return home? Do you take notes on your photos as you go? How much time did you spend putting the collection of photos together?

 

People. I didn't notice many portraits or people in your photos. Are those pictures in different galleries?

 

Prints. Do you print your photos and are photo shops able to handle the panoramas?

 

thanks.

[pierces]

Ok...Here are some answers:

 

I forgot to comment on the comments/notes. Funny and helpful to weave a story of the journey you took to get to the photos you posted. Made it even more entertaining to view the galleries.

 

I don't usually post an image for no reason and sometimes the reason that made sense to me needs a caption to make sense to sane people!:D

 

I have some follow-up questions for you if you don't mind. I tried to get info on the properties of some of the photos by right-clicking but was unable to get that detail. Is it readily available?

 

I reset the gallery format to make the EXIF visible. I didn't realize that the format I originally used didn't have an EXIF option.

 

GPS/Geotagging. Did you use this feature on the HX5V and what did it do for battery life? Do you generally charge the batteries overnight? Do you have a spare battery? My current Canon Powershot A590 uses AA batteries which are readily available and I can also use rechargeables.

 

The Geotagging works well and I never thought to turn it off, but I noticed that if I didn't turn the camera on for a minute or two before taking a series of photos, it used the last known position until it finds the satellites.

 

I never used a whole battery during a day. I do carry a spare and charge the expended one overnight. I far prefer the Li-Ion batteries to AAs. Far greater life and very compact.

 

Multiple cameras. Did you bring multiple cameras and what additional lenses did you bring with you for the DSLR? The reason I ask was the side-by-side with the comment about the difference with and without a polarizing filter.

 

In addition to the HX5V, I take my Sony A700 with three lenses: 11-18 F4.5-f/5.6, 28-75 f/2.8 and 70-200 f/2.8. I also take a teleconverter, but rarely use it. Sometimes I'll take the old Minolta 7D with the Lensbaby attached. From now on, I'll be taking my Canon SD800 with the waterproof housing in case I get the snorkeling bug.

 

The side-by-side was with the A700 but I have a little Cokin mount that allows me to use filters with the SD800 and now with the HX5V.

 

SD Cards. Now that the prices have come down, I have a bunch of the 2G and 4G size and because they don't take any space, I will be bringing as many as I can with me. How many do you bring and how much were filled with video?

 

I took the one 16GB Sandisk Extreme that I ordered with the camera and there was a 4GB in the SD800. As it was, I didn't even use a quarter of the volume and only took about 1000 images and a minute or two of video (I did say I wasn't a video guy!) I usually carry four 8GB CF cards for the A700.

 

"A bunch" of 2GB and 4GB cards should be fine. You may want to buy at least one fast (Class 10) 4GB or 8GB SDHC card to get the most out of the video. Any speed is ok for stills, except maybe for 10/sec burst mode.

 

Photo processing software. I recently loaded a new version of Photoshop Elements onto my Macbook but have yet to make a lot of progress on the steep learning curve to be able to make full use of its features. How much post processing do you do with your collections and what amount of editing/deleting of photos do you do before you post photos to your website? That is one of the things I love about digital photography. You can shoot 100's of photos and delete or reject any shot that doesn't turn out. It doesn't cost you anything (refer back to the cheap SD cards above) to take more shots the way it did with film.

 

I shot about 2400 images and deleted maybe 300, including ones that were just simply duplicates or uninteresting. I don't post all of the photos I like to the web since wading through 300 images in a gallery dilutes the experience in my opinion. I do very little post-processing, but when I do, I use a mix of Elements and the editing tools in Picasa, depending on how much fix is needed. Panoramas from the A700 are stitched in Panorama Maker 2.0. For major manipulation/restoration I use Elements now. I used to use full Photoshop CS2, but it stopped working when I went to Win7 x64. I may cough up the dollars for Photoshop CS5, but Elements does a pretty good job.

 

Do you bring a laptop with you on the cruise to download your photos every night during the cruise or download after return home? Do you take notes on your photos as you go? How much time did you spend putting the collection of photos together?

 

My Wonderful Wife and kids bought me a Netbook for my birthday and it has replaced my Epson P2000 for photo backup and viewing. I used Picasa on the netbook to organize the photos daily and just transferred them to the main system when I got home. The notes are in my head. I have a pretty good visual memory and I tag and comment the images when I get home. All told, it probably took 5 or 6 hours to rename, categorize, tag and edit as needed to post.

 

People. I didn't notice many portraits or people in your photos. Are those pictures in different galleries?

 

People? There were people?

 

It was just me and the Missus on this trip and we remember what we look like. I don't really do many people shots when travelling (I'm just getting into portraiture at home). I actually try to get the ship pictures with a few people as possible.

 

Prints. Do you print your photos and are photo shops able to handle the panoramas?

 

Very rarely print anymore. When I do, I either do prints up to 8x10 on my trusty old Epson R300 and send larger prints out to Costco or a lab I use in Las Vegas for really large prints. BTW, Costco now does 12x24 and 12x36 panoramas!

 

One of the sunrises from this trip may get put on the wall.

 

 

Hope that answered your questions...

 

Dave

[ballawana13]

Ok...Here are some answers:

 

 

Hope that answered your questions...

 

Dave

 

 

Thanks Dave for sharing your expertise and experience. It is immensely helpful to all those of us amateurs who aspire to shoot off a few great shots on our cruise and in our everyday photos.

[Ganny]

I just picked up a Sony HX5V myself and am very pleased. I've had a bunch of P&S cameras and must say this one is the most fun - with the sweep panorama, Twilight and HDR modes. Image quality in poor light is very good.

[lanabanana78]

So after having the HX1 for about 8 months I realized that I wanted to have a smaller P&S for times I want to stick it in my purse or pocket. Decided to get the HX5V and justify it by saying I would allow my husband to take the smaller one when he goes on business trips (he doesn't even want to hold my HX1, which is part of the reason I downgraded from my DSLR - hubby would never help carry it!). So far I'm loving it.

 

Have a couple of questions though. Do you think it would be worth the extra money to get a Memory-Pro Duo HG card? I think the write speed is supposed to be faster than the regular duo. Although the HX5V can use SD I plan to stick wtih MP-duo since I can share with my HX1. Just wondering how much faster the HG is than the regular.

Also, does anybody know if there is a way to make the GPS more accurate. It is pretty accurate - the pics I took in my house showed up on the map as 2 houses away, but then again Google maps never tag the right house as mine!

[pierces]

So after having the HX1 for about 8 months I realized that I wanted to have a smaller P&S for times I want to stick it in my purse or pocket. Decided to get the HX5V and justify it by saying I would allow my husband to take the smaller one when he goes on business trips (he doesn't even want to hold my HX1, which is part of the reason I downgraded from my DSLR - hubby would never help carry it!). So far I'm loving it.

 

Have a couple of questions though. Do you think it would be worth the extra money to get a Memory-Pro Duo HG card? I think the write speed is supposed to be faster than the regular duo. Although the HX5V can use SD I plan to stick wtih MP-duo since I can share with my HX1. Just wondering how much faster the HG is than the regular.

Also, does anybody know if there is a way to make the GPS more accurate. It is pretty accurate - the pics I took in my house showed up on the map as 2 houses away, but then again Google maps never tag the right house as mine!

 

I use a SanDisk Extreme SDHC (HX5V uses both MS & SD) in mine and it works fine. The Extreme series is actually a bit faster than the MS HG card and you can get an 8GB chip for about $50. On the other hand, you may want to stick with MS since your HX1 uses it and can't use SD cards. An 8GB SanDisk MS Pro VideoHD (about the same as the H) goes for $33 on Amazon. Plenty fast enough for the HX5V, even with the 1080i video.

 

http://www.amazon.com/SanDisk-SDMSPDHV-008G-A15-Video-MSPD-Memory/dp/B0012TWW9U/ref=sr_1_9?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1275474458&sr=8-9

 

Dave