digital camera recommendations

[Wasserpest]

You will love the picture quality of the G5! Canon has packed an amazing variety of features into that little box. There is also quite a bit of accessories available for it, above all the speedlight flashes. Don't forget to get the adapter that allows for lens attachments (like the UV filter to protect the lens from dust, scratches and fat fingers).

[Aftica]

Any of you photo guru's got an opinion on the following...

I am looking at getting a good digital camera (good in my mind) and I am looking a a couple...

Minolta DIMAGE A1

and

Canon EOS 300D Digital Rebel


I am liking the price on the Minolta more but the Canon does have some nice features etc... I am looking for comments - good and bad on the Minolta in comparison to the Canon... and the future expandability of the Minolta if I want to expand it later on etc...

Tnks..

[pedietz]

Even more Canon announcements...
A75
SD110

Also see this thread near the end:
http://www.plantedtank.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1058

Having a camera with a manual F-stop looks awesome !

[GDominy]

I just bought a Canon Powershot A80 and I freakin love it...

[nornicle]

I also use the Canon A80, its a good mix of 'run and click' and manual function, great for the arm chair photographer in all of us :P

my *only* complaint is some yellowing of colour when using artificial lighting and no flash, it requires a bit of touch up work to correct the colour... but lots of cameras do this.. dunno why..

[Wasserpest]

Originally Posted by nornicle

my *only* complaint is some yellowing of colour when using artificial lighting and no flash, it requires a bit of touch up work to correct the colour... but lots of cameras do this.. dunno why..

While your eyes adapt to all sorts of colors, your cameras LCD just records objectively what is there. Artificial -- incandescent -- light has a color temp of around 2700K, while regular sunlight hits at about 5500K, much more blue. Therefore the yellowish appearance of incandescents. That is how it really looked!
Automatic whitepoint adjustment can sometimes balance that out, but often it is overwhelmed by incandescent or fluorescent light colors. Your cam might have some kind of manual whitepoint adjustment, where you can set it to incandescent lighting, or even set the whitepoint with a white piece of paper or furniture or whatnot.
The only problem... I always forget to set it back, and the next day images look really cold :roll:

[GDominy]

The A80 has an awesome array of features including several different White balance options. I've finally been able to filter out a lot of the artificial yellow/green/pink haze of the aquarium lights using this...

I've even been able to use a flash finally for in-tank macro shots and not have the colour look totally yellow and washed out.

Easiest way to set your White balnace is to keep a small white piece of plastic at the back of the tank, something around 3" x 3". Focus on it then do an automatic White balance adjustment.

In my two largest tanks I don't do this as I have white sand in the bottom I use for this purpose, but the same priciple applies...