Cameras - Nikon

[Deqlyn]

Anybody have the new Nikon Coolpix S60?

Looking to get it for my GF but want to make sure it doesnt suck. The reviews I have read seem mixed but the complaints seem like ones from professional picture takers. In my case it'd just be for everyday use. I dont know much about cameras so wondering if any of you do.

Any thoughts or you nerds just stick to myth

[Frumius]

Any thoughts...

I have no thoughts, and I know you said you read reviews, but I recommend seeing what they say about it at Popular Photography (popphoto.com) and especially at dpreview.com
http://www.dpreview.com/news/0808/08080703nikons60.asp

After looking, I see neither one has a review per se, but they do have some info.

Ok, wait -- I do have thoughts. What I'm wary of in a point and shoot digital camera is the lag between pressing the shutter-release button and the actual shutter action. It's worse than having lag during an archer fight! So make sure that it's instantaneous, or close to it.

I see it's touch-screen... I love the iPod Touch and iPhone, but that touch screen is going to impact battery life. You sure you want that? I know from my digital SLR bodies that using the display a lot impacts battery life tremendously. I leave it off normally. For a touch screen, though, you'd have to have it on almost all the time.

[Death's Avatar]

Hmm. Can't speak for the S60, but I had a coolpix 990 and then an L1, and I found myself pleased with both. I mean, as pleased as you can be with a point and shoot anyway.

-DA

[Eddaweaver]

Do not get the S60. It has a F3.8 lens: that is one of the slowest you could ever find in a compact camera and folding lenses are usually lousy. Its sensor is small at only 1/2.3" which is why the base ISO is only 64.

Look for a camera with a sensor that is 1/1.8" or larger and a F2.9 or faster lens.
http://www.dpreview.com/learn/?/Glossar ... zes_01.htm

Of course, if you've got the money:
http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/specs/N ... on_d90.asp
http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/specs/F ... S100FS.asp

[Frumius]

the base ISO is only 64.

I don't understand this part. If you can actually set the ISO to 64, I'd be stoked. My lowest native ISO is 200 and I'd love to be able to set it lower if I chose. On the other hand, if that is the native ISO -- by "native ISO" I only mean the ISO higher than which you begin to get noticeable noise -- then that's too slow for everyday snapshooting.

From the little I gather, the S60 has some techie bells and whistles (the touch screen), but some practical disadvantages, especially in terms of its light-gathering ability, meaning poor low-light performance: more times in low light that the shutter speed has to be so slow that it can't stop much motion (you get motion blur); more need for flash; more need for wider apertures resulting in less depth of field... Oh, it's just awful. No, not awful, but a bummer. Well, inconvenient, anyway.

As Edda pointed out, the faster the lens the better. A "fast" lens, oddly enough, means one that has a wider maximum aperture -- you want that for better low-light performance especially. The F-number (the F3.8 and F2.9 that Edda mentioned) refers to its aperture size, and the smaller the number the larger the aperture and the better the lens will gather light.

[Death's Avatar]

If he is getting her a point and shoot most of those are irrelevant.

-DA

[Deqlyn]

So I checked into the Sony Cybershot t770 or w/e. since the people who didnt like the Nikon S60 went and got this instead.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B001CC ... d_i=507846

Checked it out at bestbuy and clearly the complaints were right about S60. The back LCD doesnt show the pictures at that high quality and I think the Cybershot is a bit more mature. I dont think my GF knows about ISO's and what not and its just for recreational use. No serious picture taking (professional), just that girls taking pictures stuff. Oh and of course it must fit in the purse. Think im going with the sony. Thanks for all your help.

[vinylrake]

as someone who purchased a basic point-n-shoot camera, I can say with a great deal of confidence that things like warm-up-time (time from turning on camera to when you can take a picture), cycle time (the delay -between taking one picture and another) and low-light capabilities REALLY do matter.

If I am just pointing and shooting I don't want to have to wait 3 seconds or longer between shots, and I definitely don't want to be limited to only daylight or well-lit locations. That's the point of a decent point and shoot - bring it pretty much anywhere and get decent pictures - not going to be reproduced in digital art galleries, but I don't want to be missing photos because by the time I turned my camera on or waited to take a picture the moment was gone or all my night/indoor shoots come out blurring or motion blurred.

[Eddaweaver]

I don't understand this part. If you can actually set the ISO to 64, I'd be stoked. My lowest native ISO is 200 and I'd love to be able to set it lower if I chose.

You must have a dSLR. There may be some way of setting it to 100 hidden in a menu somewhere.
With compact cameras, setting the base ISO below 100 is a compromise of shutter or depth of field in order to reduce noise on an undersized sensor.

I don't think they look significantly better than the Nikon S60
http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/compare ... 0&show=all

[Deqlyn]

Definately not a huge significance but I went to the store nad the 3.5 LCD on the back was waaaay better on the sony, than the S60.

There were multiple funtionality complaints on the S60 over the the SONY as well. I'm probably going to wait until after XMAS to buy it cause price wil go down for sure in the economy. No one is buying nothing.

[£N]

There were multiple funtionality complaints on the S60 over the the SONY as well. I'm probably going to wait until after XMAS to buy it cause price wil go down for sure in the economy. No one is buying nothing.

I don't think the economy has much to do with it. I'm fairly positive it's just standard procedure to mark things down in the off season.