help anyone with digital camera purchase

[windhorn]

hi,

I am buying a digital camera and need some help.

I want a 4 megapixel camera with an optical zoom of 10x. I am trying to keep the cost to around 500.
I was looking at the olympus c750, the minolta dimage z2, and the panasonic luminex fz10.

I am wondering if its important to have a hot shoe on your camera. If I do not will my pictures far away be dark. Say if I am in an auditorium. Or can I fix that in the lab.
also see the newer cameras have the antishake. With a long zoom will I have problems with blurring or can that also be corrected in the lab.
I will be taking pictures of dance in an auditorium that I probably will not be able to use a flash so I am looking for a camers that performs well in low light that wont be blurred.

so any help would be great... dance recitals are coming up and I have been putting this off for a long time!!!

[Photo-John]

For the type of photograpy you're going to be doing you should be using a tripod. Anti-shake technology will help, but it won't always do the job. And the longer the focal length, the more you'll need it. A hot shoe isn't going to make much difference either, unless you're within about 40 feet. You'll need a powerful, expensive flash to take advantage of it in the type of conditions you're describing. And you say they don't allow flash anyway?

Because of the type of photography you want to do, I'd stick with cameras that have anti-shake. I think that would be Panasonic, Konica Minolta, and Canon has one now, too. Anti-shake (or Image Stabilization) works very well. But a tripod works better. So, if you can use a tripod in the auditorium, that would be best. Still, anti-shake will free you up to move around a little and it wil come in handy other times.

[windhorn]

so you do think its worth it to get the image stablizer cameras?
Is the addtional flash a big deal to have. The only reason I ask is I hear digital cameras do not take very good pictures in low light so when I do have a situation where I can use a flash will it make a big difference to have the hot shoe to add a additional flash or does the ones on the camera work pretty good?

I guess what I am getting at is if I have to give up something would it be the image stablizer or the hot shoe... the only one I am finding that has it all is the panasonic luminex fz10 and it takes a more expensive battery verses the ones I can just buy at most stores..

I was looking at maybe the cannon powershot S1 Is but it is only 3 megapixels and not hot shoe but does have the image stabilizer.

I like the new minolta that came out but its 8 megapixels and 1000 and didn't really want to spend that much. or should I say my husband wants to keep it a little lower then that....any other suggestions? thanks!!

[Spike]

No, blurry photos can not be fixed in the lab. (By the way, with a digial camera, you pretty much are the lab.)

Yes, zooming the camera to its max and hand-holding it will tend to cause the images to be softer, which is why image stabilization or a tripod would be very helpful.

No, the flashes built into cameras are not comparable to external flash units. They are not nearly as powerful, and generally only have a range of 10 - 12 feet, depending on the camera.

When reading the reviews on the cameras you're considering, look to see what ISO ratings are available and how good the image quality is at the high ISO settings. High ISO would be helpful in low-light settings, as long as you don't mind a little noise.

Spike

so you do think its worth it to get the image stablizer cameras?
Is the addtional flash a big deal to have. The only reason I ask is I hear digital cameras do not take very good pictures in low light so when I do have a situation where I can use a flash will it make a big difference to have the hot shoe to add a additional flash or does the ones on the camera work pretty good?

I guess what I am getting at is if I have to give up something would it be the image stablizer or the hot shoe... the only one I am finding that has it all is the panasonic luminex fz10 and it takes a more expensive battery verses the ones I can just buy at most stores..

I was looking at maybe the cannon powershot S1 Is but it is only 3 megapixels and not hot shoe but does have the image stabilizer.

I like the new minolta that came out but its 8 megapixels and 1000 and didn't really want to spend that much. or should I say my husband wants to keep it a little lower then that....any other suggestions? thanks!!

[windhorn]

thanks for all the help... I was wondering what you think about the new dimage a2 by minolta??
I like that one but my husband wants to stay around 500... any suggestions......
he was looking at the dimage z1 and the dimage z2 by cannon...only problem is there is not hotshoe I believe........what do you think.....
also the powershot S1 IS has no hotshoe but stabilizer...
which do you think is more important?

[tk-6411]

windhorn, you are asking the right questions. It seldom does any good to shoot indoors with a powerfull zoom that has terrible flash coverage at the distance you are shooting at. I have several digital zoom cameras and the best by far is the Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ10. The problem with my Canon Powershot S1 IS is that the flash isn't powerfull enough to catch what I want sometimes on stage at an audtorium....sometimes yielding terribly underexposed shots. True you can touch these up in Photoshop to some extent but with the Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ10 I never need to.

The Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ10 takes great photos and with its hot shoe any standard flash all the way up to the powerfull but large Sunpak 522 and 544 Handle Mount Flash units can be used with no trouble at all giving you all the ample coverage needed. The only problem with the Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ10 is the lack of recording images in RAW mode...not a problem for me. An added plus is the 12X Leica zoom lens on the Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ10....you just never realize how much getting a little extra reach is important in certain situations till you need it. And the lens is a quality Leica lens.

All in all its a great camera and I highly recommend it...although its a bit larger than many other ultra zooms out on the market. But its light weight and 4mp and 12X Leica lens all add up to a great system. I'ld recommend picking up several batteries as it uses a proprietary one but its a small price to pay for a camera that once you use it you will be glad you passed on the other cameras out on the market. My 2 cents.

[tk-6411]

Another thing....don't get caught in the whole megapixel advertising scam. An 8 megapixel image is huge and many people haven't the computer power or resources to handle those large size images appropriately or effectively. The 8 megapixel image won't necessarily be any sharper than a properly shot and exposed 3-4 or 5 megapixel one - rather it will give you more of an opportunity to crop the image (in a sense: digitally zoom in on a certain part of the image). So just be aware that a 3-4 Megapixel camera can take excellent and sharp images depending on your skill - yeilding excellent print sizes up to 8x10. I'ld view the 8 megapixel cameras more like a medium format system and unless you have the need or desire to print A2 or poster sized prints or need the extra pixels for image cropping you'ld have more fun and more photos with a 3-5 megapixel camera.