pics of furry animals

[yaronsh]

Can anyone comment on, or better yet, post examples of, the performance of various low-end P&S cameras when taking pictures of your fuzzy friends?

I'd like to buy, at some point, a low-end P&S, which would be used in no small part on my cats. I bought an F401 a couple of months ago, and returned it within a week, in no small part due to the horrible performance on close ups of my cats, regardless of camera configuration. (Also horrible artifacts in dark regions of the shots.)(Other than that, great camera...)

Thanks!

[Canon Man]

All of these images were taken with a Canon PowerShot A60, it's a 2MP camera. Appearently, it takes amazing pictures. Oh, and none of these were taken with a tripod. So, if they're a little blurry, it's because I was shaking.

http://www.wrestlingvg.com/uploader/...s/IMG_0037.jpg

http://www.wrestlingvg.com/uploader/...s/IMG_0036.jpg

http://www.wrestlingvg.com/uploader/...s/IMG_0911.JPG

http://www.wrestlingvg.com/uploader/...s/IMG_0865.jpg

http://www.wrestlingvg.com/uploader/...s/IMG_0393.JPG

[yaronsh]

Looking back at my pics from the F401, the main issue was: When taking a picture of a cat in front of a well-defined object, the camera seems to focus on the well-defined object. Also, the worst noise seems to be in brown regions - and one of my cats is brown.

The attached pics are cropped, resized, and re-JPG'ed to fit within this site's limitations. The cropped portions demonstrate the salient points.

[Canon Man]

Wow, those look pretty bad, how many MP was that camera?

And in order to focus on whats in front you need to go into manual, or it's always going to try to focus on whatever is easier. That, or go into macro mode.

[yaronsh]

> how many MP was that camera?

2MP - but, as we know by now, that's not what matters (see "What camera is right for me?" thread).

> you need to go into manual

Manual what? Manual focus? Do low-end D-P&S cameras have manual focus? I went thru all possible settings, and nothing helped.

> That, or go into macro mode.

Well, the shots weren't that close... Keep in mind that what I posted is cropped to fit the limitations of this site. In the originals, the cats' faces are centered.

Maybe the Fuji F401 is just a lousy camera for these purposes... Great for other purposes... Do low-end D-P&S cameras tend to be narrowly optimized for particular types of subjects?

- Yaron

[Canon Man]

I think I payed around $210 total for my camera and a 128MB Kingston CF card. I think I got a pretty good deal. I consider my camera to be P&S, because of the great auto mode, but at the same time you've got all the manual controls. I'm not quite sure what it is.

And with my camera, I go into macro for any pictures closer than 12"

...Well actually, I take that back, my camera will give me sort of a "demo" shot before the actual picture is taken, so I'll switch between macro and AF. Although I've noticed that unless I'm zoomed in, macro will be used under 12"

[yaronsh]

So I looked at the specs for the Canons (A series, S series), and hey, look at all the controls on a compact P&S... Have to say I'm impressed. And Canon seems to be getting great reviews all around here in terms of noise & the such.

I have to say, one reason I did not opt for a Canon - other than that the low-end Canons were still higher priced than what I wanted to pay for a low-end P&S - is the numerous reports of the lense getting stuck in the "out" position - too numerous to ignore. That's one reason that if I'm going to buy a Canon, I want to buy it from a store, not a bargain web site.

If I find a good-priced Canon, I'll run some tests - see if it has the same focusing problem with fuzzy cats in front of crisp backgrounds (I'd think you really shouldn't have to manual focus).

- Yaron