Camera purchase advice please.
Discussion
As per the title really. Mrs Easytiger is about to give birth any day now and I'd like to buy a digital camera (or at least one that doesn't require me to get the film developed), that takes decent quality photographs plus video capability and is easy for a novice like me to use out of the box. Don't mind splashing out a bit so budget of say up to a grand though obviously happy to spend less if you think my complete lack of technique doesn't require that kind of spend. Will be used largely for baby/child snaps and holidays rather than any high-speed or technical type pics. All advice gratefully received.
Mods, apologies just seen there is a photography and video thread. Could you please move there as I am unsure how to. Thanks. Great start!
Mods, apologies just seen there is a photography and video thread. Could you please move there as I am unsure how to. Thanks. Great start!
First of all - congratulations! The "PH Parents of 2016" in the health forum is where all the new Dads are to be found.
With regards to cameras, I have loads, from DLSRs to compacts and GoPros, but 95% of photos and 100% of videos of my son have been on iPhones of various family members (shared on Apple Photos shared albums). When you've got a new baby you have plenty of stuff that comes with it and we've found we have enough to carry around without extra cameras.
I'll use this as an excuse to post a photo of my son, taken on iPhone:
Owen by Lewis Craik, on Flickr
</prouddadmode>
With regards to cameras, I have loads, from DLSRs to compacts and GoPros, but 95% of photos and 100% of videos of my son have been on iPhones of various family members (shared on Apple Photos shared albums). When you've got a new baby you have plenty of stuff that comes with it and we've found we have enough to carry around without extra cameras.
I'll use this as an excuse to post a photo of my son, taken on iPhone:
Owen by Lewis Craik, on Flickr
</prouddadmode>
Awesome pic! And thanks Lewis. I was sort of thinking about just using my iPhone for pics and vids but I went into expectant father guilt mode and thought I should look for a proper camera. I hadn't even considered all the stuff I'll be hauling around for the baby anyway. Pending some recommendations on this thread I'll take a look at some cameras and see how compact and easy they are and make a decision from there.
easytiger123 said:
Awesome pic! And thanks Lewis. I was sort of thinking about just using my iPhone for pics and vids but I went into expectant father guilt mode and thought I should look for a proper camera. I hadn't even considered all the stuff I'll be hauling around for the baby anyway. Pending some recommendations on this thread I'll take a look at some cameras and see how compact and easy they are and make a decision from there.
One other thing - make sure you get the photos suitably backed up/in the cloud or something.Just to second the above post about backing up your photos.
The micro SD card that I've been using in my Android phones for a few years suddenly died and with it went all my photos and videos. EXCEPT for the fact I've just upgraded a month ago and a lot was backed up then (I wouldn't normally bother backing anything up).
I was lucky, I only lost a months worth of photos including some car pics and a visit to Old Trafford, also a few of my young nieces. If it had been baby pictures over a much longer period I would be devastated.
The micro SD card that I've been using in my Android phones for a few years suddenly died and with it went all my photos and videos. EXCEPT for the fact I've just upgraded a month ago and a lot was backed up then (I wouldn't normally bother backing anything up).
I was lucky, I only lost a months worth of photos including some car pics and a visit to Old Trafford, also a few of my young nieces. If it had been baby pictures over a much longer period I would be devastated.
As others have said on here, the Sony RX100 MK3 is one of the best, or if you really want to go for it, the Sony RX100 MK4 - note the MK5 is due out sometime soon but so is your baby so you probably can't hang around for a few more months! Buy it from John Lewis and take out the additional 3 year accidental damage warranty because you might need it with a baby in the house!
I previously owned a RX100 MK1 and was mighty pleased with the results till it broke, I exchanged it for a Sony WX500 which was horrible photo quality in comparison, exchanged that for a Canon G7X which was the wrong colour in the box so returned that, only to be told the black version was out-of-stock, so went for the RX100 MK3 which was more expensive but I have to say I am mighty pleased with. It takes decent quality photos and is also very good with recording video which is a must.
At this point I must say you can't achieve such gorgeous blurry depth of field photos as when using a proper DSLR but you're probably more likely to be carrying the RX100 around with you. If you're considering an inexpensive but decent quality DSLR then the Canon 100D is pretty good, pick up a Canon 50mm f1.8 lens for some lovely portrait photos if you set it to 'Av' for Aperture, rather than leaving it in AUTO mode, and remember to set the aperture to f1.8 for a narrow depth-of-field and that lovely background blurred effect - Bokeh is the technical term for this. I bought the slightly bigger Canon 700D mainly because it had a few more gadgets and a longer battery life and I'm thoroughly pleased with it. There are better cameras out there but it's a damn good start.
Don't forget to buy the SD card, if you're intending to video then buy a 32GB class 10 SD card, and buy it from either JL or PC World, don't risk buying a fake from one of the internet sites because for what they cost it's just not worth the grief.
In terms of use of the Sony RX100, it will work straight out of the box in 'Auto' mode, though you can achieve even better results by experimenting in 'A' for Aperture mode, or 'S' for Shutter mode for when you're photographing faster moving kids like ours and don't want motion blurred! There are some excellent tutorial books available on Amazon either for instant download or in proper book format. Do a search on flickr.com for RX100 to see the quality of photographs across a wide range of subjects.
I'm so pleased that I purchased one of these to photograph and video my kids as they get older, is quite astonishing how time has flown by...
As a footnote, most modern mobile phone cameras do tend to be pretty good so are better than nothing, though they do tend to struggle a bit in low light conditions unless the flash is used which makes the lighting rather harsh. Avoid flash whenever possible.
Hope this helps.... and good luck
I previously owned a RX100 MK1 and was mighty pleased with the results till it broke, I exchanged it for a Sony WX500 which was horrible photo quality in comparison, exchanged that for a Canon G7X which was the wrong colour in the box so returned that, only to be told the black version was out-of-stock, so went for the RX100 MK3 which was more expensive but I have to say I am mighty pleased with. It takes decent quality photos and is also very good with recording video which is a must.
At this point I must say you can't achieve such gorgeous blurry depth of field photos as when using a proper DSLR but you're probably more likely to be carrying the RX100 around with you. If you're considering an inexpensive but decent quality DSLR then the Canon 100D is pretty good, pick up a Canon 50mm f1.8 lens for some lovely portrait photos if you set it to 'Av' for Aperture, rather than leaving it in AUTO mode, and remember to set the aperture to f1.8 for a narrow depth-of-field and that lovely background blurred effect - Bokeh is the technical term for this. I bought the slightly bigger Canon 700D mainly because it had a few more gadgets and a longer battery life and I'm thoroughly pleased with it. There are better cameras out there but it's a damn good start.
Don't forget to buy the SD card, if you're intending to video then buy a 32GB class 10 SD card, and buy it from either JL or PC World, don't risk buying a fake from one of the internet sites because for what they cost it's just not worth the grief.
In terms of use of the Sony RX100, it will work straight out of the box in 'Auto' mode, though you can achieve even better results by experimenting in 'A' for Aperture mode, or 'S' for Shutter mode for when you're photographing faster moving kids like ours and don't want motion blurred! There are some excellent tutorial books available on Amazon either for instant download or in proper book format. Do a search on flickr.com for RX100 to see the quality of photographs across a wide range of subjects.
I'm so pleased that I purchased one of these to photograph and video my kids as they get older, is quite astonishing how time has flown by...
As a footnote, most modern mobile phone cameras do tend to be pretty good so are better than nothing, though they do tend to struggle a bit in low light conditions unless the flash is used which makes the lighting rather harsh. Avoid flash whenever possible.
Hope this helps.... and good luck
Edited by rich888 on Tuesday 4th October 22:18
Thanks everyone for your comments. I have ordered the Sony RX100 Mk3 and will also get the memory card recommended too. It looks absolutely ideal for me. I'll probably still end up using my iPhone too as I've always got it to hand but as I said I really wanted to have something better for some higher quality stuff. As someone who has never backed up his iPhone I'll also take those comments on board too.
Now I just need to hope that Amazon delivers before Mrs Easytiger does!
Thanks again, that was really helpful.
Now I just need to hope that Amazon delivers before Mrs Easytiger does!
Thanks again, that was really helpful.
easytiger123 said:
Thanks everyone for your comments. I have ordered the Sony RX100 Mk3 and will also get the memory card recommended too. It looks absolutely ideal for me. I'll probably still end up using my iPhone too as I've always got it to hand but as I said I really wanted to have something better for some higher quality stuff. As someone who has never backed up his iPhone I'll also take those comments on board too.
Now I just need to hope that Amazon delivers before Mrs Easytiger does!
Thanks again, that was really helpful.
Great stuff, it's a fantastic bit of kit and works straight out of the box, also worth mentioning is that it takes well over 500 photos on one battery charge if you don't use the flash. I speak from experience. Just watch that the shutter speed doesn't drop too low such as 1/30th in 'Auto' which tends to result in blurred pics, switch to 'S' shutter priority and increase the shutter speed to 1/80th or higher to reduce the chance of blurred pics and try a few test shots ahead of the birth to see what happens.Now I just need to hope that Amazon delivers before Mrs Easytiger does!
Thanks again, that was really helpful.
In terms of RX100 tutorials, there are plenty of videos on Youtube, however it might be worth your while investing in a kindle book, namely 'Photographer's Guide to the Sony DSC-RX100 III: Getting the Most from Sony's Pocketable Digital Camera' by Alexander White - Kindle Edition costs £4.54 so you can be reading it while you're waiting for your wife to give birth
For what it's worth, the latest iPhones do tend to automatically upload photos onto iCloud if you have it switched on, so even if you break the phone you should be able to restore from an iCloud backup providing you have enough iCloud space, it does tend to remind you to increase storage space if it's running out. I recently changed a faulty iPhone 5 so can vouch it does work quite well - isn't perfect though it did backup the photos and videos.
rich888 said:
Great stuff, it's a fantastic bit of kit and works straight out of the box, also worth mentioning is that it takes well over 500 photos on one battery charge if you don't use the flash. I speak from experience. Just watch that the shutter speed doesn't drop too low such as 1/30th in 'Auto' which tends to result in blurred pics, switch to 'S' shutter priority and increase the shutter speed to 1/80th or higher to reduce the chance of blurred pics and try a few test shots ahead of the birth to see what happens.
In terms of RX100 tutorials, there are plenty of videos on Youtube, however it might be worth your while investing in a kindle book, namely 'Photographer's Guide to the Sony DSC-RX100 III: Getting the Most from Sony's Pocketable Digital Camera' by Alexander White - Kindle Edition costs £4.54 so you can be reading it while you're waiting for your wife to give birth
For what it's worth, the latest iPhones do tend to automatically upload photos onto iCloud if you have it switched on, so even if you break the phone you should be able to restore from an iCloud backup providing you have enough iCloud space, it does tend to remind you to increase storage space if it's running out. I recently changed a faulty iPhone 5 so can vouch it does work quite well - isn't perfect though it did backup the photos and videos.
Thank a lot Rich. That's really helpful and much appreciated. The camera arrived last night (baby still not here!) so I'm planning on spending this weekend playing around with it, and will sort the shutter speed as you advise. Thanks again!In terms of RX100 tutorials, there are plenty of videos on Youtube, however it might be worth your while investing in a kindle book, namely 'Photographer's Guide to the Sony DSC-RX100 III: Getting the Most from Sony's Pocketable Digital Camera' by Alexander White - Kindle Edition costs £4.54 so you can be reading it while you're waiting for your wife to give birth
For what it's worth, the latest iPhones do tend to automatically upload photos onto iCloud if you have it switched on, so even if you break the phone you should be able to restore from an iCloud backup providing you have enough iCloud space, it does tend to remind you to increase storage space if it's running out. I recently changed a faulty iPhone 5 so can vouch it does work quite well - isn't perfect though it did backup the photos and videos.
Congrats on your imminent new arrival.....One word of advice, don't write off your phone camera. The latest iPhone (7) and other like the S7 have amazing cameras, much better than previous phone cameras. I've taken more photos of our little on the S7 than any thing else, mainly because I always have it with me. I grab these two shots whilst on holiday, with baby strapped to me as well .
. Gassing Station | Photography & Video | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff