Classic British Flight Sim

Hello all!

Im looking into buying 2 Digital cameras in the near future.

One is for my mum who's looking for something about the £100 mark and the other is for myself looking to replace my 'DigiLife' (whoever the hell they are!) DGL660. Im looking to spend upto £350.

Mum's cam I assume would be used for general snapping whilst mine would be used more commonly for Aircraft piccys. Though general snapping would be used as well.

Can anyone recommend the best cameras available for these prices?

Any help would be appreciated,

Cheers,

We have a Fuji 210A, couple years old, but for $149 USD it is great, and
easy to use!! Very easy on batterys!!

The new model is about the same price!!

http://img340.imageshack.us/img340/9747 ... 0018xv.jpg

It's a bit over your price limit but i've just ordered an EOS 350d and will let you know.

Realised it was silly to spend a fortune on film which I was only going to scan anyway...

I've used Sony for point and shoot for a long while and find them very good and easy to use. The 2.5 inch LCD on the back of my DSC-W1 is most useful if not quite as hi-res as it could be.

the Lumix DMC-FZ5 Digital Camera, 5.0 Megapixel
is a nice one
I think it has as many features as a digital camera can
have
I think it will be my replacment for the D30 with a 100-400 IS
I recently sold
(it's just too big and draws to much attention for many
situations)
heres a link to view it
http://www.compusa.com/products/product ... tal_Camera


12x Optical Zoom and a Brightness of F2.8 to 3.3
The LEICA DC VARIO-ELMARIT lens is a small, lightweight lens that packs the same zoom power as a big, clunky 400mm-class film camera lens. This 12x optical zoom lens is super-bright too, at F2.8 to 3.3 with a focal length of 6 to 72mm (equivalent to 36mm to 432mm in a 35mm film camera). You've got all the power and flexibility you need to take exquisitely beautiful shots all the way from telephoto to wide angle and macro. The DMC-FZ5 also has a 4x digital zoom. Use it together with the 12x optical zoom and you've got ultra-powerful 48x zooming1 - roughly equivalent to a huge 1680mm lens on a 35mm camera.
ATB
joe

When i went to buy one for Aviation photography, two shops offered me the Nikkon D50 (an SLR) which has 6 million pixels, is fully auto or manual, has loads of programs/settings, and I was pleasantly suprised by the price: £459.99 from where I got mine from. A year or two ago it would have cost somewhere in the £1000 range!

Though you will want a zoom lens of course: a 70-300mm (of which the 300 is equivelent to 480 of an 'old' 35mm camera!! :shock:) will set you back another £120 or so at the moment.

I don't think there's a digi SLR below that model, but if you wait a while longer, or wait for a sale, it could well be nearer to your budget!

My mum is also after a camera around the £100 figure. After reading up on all the cameras in that price range, I've decided upon the Canon A430. 4x optical zoom and 4mp for around £99. Also available in 4 colours

I'm also looking for a new camera to replace my Canon S1 IS. Whilst the likes of the ulta zoom cameras have some good features (S3 IS, S9500, FZ30 etc) they are far from great for aviation photography.
They all tend to hunt when it comes to focusing on a moving subject at the telephoto end of the zoom and as with all digicams they suffer with noise, some more so than others.

With rgds to the Panasonic FZ30, that produces quite noisy images.


The best cameras are of course DSLR's but they come at a price. However..... yesterday I stumbled upon the Pentax *ist DL2. It's a 6.3mp DSLR with an 18-55mm kit lens all for £349.99 at Jessops. It also uses the same image chip as the Nikon D50.

Pentax are releasing 2 new DSLR's over the next 2 months although these will be more expensive than the *ist DL2.

Whatever cameras you purchase, you will of course have to include the cost of rechargeable batteries and a larger memory card.
I've read some very good reviews on the *ist DL and DL2 so I'm off to Jessops tomorrow to check it out and if I like it I shall make a purchase. Once I'm paid at the end of the month I'll then buy a 55-200mm lens for £106. Larger lenses can come at a later date.

Sounds like you're in a similar situation to me CB.

Mum was looking into the Sony Cybershot S600 but I put her off after reading the reviews on Amazon! They make it seem terrible, plagued with technical troubles almost!

Still....I shall bear in mind what you say and shop around.

Thanks for your help!

Cheers,

I have a Canon Powershot A75, its a couple of years old now, 3.2 MP and 3X optical zoomand it also does video clips. Theres probably a new model out by now but it wasnt expensive, only £179 including a compact flash card (though admittedly a 32mb one) but it does allow me full control over aperture, shutter speed, ISO rating, colour balance and various other settings and features in the same way as a dSLR would (which was a pre-requisite for me).

ISO range is 50-400 and the 400 is basically unusable because its too noisy but for most daylight stuff its good and the lens is nice and sharp which is also important to me. No point taking a well composed picture of an interesting subject if its soft and low quality!

AndyMinx wrote:Sounds like you're in a similar situation to me CB.

Mum was looking into the Sony Cybershot S600 but I put her off after reading the reviews on Amazon! They make it seem terrible, plagued with technical troubles almost!

Still....I shall bear in mind what you say and shop around.

Thanks for your help!

Cheers,

I spent a few hours looking at cameras for my mum and as I say, the Canon A430 came out tops for that budget.

Good review sites to look at are:

http://www.dcresource.com
http://www.steves-digicams.com
http://www.dpreview.com
http://www.dcviews.com/

and good (cheap) shops:

http://www.digitaldepot.co.uk
http://www.parkcameras.com
http://www.camerabox.co.uk
http://www.cameraking.co.uk

I'm still using my Fujifilm S304.
Well pleased with it.
Got it from PC World :shock: and managed to blag the salesman into letting me have 2x128mb cards for the price of one.
At the time, the camera was cheaper than anywhere else.
I suppose cameras are like cars....................each to his own.