Budget Digicam for Nature Macro Photography, something with

[chupicabra30]

Hello,

My budget is around $250 max for camera, media. I currently own the nikon coolpix 2500 but the auto focus is horrendous. I was wondering if someone could recommend a good macro budget digicam can be 2mp since that is what I have now. This is just for being able to identify butterfly, bug later on at home. But I need speed, because right now when I depress the button it takes me a good 2 minutes to get the dang focus dialied in. It does this weird thing to where when I depress the button halfway and hold it, it will focus once, and then look outta focus, then look in focus, so I will then depress all the way and it automatically refocuses and creates a shot that is out of focus! It is maddening!

Thanks in advance for any advice. I need this soon, cause I am going on a once in a lifetime (well okay maybe not once in a life time, but it will be a long, long time before I get to do this again) trip to South East Arizona on a birding/nature excursion and the last time I went I was so bumbed because there was an amazing subtropical black with hotpink spotted butterfly I could not catch on film because of my horrible camera.

[mtclimber]

You might take a look at the Fuji F-10 and the Olympus SP-310/350 (which have a super macro mode), which do well with macro shots.

MT

[RegBaron]

Hi
I have a Olympus C740 Zoom 3.2 MP has a Great Macro and also a 10x Zoom also uses 4 AA batterys, Recomend Nimh Rechargebles.This very small flower was taken hand held with the macro

[RegBaron]

Her is another Pic taken with the Zoom,also hand held

[chupicabra30]

RegBaron wrote:

Her is another Pic taken with the Zoom,also hand held

Wow! Very nice! I wish I saw this before I got the camera I did. But I am somewhat happy with what I got while it does not do so well in the zoom department 4x it does excellent in the macro department and focuses very fast! Although it does have a 16x digital zoom which actually works pretty well.

I ended up with a Canon A610, gotta figure out how to tweak the color and get the pictures to come out sharper when hand holding and trying to shoot a bird that is 10-20 feet away.

[mtclimber]

Reg-

Here is a handheld shot I did this afternoon with my Pentax DS and the Pentax 50-200mm lens at max zoom (300mm). Considering that this was a handheld shot I was pleased with the results.

MT

[flippedgazelle]

Chupi, I have the Canon A620 and have found the best way to get reasonably sharp, hand-held pictures is to have the camera as close toyour body as possible - your hands tend to shake more when the arms are fully extended. Even better is to prop the camera on something solid, or lean against a sturdy structure. I also snap 3-4 pics in a row, knowing that at least one will come out sharp. I guess you can tell I'm not a real photographer! Also, you may want to try setting the ISO to 100.

What kind of color issues are you having? I find the A620's colors to be properly saturated and pretty accurate.

MT, that is an awesome photo!!!! :-)

[chupicabra30]

flippedgazelle wrote:

Chupi, I have the Canon A620 and have found the best way to get reasonably sharp, hand-held pictures is to have the camera as close toyour body as possible - your hands tend to shake more when the arms are fully extended. Even better is to prop the camera on something solid, or lean against a sturdy structure. I also snap 3-4 pics in a row, knowing that at least one will come out sharp. I guess you can tell I'm not a real photographer! Also, you may want to try setting the ISO to 100.

What kind of color issues are you having? I find the A620's colors to be properly saturated and pretty accurate.

MT, that is an awesome photo!!!! :-)

Hi and thanks for reading my post.

Well as for the color, it just does not capture color the way I see them. In other words I am having trouble getting the colors to look like what I see which for instance on one subject an aquarium coral the green capture in the image is not the green I see it is subdued not as bright.

Thanks for your help.

Oh and great shots you guys! Totally amazing! One thing I like about my camera is that it has all these accessories which includes a underwater housing and a teleconverter!!