PLEASE HELP!!!! Canon SD700 IS vs. Fujifilm F30

[Gozinta]

BenjaminXYZ wrote:

I'm just curious, but do you actually own or have used both of thesecameras? In what way does the Fuji suffer in daylight?

No, I do not owned any of them. However, I have read reviews of them both. The F30 suffers purple fringings, bloomings, CAsand blown out highlights in the bright. The Canon can handle bright situations better. Read the F30 review at dpreview and check out the conclusion.

Reviews are subjective and not an end all to buying a camera. I read reviews too, but I would be a fool tosimply rely on reviews. That would belike letting someone else make your decision for you. Yes reviews have good info, but to put your faith completely in a review is ludicrous. Many have done justthat and ended up with cameras they don't use or ended up selling on EBayI have compared just about all of the most popular cameras in this category with the type of features I needed and both the Canon and Fujiaregood cameras. The Fuji does not suffer in daylight conditions as poorly as Dpreview reviewerwould have you believe. The examples they post as proof are the extreme situations.I have taken over 500 pictures with mine, mostly daylight conditionsand not one with even a hintof purple fringing. I suggest you take pictures with both cameras and make your own comparisons rather than rely on just reading reviews. If I went strictly by reviews, I wouldn't buy any of these cameras. They all have their strong points and weak points otherwise we would all buy the best camera. There simply is no one-size fits all solution.

[kenbalbari]

I'm just curious, but do you actually own or have used both of these cameras? In what way does the Fuji suffer in daylight?

Well, I own the F30, and I agree with Ben. But it's not a matter of it being "bad" in daylight, it's just not as good as the SD700. Generally, I think the SD700 has an overall edge in image quality.

It's similar to the discussion of color above. The F30 actually has pretty good color reproduction overall when compared to most of the top models. It's overall comparable to the Kodaks or Panisonics, and pretty close even to the best Sonys. But it's not as good as the SD700. It does undersaturate a bit.

Likewise, most of the issues mentioned, like purple fringing and overexposure in bright sunlight, are common to some degree in alot of digital compact cameras. And most can be worked around. Bumping the EV down a couple of steps in bright sunlight when using the default multi-metering corrects alot of it. Nonetheless, even though I knew this even before I got my camera, I still managed to ruin a few macro shots in bright sunlight because I didn't think to make the adjustment. It takes a bit of getting used to.

Like many of the above posters, I went with the F30 because manual controls were important to me. But I think that 90% of photographers 90% of the time will probably do a bit better with the SD700. Still, if you're good at post processing, because the F30 has even better reolution and dynamic range than the SD700, and because the color error is mostly in one direction (just boost saturation by about 5%), your end result with the F30 could be even better than with the SD700.

Some of the above are fine examples of the F30's capabilitites, and I doubt they needed any post processing. But I think they were also taken by some good photographers. In some of them, you have to ask yourself whether you would have got a shot that clear, handheld, without IS. And some of them would have been even a bit sharper in that photographers hands if taken with the SD700.

For someone who wants the best automatic results from a pure point and shoot, the SD700 is almost a no-brainer. For someone who really wants manual control over things like aperture and shutter priority, the F30 is probably the best point and shoot out there. It's pretty much ideal for a photography student--almost a baby DSLR. It also seems to appeal to many experieced photographers who already own a DSLR. Ruski seems a bit caught in the middle.

[shooting_rubber]

I recommend the Kodak P850, I have it and it works in almost all conditions, and you can buy accessory lenses for it... For example the olympus tcon 17 works perfectly with mine, but you have to order the Kodak Lens adapter....



If you are planning on shooting in the night time, then I wouldn't reccomend it.....

[sjseto]

BenjaminXYZ wrote:

I'm just curious, but do you actually own or have used both of thesecameras? In what way does the Fuji suffer in daylight?

No, I do not owned any of them. However, I have read reviews of them both. The F30 suffers purple fringings, bloomings, CAsand blown out highlights in the bright. The Canon can handle bright situations better. Read the F30 review at dpreview and check out the conclusion.

Iactually do own the F30, and I owned the F10 before it.I find that this is a very broad statement about howit performs in bright sunlight and not true in most circumstances. Not even the review at dpreview.com was that broad about the F30's capabilities. And if you actually look at the sample photos at the end of the review (most of which were taken in bright sunlight), you'll see that they turned out beautifully.

Where you'll find the occasional problem with purple fringing and blown highlights is in areas of overexposure, which can occur in photos with both very bright and very dark areas. Sometimes the F30 seems to favour proper exposure of the dark areas, at the expense of the bright ones. This is quite easily handled, in camera, by using negative exposure compensation. You can even leave that as a permanent setting if you wish. PF is sometimes not completely eliminated using this technique but it is reduced.

I must stress, however, that problems like this are occasional and certainly not the norm. I have been very pleased with the majority of shots taken by my F30 in bright sunlight.




Stephanie

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My Fujifilm FinePix F30and F10galleries