[at-l] casio digital camera questions

[Clark Wright]

Some quick thoughts re the posts on the casio camera:

 

1)  Decide if you want to go AA batteries or rechargeable – some good brands
either way; personally, I hate being beholden to someone’s particular custom
rechargeable camera batteries - and thus having to buy a second one, usually
at a huge price, so I won’t go dead in the woods . . . 

 

2)  Try to review consumer report’s reviews to get a handle on battery life;

 

3)  Having an optical viewfinder, which is becoming a disappearing item on
lighter weight digital cameras, can be a very good thing to prolong battery
life in the woods; if you harken back to the good old camera days, and use
the optical viewfinder with the LCD screen turned off (look for models that
let you do this manually), your battery life goes way, way up!

 

4)  Decide which kind of memory card you want to use; SD cards are probably
the most ubiquitous and you can find them cheaper;

 

5)  Decide how important good sharp images are, and zoom capability; focus
on the OPTICAL zoom only, as that is the only one worth a flip for really
sharp pics; it used to be that 3x optical was about all you could get in a
lightweight digital pocket camera, but now there are some 4x and 5x models
out there; you pay more for them, but IMHO that is worth it if you want to
capture wildlife, frame scenes, etc.

 

6)  Look for a panorama feature – I love to take vertical panorama shots of
the Trail itself, and horizontal panorama shots of good views . . .

 

7)  Consider weatherproof capabilities, which heavily favor the olympus
stylus series (but they have a proprietary rechargeable battery system – it
works well, though, but count on buying the extra battery and then having to
figure out how to recharge on your thru using a bounce box – sure makes
those AAs look attractive when you think about that for a six month plus
walk in the woods!)

 

8) I don’t like the inevitable digital camera shutter lag – even the best
ones still have it, though much less so

 

9) Consider (at least for a minute) the poor man’s digital camera – buy some
disposable film pocket cameras and pay the extra $2.00 to get a CD of the
pics, and you are done; or, more upscale, do what I did in 2001 - I used a
higher end 35mm film Nikon pocket camera that had ground glass lenses, a
good zoom, and a panorama feature.  I mailed the rolls home as I shot them
and my wife got them developed with a CD of the pics included – that way I
got digital pics and prints too!  I still think this is worth considering,
though you do have film and developing costs . . . the resolution on film is
nice.

 

10) Consider the growing list of crossover digital still shot
cameras/camcorders . . . as flash memory technology increases, you can get
2, 3 and 4 Gig SD cards that will hold a fair amount of video footage, with
sound, to go with your still pics . . . the Trail will never be the same!
:-)

 

Thru-Thinker

 

 

I. Clark Wright, Jr.

Ward and Davis, LLP

409 Pollock Street

New Bern, NC 28560

252-633-1101

252-633-9400 (fax)

252-229-5900 (cell)

 


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