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Good digital camera for low light conditions
I'm looking for ideas on a digital camera suitable for flashless photography
in low light conditions such as concerts, horse shows, and forests. I'm looking for compact, but I haven't seen any point 'n shoot or ZLR cameras that are very good with low light. Any ideas would be appreciated. -- Chris Dukes Suspicion breeds confidance -- Brazil |
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On Tue, 23 Nov 2004 18:58:43 GMT in YAG-ART wrote:
On Tue, 23 Nov 2004 16:03:28 GMT, wrote: I'm looking for ideas on a digital camera suitable for flashless photography in low light conditions such as concerts, horse shows, and forests. I'm looking for compact, but I haven't seen any point 'n shoot or ZLR cameras that are very good with low light. Canon EOS 1DMark2 comes to mind Outside of my price range. Of the ideas mentioned by Sophie, the EOS 300D most closely matches what I can afford on the short term. The Pentax *ist DS and Canon EOS 20D would have me waiting until the next generation of DSLRs is out. So, of those does anyone have experience with them with dim lighting conditions and something as fast as a horse at a trot? Or taking photos of wildlife at dusk? -- Chris Dukes Suspicion breeds confidance -- Brazil |
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wrote in
rg: On Tue, 23 Nov 2004 18:58:43 GMT in YAG-ART wrote: On Tue, 23 Nov 2004 16:03:28 GMT, wrote: I'm looking for ideas on a digital camera suitable for flashless photography in low light conditions such as concerts, horse shows, and forests. I'm looking for compact, but I haven't seen any point 'n shoot or ZLR cameras that are very good with low light. Canon EOS 1DMark2 comes to mind Outside of my price range. Well, yes. And I think you'd find it a smidgen heavy, too... Of the ideas mentioned by Sophie, the EOS 300D most closely matches what I can afford on the short term. The Pentax *ist DS and Canon EOS 20D would have me waiting until the next generation of DSLRs is out. *ist DS is as cheap as the 300D in the UK. And my friend Emma's 20D should have been delivered yesterday (I'm taking the lack of email as positive confirmation that she's spending every waking minute with it...). So, of those does anyone have experience with them with dim lighting conditions and something as fast as a horse at a trot? Or taking photos of wildlife at dusk? I could ask my dad - he's got a 300D. My experience with the *ist D (the *ist DS's bigger brother) is that it is literally incredible (spooky!) what it can do in dim light - with the right lens. You should get similar performance from the 300D up to ISO1600, but if you're desperate for speed, it doesn't have ISO3200 which the *ist DS does. You can buy image stabilised lenses for the Canon, but clearly those have no shutter speed advantage and aren't going to help with a moving horse: you will need the fastest lenses you can get instead. A 50 at f1.4 or f1.2 and an 85 at f1.4 are available and you will get results as good as can be got. If you have difficulty framing the shot, then a 70-200 f2.8 is about the best option I can think of! (If you want a tripod, then get one upon which you can mount a Manfrotto grip head - 222 or 322.) Traditionally, at this point, I'm supposed to point you to pictures of a horse shot with an f1.4 lens in low light. But I don't do horses in low light - I can point you to a wedding in low light instead! --Sophie (Yes, I know - it seems like everyone has a DSLR. I live in a strange world in that I even know someone else with a Pentax *ist D (i.e. not via the internet), but appearances to the contrary, not everyone has one yet. But for low light, they're probably obligatory.) |
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wrote in
rg: I'm looking for ideas on a digital camera suitable for flashless photography in low light conditions such as concerts, horse shows, and forests. I'm looking for compact, but I haven't seen any point 'n shoot or ZLR cameras that are very good with low light. Any ideas would be appreciated. Canon 20D, Canon 70-200 f2.8L (preferably the IS model), Canon 580EX speedlite for when it doesn't need to be flashless. Unfortunately the cost is high for the good lenses (dearer than the camera). On a budget there is the Canon 300D and the 50 f1.8 and the 85 f1.8. You do need to pay attention to the max lens aperture, a lens with f5.6 is not going to do so well in low light. F5.6 requires a shutter speed 4x as long as f2.8 and over 8 times as long as f1.8. -- Mark Heyes (New Zealand) See my pics at www.gigatech.co.nz (last updated 12-Nov-04) "There are 10 types of people, those that understand binary and those that don't" |
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Maybe it's not just the camera. If you need to use a long focal length the
bigger investment needed is a low F-stop lens. -Michael |
#9
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You need Very Fast Lenses and really good sensors for low light
photography. You will either need to invest several thousand dollars for lens and body, or save a thousand and start with film and very fast lenses. But point and shoot lenses of any type just do not put enough light on the sensor to do well in low light. wrote: I'm looking for ideas on a digital camera suitable for flashless photography in low light conditions such as concerts, horse shows, and forests. I'm looking for compact, but I haven't seen any point 'n shoot or ZLR cameras that are very good with low light. Any ideas would be appreciated. |
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wrote: I'm looking for ideas on a digital camera suitable for flashless photography in low light conditions such as concerts, horse shows, and forests. For low-light horse show conditions, you need A) fast shutter response, B) a relatively noise free high ISO, C) fast shutter speed and D) fast glass. I'm looking for compact, but I haven't seen any point 'n shoot or ZLR cameras that are very good with low light. You aren't going to find all of that in a low cost PnS or ZLR camera. Any ideas would be appreciated. (top posting fixed) On Fri, 17 Dec 2004 16:08:29 -0800, fortknight wrote: You need Very Fast Lenses and really good sensors for low light photography. You will either need to invest several thousand dollars for lens and body, or save a thousand and start with film and very fast lenses. I'm using the 300 D and a 70-200 IS f2.8 to shoot horses, and it does very well in low light, until I have to crank the ISO above 400 at which point the images are pretty noisy. I'm itching to get a 20D as I believe that the improved image quality at the higher ISOs will be just the ticket. But point and shoot lenses of any type just do not put enough light on the sensor to do well in low light. The PoS built-in camera in my Treo 600 does amazingly well in low light, for what it is, but you aren't going to be able to use it to take photos of horses at a horse show. :-) jc |
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