Canon digital camera for sale...

[jules]

I'm going to be purchasing a digital camera for land and diving pics. I'm looking at the Olympus C-50Z with the PT-014 housing and the Sony DSC-P9 with the MPK-P9 housing.

My budget won't allow for a strobe or other external light source right now. I do intend to add on later.

Is anyone using either of these setups right now with just the internal flash?

I'd appreciate any advice or recommendations.

 

[stiebs]

Which is basically the older version of the P9. The Marine Pack is rated to 40m, although I've only taken it to 18m so far. I don't have a strobe either, and have had some good results with the internal flash.

You have to be careful of backscatter, as any small amount of silt or other 'floaties' in the water will show up as white speckles in your photo.

One problem with the Sony cameras that I have found out recently, is that if you want to add a strobe in the future, it is most certainly possible, but a little limiting.

See this thread for some more detail.

You can take a look at some of my pics taken with the P5/internal flash on froop.net/scuba/index.php?dive=43 or froop.net/scuba/index.php?dive=44

 

[Big-t-2538]

I also was looking at the DSC-P9, but ended up going with the DSC-S85...same price, but a lot more bang for the buck.

Check out these two sites (if you haven't already).

http://www.dpreview.com/

and

http://www.digideep.com/

The first site is a guy who focuses solely on the use of a digital camera. He has an excellent variety of cameras that he reviews and he is fairly unbiased. The second is obviously a SCUBA site, but it is also a good source of info for housings and what not.

I found that the dsc-s85 has many more maual exposure options than the p9 does, also it does a decent video if you'd like to see some samples...PM me, and I'll see what we can dig up

 

[ReyeR]

Big-t-2538, the S85 specs looks pretty good. Don't know why they didn't put the same features in the P series .

You'd have to get a third party housing though.

Going just by the quality of pics I've seen (Olympus vs Sony) I'd go C50. The manual features of the C50 are also a big big plus over the P9. The only negative about the camera is the macro range:

S85: 4cms
P9: 10cms
C50: 20 cms

I haven't used the P9 but the P5 underwater (low light) seems to have a problem focusing. This is also compounded by the fact that being a full auto camera it had the tendency to open the aperture to full wide and to use the slowest shutter speed - see EXIF stats in the thread froop refers to.

Not sure why you want to go C50 (price? size?), but have you considered the C40? Even though it's 4MP and uses the older Smartmedia card it's rated pretty good. Macro 10cm and uses AA NiMH batteries. Some of the pics I've seen with the built-in flash are very good too.

Be aware that the current design of the Memory Stick and Smartmedia card limits it to 128MB...

 

[Big-t-2538]

Yeah, I was real interested in the P-9 until I came across the s85...it just does so much more, it also focuses really well in little to no light at all. I'm not all that hot on the idea of getting a third party housing, but I'm not too afraid to pick something up from Ikelite, both the camera I have and my buddy currelty have are ikelites, and they are great for just point and shoot underwater. We're not pros, we just like shooting the stupid stuff we do from time to time for our own amusment.

P.S. I got the digital camera b/c I just had a baby girl and she's now 4 months old. I love the movie feature, all in all, I have no complaitns at all about the S85

 

[jules]

Thanks for the responses. I started looking at the P9 because someone had one on the last dive trip and got some really nice shots with it. I saw the C-50 in a photography magazine and some of the features caught my eye. I also liked the idea of getting up to a 5 megapixel camera for only about an extra $50.

I was in Best Buy over the weekend and didn't like the controls on the C-50 too much. I liked the feel of the C-5050, but it's way out of my budget.

I'll take a look at the S85. My goal is to get something that takes decent pictures, is affordable, and can be added on to later.