severn bridge
Originally uploaded by Nevoir.
What is great about the G10?
The live histogram is a great feature that helps to make better exposures first time. It gives great feedback in manual mode of the effects of changing apertures and shutter speeds which helps you to maximise the tonal range in your images. The screen also darkens/ lightens to give additional feedback about the impacts of your adjustments.
The camera gives you the choice of seeing everything or nothing in terms of settings on the screen. You can choose to see the classic two thirds composition aid which is a great tool. I found with so much noise it can make composing an image with the screen really difficult. You can choose to see fewer settings but this removes the crucial ones which is frustrating.
Manual controls
I was interested to see the extent to which you could manually control the camera. It actually is quite powerful and is a great mode to use if you want to take complete control. The one surprising constraint is a minimum of f8 which is usually the half way point within your aperture options.
Of course the most important element is picture quality. From what I have seen the G10 delivers fantastic image quality provided you support the camera properly. An old rule of thumb with an slr is to never shoot at a shutter speed that is less than the focal length of the lens. So if you are using a 50mm lens then dont drop below 1/60th second. The G10 makes it difficult to know what focal length you are shooting at but it will warn you if are likely to get camera shake.
I bought a retro leather wrap over case (SC-DC60A) to protect the G10. It looks great but is taking a bit of getting used to with the poppers and nowhere to store a spare battery or card. Possibly a case of style over substance (quite literally). I like the way that the case screws into the tripod screw thread but it make getting to the SD card difficult.
Raw shooting
The option to shoot raw is a big draw and I see no reason why I will ever change it to shoot jpeg given that SD cards are so cheap. I wouldn't have bought a camera without raw as an option and this will be a primary concern for many of you looking for a good quality digital compact.
One of the great things things about these types of cameras is that their portability makes it more likely that you will take them out with you. Also i've noticed that with this camera i'm more likely to bother taking a few shots than I might with an slr. This has already meant that i've got a few shots that I would never have got with an slr.
The viewfinder is like the cameras appendix, a throwback to a once useful tool that has been superceded. The viewfinder is pretty much useless, when you look through it you dont get any info on any of your camera settings. Worse still when you zoom in and out the field of view remains the same so its useless for composing.
I was annoyed to find out they had removed the time lapse feature that was available with the G9. You can buy a remote release with a timer to get the same effect but its annoying that you need to buy another tool to do this.
Its certainly not the cheapest camera but i'm sure i'll get my moneys worth as it'll get a hammering if i've got it with me all the time.
Summary
If you are after a very good quality second camera to have with you all the time you won't go far wrong with the G10. It offers a great trade off between features and portability and i'm looking forward to seeing how it will improve my photography.
2 comments:
How's the form factor working for you? I'd have thought that's the main reason for getting one - something that slips in a bag easily and delivers quality results? Also what about the zoom range? Doesn't a camera like this suffer compared to the superzooms out there?
It is definitely a shade bigger than I would have ideally liked it to be. It wont fit into a trouser pocket unless you are mc hammer. It happily slips into the man bag though and not so big that you think twice about taking it out regularly which is the main thing really.
The zoom range is 28mm - 140mm which is very good compared to a typical zoom range for an slr lens. I think the zoom range is a misnomer. The further you zoom in the less light the lens can let in and the "slower" it becomes.
This leads to you needing to increase the iso to maintain reasonable shutter speeds thus your picture quality can suffer.
The other point about the long end of the lens is that the camera goes from optical to digital zoom. This means the camera starts inventing pixels and basically it all goes rancid so avoid this if you can.
I guess having been used to fixed focal length lenses on my slr i'm just used to walking closer to the subject. Thats often the best solution if you can do it.
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