Re: 5 Digital Camera Questions

Judy, I feel responsible for your travails since it was my recommendation. I
love my new Nikon D-SLR, the D-70, but it's much heavier than you want. My
wife's Canon S-50 has one battery which has no juice and one which lasts a
long time. You might simply have a bad battery or two. Also don't
over-charge the batteries just like light, too much of a good thing can be
bad and will actually damage the battery. Silly I know but true. Good luck
and I hope that the technology genie waves the magic happiness wand over
your camera and you as you seek silly saying shirts...Thom
----- Original Message -----
From: "Judy Seigel" <jseigel@panix.com>
To: <alt-photo-process-l@sask.usask.ca>
Sent: Thursday, June 10, 2004 11:54 PM
Subject: Re: 5 Digital Camera Questions

On Thu, 10 Jun 2004, Barry Kleider wrote:

> Judy,
> I'm assuming you have one of the "cheaper" consumer model digital cameras.

I have the Canon Powershot G5; when I bought it last year it cost about
$700, including 256 MB memory chip. Is that one of the cheaper consumer
models?

> Though you don't mention which one. A lot of these cheaper models have
some
> very frustrating "quirks."

IME all of them have their quirks, although comparing notes with my
brother who has an older 3 megapixel, I see that the G5 has some
improvements. For instance, you can delete pictures at any point -- it
simply tightens the thread. The next picture doesn't go in the hole, but
continues in sequence. His drops new ones in wherever a space has been
made, and since it doesn't show date and time on each (as the G5 does), it
can be impossible to know where on a 10 or 20 day trip a picture was made.

> All digital equipment eats batteries for breakfast. If your battery is
dying
> off faster than you should expect, it might be an old battery. The fun
> little LCD screens are the biggest power hogs onboard. Some cameras have a
> way to turn off the LCD screen. If you find yourself running out of juice,
> this may save your skin.

The viewing lens on the G5 is dreck, so I usually use the LCD monitor. If
it runs out, I carry a spare, but I was struck by the great discrepancy
between the mileage I was getting and that claimed in the manual.

> Also, make sure you run your battery all the way down to zero before you
> recharge it. this helps keep the battery toned.

Actually, rather than my running the battery down to zero, my battery runs
me down to zero. The interval between the low battery warning and the "no
power" message is breathtakingly short. I also charge the batteries to
the total, two hours past the merely "charged" point, as the manual
suggests, etc. etc. etc. The manual says I should get 450 shots WITH THE
MONITOR on. I'm getting about 1/7th of that. I just wondered if there's
any explanation other than "the manufacturer is lying." But it occurs to
me that Canon may have included less monitor time per shot than reality
requires.

> One trick I learned by accident: download your user's manual and save it
to
> CD. Then, when you're looking for the button that controls the who-haw
> settings when you're shooting in Yamaguchi mode, you can just do a key
word
> search...

My users manual is a 209 page book. There is a canon website for the G5,
which was some help because the illustrations are more realistic, but
otherwise, being able to turn pages works better. However, not all "key
words" are indexed. For instance, "monitor" n'existe pas. You have to
look up "LCD monitor." And if you know exactly what terminology those
bozos used, you probably already know how to operate the thing.

> ...BTW - don't throw away your manual.

Barry, Barry, Barry ! -- Why would I throw away my manual??!! Who throws
away the manual for complicated digital equipment????? I'm also keeping it
for my PhD -- a case study in how to make information inacessible.

best,

Judy
Received on Fri Jun 11 06:55:04 2004