I have one of the first, if not the first, Sony Mavicas that were made. I use it on almost a daily basis taking pictures of construction jobs. My question is, can I get decent wildlife photos with this camera? I would primarily use it while deer hunting. Here are the specs on the camera - 1.3 mega pixels, 16x zoom. Most of the deer that I see are outside of 75 yds. Can I get a decent picture with this camera at that distance? I tried using a camera in the stand years ago. I even borrowed a nice 35mm from a guy that owns a camera shop in town to try it before I bought one. I didn't get the results I expected, got frustrated and didn't try again. I would like to try again with the camera that I have, but if it is not sufficient I may have to look at getting a better camera.
- Thread starter big dave
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Dave, First I havenever used that camera, now that said, is that 16x optical or combination optical and digital zoom. If just optical the zoom should be fine but at only 1.3 meg the pics will be ok unless you want to blow them up or print 8x10's....I never use the digital zoom on mine as it distorts the pic to much for my liking. I guess it depends on what quality photos you are after. If just something to view on the computer they may turn out fine. If you are after photos to print out and hang on a wall I would look into one of the newer 3 or 4 meg cameras with a nice zoom.
I am sure other more camera savy members will add on to this.
GHog
I am sure other more camera savy members will add on to this.
GHog
Lan-Lord
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If that is the Mavica that I am thinking of, it has a pretty good lens. You will need every bit of 16x if you are shooting at 75 yards. I have 17x and I consider 50-60 yards the MAX for a good/artistic photograph worth printing. If you just want to take photos for emailing and posting on the web your camera is fine, if you want to do fine art photography, you would probably need to upgrade to a dslr with a 500mm lens to get decent photos beyond 75 yards.
This guy was probably 75-100 yards from me. It was kind of hard to judge the range because there are several dips and low lying areas between me and him. I was at 17x (this includes digital zoom). I dont consider this a "high" quality photo, but it is good for looking at on the computer and emailing and such.
taken with my sony f707 + B300 telephoto.
This guy was probably 75-100 yards from me. It was kind of hard to judge the range because there are several dips and low lying areas between me and him. I was at 17x (this includes digital zoom). I dont consider this a "high" quality photo, but it is good for looking at on the computer and emailing and such.
taken with my sony f707 + B300 telephoto.
Lan-Lord
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Actually, I take that back. There are a few other options besides spending alot of money on a dslr. One is the new panazonic FZ10. It has a really nice lens, 4mp, AND you can add a 1.7x telephoto. You can essentially get out beyond 36x if you dont mind leaning on digital zoom.
lan-lord...Hope I didn't mislead big dave. I can't believe that photo is using digital zoom. Is it at full digital zoom? I have not even tried the digital zoom on my new 750 as when I used it on my old 380 it just distorted the pics to bad......Sorry Big Dave if mislead you on the zoom issue.
GHog
GHog
Lan-Lord
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no, you didnt mislead dave. I use digital because I have to. If I had a preference, I wouldn't use it, but I have to in order to get the subject in the frame. Some cameras may do a better job than others in regards to digital up-sampling. I think the "3x" digital zoom cams may be up-sampling a little too much. Lens quality could also come into play as to how bad digital zoom looks. eg if the original isnt good to begin with, digital up-sampling it wont make it any better, and may just exagerate the bad. That may be what you have noticed. Mine is only 2x, which is better than NoX (0x).
If Dave's cam is the one Im thinking of, it is 16x optical with IS. (although it has been a while since I looked at those specs)
There is a really good/professional wildlife/landscape photographer named jesse spear who used the sony dave is talking about exclusively in his first few years of photography (now he uses high end canon gear).
his site is: www.explore-rocky.com
really I think it depends on what Dave wants, and what he expects. His sony could be just fine, then again he may need more. Depends on what he wants/needs.
If Dave's cam is the one Im thinking of, it is 16x optical with IS. (although it has been a while since I looked at those specs)
There is a really good/professional wildlife/landscape photographer named jesse spear who used the sony dave is talking about exclusively in his first few years of photography (now he uses high end canon gear).
his site is: www.explore-rocky.com
really I think it depends on what Dave wants, and what he expects. His sony could be just fine, then again he may need more. Depends on what he wants/needs.
THanks for the replies guys. At this point all I want is to post pictures on the web and email friends. At some point, I may want to get deeper into it. Tell me about the digital zoom. I am not sure I understand what you are talking about.. I am not photo savvy. And I guess I need to use the manual focus as opposed to the automatic focus. Is that right?
Big Dave, I will do my best to explain this, others may can get more technical with it. Most cameras now come with both Optical and Digital zoom. Optical zoom is done with the camera lens itself, much like moving the zoom up on a scope from say 3 power to 9 power. You still get a very clear undistorted image just much closer with less field of view. Digital zoom works differently. It more or less will take the pixels that make up the photograph and enlarge them to bring the image closer. This leads to some distortion in the quality of the pic. Similiar to if you open a picture in a photo editing software and view it at 100% then blow that picture up to say 150% you will notice a loss of quality, go to 200% it comes closer but yet even more distorted. Hope this helps a little.
GHog
GHog
