Camera/Photos and your rMBP

[Augustine864]

Hello All,

So I am about to buy a rMBP for my first year of grad school in Italy. What I would also like to do is buy a new camera for my travels while I am there. What I am looking for is a point and shoot digital that will give me images of high enough quality that I could use them as a high-res background on my rMBP.

I'm having trouble because I am not up on camera tech and I know that it isn't all about Megapixels. For example, I have a 10.1 megapixel Olympus already, but the pictures are not sharp at all and look weak even on my four year old Dell.

So what do you guys use? Do any of your use your own photos as backgrounds on your rMBP? How does it look? What kind of camera?

I am not looking to go crazy here. I am looking at $300 and under. I am aware of the things I will not be getting with that type of camera, but that's not what I need to know. I am not expecting these photos to be professional grade. They just need to look good and not like my Olympus, which was built for ruggedness and not picture quality.

Right now I've been looking at:

Canon S110
Nikon P330
Panasonic DMC-LX7

Really the Nikon and Panasonic might even be "too big" because ideally I'd like to pocket it, but I could be talked into something the size of the Nikon or Panasonic.

 

[ColdCase]

Canon seems to integrate well with the mac. I've used a SD960IS (12MP), a SX260HS (12MP with 20x zoom), and a EOS M (18MP) all with excellent results. I slideshow some photos as my desktop and they are sharp even on my external 27in monitor. Some cropped photos can get pixelated, but not ones untouched from the cameras.

My spouse has a SD1100 IS 8MP which looks good on the r15 but can be fuzzy on the 27inch. So if you purchase at least a 10-12 MP camera you should be fine. There are a few independent camera review sites that do decent comparisons. http://www.dpreview.com is decent, there are others.

Oh its more than megapixels, the quality of the sensor and skill of the photographer have something to do with it

 

[MCAsan]

Canon Sxxx bodies are excellent. My wife swears by her S95. Great that the S series will let you shoot lossless raw instead of loss-full jpeg format.

 

[ColdCase]

Canon Sxxx bodies are excellent. My wife swears by her S95. Great that the S series will let you shoot lossless raw instead of loss-full jpeg format.

Images need to be converted to jpeg anyway for display or print, and if you are a good photographer that doesn't need to post process, you have no need for the RAW footage. Some photographers take both RAW and jpeg just in case they need to tweak, but others don't want to be bothered with the system slow downs of large RAW files. 90% of my photos don't get touched other than cropping for the display media... but its nice to have those RAW files for the photos that need a bit of touch up.

The S100 (S95 replacement) is a nice camera, selling right at $300 on amazon at the moment. I like more than 5x optical zoom in a point and shoot, however. Something approaching 20x optical is great.

 

[SnowLeopard2008]

I don't know your definition of "pocketable" but any of the Canon or Nikon P&S cameras are good. Sony makes so good cameras too. As for picture quality, they're all pretty much the same in terms of price tier. A $200 Canon and $200 Sony isn't significantly different assuming they're both the newest models and such. Look for something with at least 10+ megapixels as the minimum. And if you're trying to get the best picture quality, just google the two models and look for snapsort.com for the comparison of the two. While amateur/pro photographers will scoff at that site, it's good enough to get a general idea of the specs and quality and etc.

 

[Augustine864]

I don't know your definition of "pocketable" but any of the Canon or Nikon P&S cameras are good. Sony makes so good cameras too. As for picture quality, they're all pretty much the same in terms of price tier. A $200 Canon and $200 Sony isn't significantly different assuming they're both the newest models and such. Look for something with at least 10+ megapixels as the minimum. And if you're trying to get the best picture quality, just google the two models and look for snapsort.com for the comparison of the two. While amateur/pro photographers will scoff at that site, it's good enough to get a general idea of the specs and quality and etc.

Yeah I've been on that snapsort a lot the last couple of days, though I've found some incorrect information regarding sensor types already.

I went to BestBuy today to try to get hands on with some, but the main ones I had been hoping to find were not there and a lot of the rest either were dead or had no memory card so I couldn't play around with photos much.

I allow myself to get very overwhelmed when researching a new tech product. I spend way too much time on it. I always end up feeling like I can't win. Always have to make a sacrifice somewhere. I suppose that is less true at higher price points, but unfortunately I can't go higher.

Heck, I'm still trying to decide between a 13" and 15" rMBP and I've been thinking about it for four months.

 

[SnowLeopard2008]

Yeah I've been on that snapsort a lot the last couple of days, though I've found some incorrect information regarding sensor types already.

I went to BestBuy today to try to get hands on with some, but the main ones I had been hoping to find were not there and a lot of the rest either were dead or had no memory card so I couldn't play around with photos much.

I allow myself to get very overwhelmed when researching a new tech product. I spend way too much time on it. I always end up feeling like I can't win. Always have to make a sacrifice somewhere. I suppose that is less true at higher price points, but unfortunately I can't go higher.

Heck, I'm still trying to decide between a 13" and 15" rMBP and I've been thinking about it for four months.

You should take a break. You seem to not want to make a mistake and while that's admirable, you won't learn if you never make a mistake. That isn't to say just buy any and everything you want and not give a crap at all. Just to kind of relax the barriers a bit. Life is all about sacrifices. The trick is to balance everything so you aren't sorely lacking in important aspects.