Tong Family

Well, the day for our big trip to Europe is getting close, so time to get on the ball and get the right equipment. That means an ultralight digital camera and ultralight digital camcorder too. Here are the final shootout choices for the digital camera.
Either the Canon SD-500, this is expensive ($450 street) and bigger ( 3.37 x 2.24 x 1.04 inches and 170 grams or 6 ounces without battery or memory card), but it is 7 megapixels and very high quality in images.
On the other side, we have the Pentax Optio S5Z. (This is essentially the same as the S5W and the original S5i, but with 2.5″ screen on the back). It is inexpensive ($250 street) and tiny (only 3.3 x 2.0 x 0.81 inches i and 4 ounces or 120 grams including battery and memory card!), but it is 5 megapixels and image quality is not as good. About 1200 lph vs. 1500 lph resolution for the Canon and it has contrasty and a little undersaturated in color.
More data below:
* Canon PowerShot SD500 Review: 1. Introduction: Digital Photography Review. A good detailed review especially showing the high image quality.
* “Imaging Resources”:http://www.imaging-resource.com/PRODS/SD500/SD50A.HTM. Another good in-depth review. A great description of high quality and 1500 lph image resolution.
* “Digital Camera Info”:http://www.digitalcamerainfo.com/content/Canon-PowerShot-SD500-Digital-Camera-Review-.htm. The most detailed reviews on color balance, scored well. Main thing is a red-push that is common in consumer cameras like it is consumer TVs. People like pink skinned people 🙂 Its ratings were Color 8.12, Resolution 5.28, Noise 5.58, and Low Light 7.0 which aren’t bad.
* “Steve’s Digicam”:http://www.steves-digicams.com/2005_reviews/sd500.html. Like everyone else liked the image quality.
On the Pentax, here are reviews for it and its similar older models, mainly the S5i:
* “DP Review”:http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/pentaxs5i/. Consistent with Imaging Resources, found it would undersaturate and overcontrast, but pretty good quality. Also found pretty high barrel distortion at maximum zoom (1.3%).
* “Imaging Resources”:http://www.imaging-resource.com/PRODS/S5I/S5IA.HTM. A good general review particularly on image details.
* “Steve’s Digicam”:http://www.steves-digicams.com/2004_reviews/optios5i.html. He really didn’t like the ergonomics of having the power button on top so you’d accidentally turn the camera off while taking a picture for example, but his reviews don’t focus as much on image quality as the ones above do.
For the Casio EXILIM EX-Z750, this is a 7Mp camera and is the same dimensions (3.5″ W x 2.3″ H x 0.88″ D, so a little longer, but thinner ) as the Canon but considerably lighter (4.2 ounces without battery vs. 6 ounces):
* “DP Review”:http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/casioz750/page5.asp. They mainly found that the camera was way overcontrast, saturated but by turning down internal settings it looked fine.
* “Steve’s Digicam”:http://www.steves-digicams.com/2005_reviews/ex-z750.html. It uses the Sony 7Mpx imager so it is sharp and good color
* “Digital Camera Info”:http://www.digitalcamerainfo.com/content/First-Impressions-Casio-Exilim-EX-Z750.htm. They didn’t do a technical review, but did say it was a little hard to use.