Camera for Hillwalking

[Owen]

My trusty Nikon 5900 has now reached end of road and I am in market for
replacement. Occurs that there may be some regular hillwalkers/photographers
out there with expertise in present camera market.? I suppose I require
something reasonably compact,rugged, reasonably water resistant (I have
nasty habit of bagging Munros in Winter) and a good quality wide angle lens.
Ability to shoot RAW would be bonus. I'd be prepared to pay up to £350.
Any advice appreciated.
--
Owen McKeown

[Chris Gilbert]

Owen wrote

> Any advice appreciated.

I usually advocate the Canon G12.

Chris

[Mike Clark]

In message <4f27f1bd$1...@news.x-privat.org>

"Owen" <san...@iol.ie> wrote:

> My trusty Nikon 5900 has now reached end of road and I am in market
> for replacement. Occurs that there may be some regular
> hillwalkers/photographers out there with expertise in present camera
> market.? I suppose I require something reasonably compact,rugged,
> reasonably water resistant (I have nasty habit of bagging Munros in
> Winter) and a good quality wide angle lens. Ability to shoot RAW

> would be bonus. I'd be prepared to pay up to Ł350. Any advice
> appreciated.

There are quite a few rugged fully waterproof compact cameras that would
enable you to keep shooting in bad conditions. I tend to use an Olympus
mju-Tough for caving photography and also for ski-mountaineering.

e.g. http://www.dpreview.com/products/olympus/compacts/oly_tg320

Some example photos at

http://www.flickr.com/photos/campathmike/collections/72157625603411499/

However for hill-walking I tend to also take along an interchangeable
lense digital camera. That used to be an Olympus E-400 SLR but I've now
moved on to the micro 4/3 Olympus PEN format cameras and use either an
E-P2 or an E-PM1.

see for example some recent photos from Yorkshire taken with the E-P2

http://www.flickr.com/photos/campathmike/sets/72157629106586383/

The E-PM1 comes out at about Ł350 with the standard zoom lense.

see http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/olympusepm1/

Having said the above if you were just after a single camera without
interchangeable lenses but also prefered an optical finder the choices
would probably be between the Canon G12 or the Nikon Coolpix P7100

see
http://www.dpreview.com/articles/4333175133/buyers-guide-enthusiast-raw-shooting-compact-cameras

Mike
--
o/ \\ // |\ ,_ o Mike Clark
<\__,\\ // __o | \ / /\, "A mountain climbing, cycling, skiing,
"> || _`\<,_ |__\ \> | caving, antibody engineer and
` || (_)/ (_) | \corn computer user" http://www.antibody.me.uk/

[Owen]

Mike/Chris,
Thanks for help, I'm pricing G12 and P7000. There doesn't seem to be much
between them sidewise or performance wise. They even seem to use same
sensor?
Will decide on price. See you in Scotland sometime!

--
Owen McKeown
Phone:- 2805031
Mobile:- 087 6860736
"Mike Clark" <mrc7...@cam.ac.uk> wrote in message
news:90eb3b5a52....@mrc7acorn1.path.cam.ac.uk...

> In message <4f27f1bd$1...@news.x-privat.org>
> "Owen" <san...@iol.ie> wrote:
>
>> My trusty Nikon 5900 has now reached end of road and I am in market
>> for replacement. Occurs that there may be some regular
>> hillwalkers/photographers out there with expertise in present camera
>> market.? I suppose I require something reasonably compact,rugged,
>> reasonably water resistant (I have nasty habit of bagging Munros in
>> Winter) and a good quality wide angle lens. Ability to shoot RAW

>> would be bonus. I'd be prepared to pay up to £350. Any advice

>> appreciated.
>
> There are quite a few rugged fully waterproof compact cameras that would
> enable you to keep shooting in bad conditions. I tend to use an Olympus
> mju-Tough for caving photography and also for ski-mountaineering.
>
> e.g. http://www.dpreview.com/products/olympus/compacts/oly_tg320
>
> Some example photos at
>
> http://www.flickr.com/photos/campathmike/collections/72157625603411499/
>
> However for hill-walking I tend to also take along an interchangeable
> lense digital camera. That used to be an Olympus E-400 SLR but I've now
> moved on to the micro 4/3 Olympus PEN format cameras and use either an
> E-P2 or an E-PM1.
>
> see for example some recent photos from Yorkshire taken with the E-P2
>
> http://www.flickr.com/photos/campathmike/sets/72157629106586383/
>

> The E-PM1 comes out at about £350 with the standard zoom lense.

[Mike Clark]

In message <4f29...@news.x-privat.org>

"Owen" <san...@iol.ie> wrote:

> Mike/Chris,
> Thanks for help, I'm pricing G12 and P7000. There doesn't seem to be much
> between them sidewise or performance wise. They even seem to use same
> sensor?
> Will decide on price. See you in Scotland sometime!
>

Yes you'd almost believe that one was a copy of the other, even down to
the ergonomics.

The P7000 has been replaced with an updated version, the P7100

see http://www.dpreview.com/products/nikon/compacts/nikon_cpp7100

which thus means that there might be some bargains out there on the
older model if you don't require the enhancements.

[ianp...@googlemail.com]

Great camera but:
1) you can get the same sensor in a truly shirt pocketable case, in
the S95 (now superceded by the S100) The size of the S95 is very
similar to your 5900...the G12 is quite a lot bigger
2) the G12 may need you to up your budget a little (as would the s100)

The lens is the same at the wideangle end but not as long at the
longest setting on the G12. Either are wider at 28mm than your 5900.
It is also a slighty faster lens and does shoot RAW. The S95 is very
controllable although perhaps not as easily as the G12 in that it has
less buttons/dials. However, it is easy to configure your favourite
couple of adjustments to the main control rings. The biggest drawback
in comparison to the G12 that kept putting me off before purchase was
the lack of an optical viewfinder - I REALLY did not like that
idea...but the smaller size has more than compensated for this. The
screen is actually quite useable - even in bright sunlight as long as
I remember not to use my polarising sunglasses! The optical viewfinder
on the G12 isn't great either if you're used to a dSLR .
I now find that when using my Canon 50D, when I bother carrying it, I
look for the image on the screen rather than through the viewfinder!
Don't rule it out without handling one.
Jessops have some S95's available at £300.
Please reply to group - email address is not monitored
Ian

[Mike Clark]

In message <278li7lujg8sump80...@4ax.com>
ianp...@googlemail.com wrote:

[snip]

> I now find that when using my Canon 50D, when I bother carrying it, I
> look for the image on the screen rather than through the viewfinder!

When I switched from regularly using my Olympus E-400 to the Olympus Pen
EP-2 I started off by mostly using the attacheable Electronic View
Finder VF-2, but after a while I got used to framing most of my shots
using the rear LCD screen. I now mainly use the VF-2 for difficult shots
such as wildlife photography with the 75-300mm lense (150mm-600mm
35mm equivalent).

[Owen]

Ian, Thanks for response. My first reaction is to agree with you about the
lack of viewfinder on the S100. However, on reflection, if there are really
important shots to be taken, I will take my DSLR. I suppose that what I am
looking for is an everyday camera that I can always carry when hillwalking.
SLR is too bulky. Being honest, with my old 5900, despite the fact that it
had a viewfinder, I at least half of the time use the screen especially when
I am taking a group photos or panoramas.
I will go around a few shops at weekend and handle the G12 and the S100 and
being honest , the price will be big factor even though I will probably end
up spending a little over my budget (as usual)
Thanks again to all.

--
Owen McKeown

<ianp...@googlemail.com> wrote in message
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