Why buy a DSL digital camera vs. normal digital camera?

Question

I am looking into buying the Oylmpus E-Volt 500 DSL digital camera and also looking at a Panasonic DMC-FZ50K 10.1MP with 12x optical zoom. I am looking for a camera that I can zoom in but I don't know what all that pixel information means. Why buy a DSL when the zoom on another camera seems to be the same?

Answer 1

If you "don't want to know," maybe the Panasonic is a good choice for you. In case you want to know a little, though, the sensor on the Olympus Evolt 500 is almost 6 times bigger than the Panasonic. The Panasonic sensor is really packed with almost 8 time the density of pixels per square millimeter. This means that, even though there are 10 million of them, they are TINY compared to the Evolt. This generally translates into lower image quality.

Of course, you get what you pay for. The Evolt is almost $100 more and you still have to buy at least one lens. Personally, I'd look into the Nikon SLR line before buying Olympus, but that is just my opinion. You're trying to decide about making the leap up to a DSLR....

Answer 2

First of all, it's 'DSLR' which stands for Digital Single Lens Reflex. i.e. you look through the lens of the camera.

Practically- the difference between a DSLR and a 'regular' digital camera is the size of the sensor (i.e. which, in essence is your film). The bigger the piece of film (sensor) the better the image quality and lower the noise (grain). Bigger sensors are much better in lower light.

DSLRs are faster focussing, bigger, heavier, more costly, better in low light, and have lower image noise. They don't do movies.

The Panasonic FZ50 is a terrific camera if you're looking for a 12X zoom camera. If you need or want 432mm of telephoto, then it's a good one. There are other cameras in that class from Sony (H2, H6), Canon's S3 IS, Panny's own FZ30 or FZ7, and I like the Fuji's as well. They are better in low light, and have a more usable zoom range of 28mm-300mm. I use a 28mm wide angle far more than I use anything over 200mm zoom.

sounds like you'll be happy with a regular digicam. Forgo the weight and cost of a DSLR and get something easier to handle. However- if you do want a DSLR (and there are good reasons for them), don't get teh Oly. There are better entry level DSLRs out there from Canon (Rebel XT and Ti), Nikon (D50, D40), Pentax 10D, 100D, Sony A100. Any of them would be a better choice.

Answer 3

For just general family and vacation snaps, any high quality point & shoot would be fine. Many do have limitations, such as low light performance and shutter lag.
The dslr camera's strengths are:
The ability to change lenses.
The lenses are usually of higher quality, both in optics and function.
The higher iso settings on dslr's are immensly superior to most digicams, which means you can take pictures with less light.
The shutter lag is almost non-existant, Also card write speeds are faster, which means you won't miss pictures waiting on the camera to do its thing.
On a dslr, what you see through the lens is the picture you are taking. Of course, with a p&s you see the pic on the little screen, so I guess that's about the same difference. But most p&s cameras are getting away from having a viewfinder, and sometimes that little lcd screen is hard to see outdoors. So having a viewfinder is a good thing, in my opinion.
Go to www. dpreview to see comparisons of different cameras and reviews.
Good luck!

Answer 4

are you talking about the DSLR camera? That just means you can interchange the lenses of the camera, very helpful for a wide variety of shots. I personally despise the point-and-shoot models, but perhaps you can live with them.

Answer 5

I have used both point & shoot and DSLR’s and have obtained excellent results with both. The DSLR gives you more options with depth of field and lens choices.
If you go the point & shoot route, get a good sturdy mono pod, you’ll notice a difference in the sharpness of your photos. Check out www.dpreview.com for more info.

Answer 6

I really like Yahoo Tech section- check comparisons there- they have CNN and consumer reports but also- and this is more important to me- user reviews and comments....