Looking for a new family camera

ssramage · Jan 26, 2017

Hoping you folks can help me narrow down some choices for a new family camera. Currently all of the pictures we take are either on a smartphone or with my mother-in-laws Canon Rebel, but my wife would like to have our own nice camera for our family to capture sports, beach days, etc... Selfishly, I'd like to get something I can carry on fishing/hunting trips to get some nice edited photos with also.

I'm leaning towards a nice point and shoot camera. It looks like they've come a long ways since the last Nikon I had and since my inlaws already have the big DSLR I think we'd get more use out of a smaller camera. I'd still like the option to do some nice editing (blurred backgrounds, etc) but obviously you can tell I'm pretty green with photography.

I'll throw a budget out there of $500-600 for a nice camera, but only want to spend what I have to.

Flatlander · Jan 26, 2017

Yeah the blurred background is really only achievable with a lens on a DSLR...there are tips to do it with a point and shoot. Id look at the Nikons..they make one thats ruggedized and still takes pretty nice pictures.

ssramage · Jan 27, 2017

Flatlander said:
Yeah the blurred background is really only achievable with a lens on a DSLR...there are tips to do it with a point and shoot. Id look at the Nikons..they make one thats ruggedized and still takes pretty nice pictures.

Understood that a P&S will be limited in it's capacity, but I'm really looking for something easy to carry while still being able to take great pictures. We have access to the DSLR for family photo shoots but I don't think it makes sense to lug that one around on beach trips or trips to Disney, etc while chasing 2 little boys. Really looking for something easy to use instead of having everything on our phones.

rip18 · Jan 27, 2017

Flatlander is right, those images with the nicely blurred backgrounds take a shallow depth of field (wide open aperture) and are easier to do with longer lenses (shallower depth of field). The lenses in the P&S are, by necessity, short, which gives you great depth of field, but makes it hard to isolate subjects from their background. It CAN be done, but the camera needs to be very close to the subject, and the background needs to be WAAAAY in the back...

That said, the current entry level DSLRs are getting smaller and smaller, but they still basically add a pound or three to your load & take up space in a bag.

The P&Ss are getting better and better. The thing that still bothers me about them is "shutter lag" - that time between the time you depress the shutter release and image is taken. I won't go into the reason it exists, but it does.

I have shot Nikon SLRs & DSLRs for a long time, but my camera of choice for the P&S is the Olympus Tough series - shockproof, waterproof to a reasonable depth, good image quality, great options in the camera, pocket-sized, etc. The latest model is the Olympus Stylus Tough TG-870 with a MSRP of $279 - https://www.dpreview.com/products/olympus/compacts/olympus_tg870

Good luck!

ssramage · Jan 27, 2017

rip18 said:
Flatlander is right, those images with the nicely blurred backgrounds take a shallow depth of field (wide open aperture) and are easier to do with longer lenses (shallower depth of field). The lenses in the P&S are, by necessity, short, which gives you great depth of field, but makes it hard to isolate subjects from their background. It CAN be done, but the camera needs to be very close to the subject, and the background needs to be WAAAAY in the back...

That said, the current entry level DSLRs are getting smaller and smaller, but they still basically add a pound or three to your load & take up space in a bag.

The P&Ss are getting better and better. The thing that still bothers me about them is "shutter lag" - that time between the time you depress the shutter release and image is taken. I won't go into the reason it exists, but it does.

I have shot Nikon SLRs & DSLRs for a long time, but my camera of choice for the P&S is the Olympus Tough series - shockproof, waterproof to a reasonable depth, good image quality, great options in the camera, pocket-sized, etc. The latest model is the Olympus Stylus Tough TG-870 with a MSRP of $279 - https://www.dpreview.com/products/olympus/compacts/olympus_tg870

Good luck!

Thanks for the feedback! The Olympus tough series was actually the direction I was leaning prior to asking the question. Seems to be a solid camera. Not sure what the differences are but I was looking at the TG-4 vs the TG-870.

chainshaw · Jan 27, 2017

https://shop.usa.canon.com/shop/en/catalog/eos-sl1-18-55-is-stm-lens-kit-refurbished

Get the best of both worlds. My wife has a Canon Rebel SL1 and it is the smallest DSLR available. Add a 40mm 2.8 pancake lens or a 50mm 1.8 prime and you have a very small camera that takes professional quality pictures. All of that for under what you want to spend.

rip18 · Jan 27, 2017

I hope the comparison comes through, but you can use dpreview's "compare" feature to compare camera specs side by side: https://www.dpreview.com/products/c..._tg4&products=olympus_tg870&sortDir=ascending

I put the Canon SL1 that chainsaw suggested with the TG-4 and TG-870 to compare the 3. The difference in the TG-4 and TG-870 seem to mainly be in flash range, frames per second, RAW/jpg support, etc. Not a lot of difference in size between the two TGs - the Canon is twice as heavy (a pound) and roughly an inch thicker (plus the lens).

Here's the link again: https://www.dpreview.com/products/c..._tg4&products=olympus_tg870&sortDir=ascending

Looking for a new family camera

ssramage

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Flatlander

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chainshaw

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