Mountain Biking - Camera Recomendations

I went to the doc today and it turns out I broke two bones in my wrist. So he set the bones by twisting and pulling on my wrist and put me in a cast. I should be out of the cast by early july but he said it would probably be 10 weeks before im back on the bike which would be early august. So now that my plans of racing downhill have been shattered (im so sad), Im thinking about going to the races and photographing them. Im looking for a 3.2 mp digicam and im wondering if anyone has any reccomendations.

man, you have my sympathy, I had the same thing happen 2 yrs ago but it was my knee, kept me down for 4mo, missed the whole summer riding season. We have a canon powershot g3, great camera, my buddy has the canon powershot A70 3.2mp and likes it really well too......tom

http://www.costco.com/frameset.asp?trg=subcat%2Easp&catid=79&subid=83&log=

The Nikon Coolpix (http://www.nikon-coolpix.com/products/coolpix3100_2100/index.htm) is a very popular choice. Its what you'll usually hear cameras contrasted against.

I didn't get it because I absolutely refuse to do the sollid-state memory storage thing. So I went with a Sony Mavica (http://www.sonystyle.com/is-bin/INTERSHOP.enfinity/eCS/Store/en/-/USD/SY_DisplayProductInformation-Start;sid=E_csU_lYeu0sE8ePMmcmWLZXNP1mZ9GxYkc=?ProductID=YaUKC0%2eNkxIAAAD19z2OZmjy&Dept=dcc&CatalogCategoryID=2wsKC0%2eNcYAAAAD1vxeOZmju) which stores everything on a 3" CD which holds 180 megs of pictures and can be viewed on your computer. Each CD costs $2-3. However, it is not without its disadvantages. You can't take pictures as fast as you can with a coolpix. Reviewing and deleting are also slower on the Mavica, and it lacks an optical viewfinder.

I was looking for a camera a while back, found this and bookmarked it, didn't get round to buying it.

Kodak DX4330 (http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/B00006IJK3/qid%3D1048022244/sr%3D1-1/ref%3Dsr%5F1%5F3%5F1/026-3994143-5378800)

Its 3.1MP but has x10 digital zoom

Well rated cam. Good luck, and sorry to hear about your wrist. All the best mate :beer:

I have a Canon S30 and I dig it.

There are a lot of things you should consider when purchasing a camera. First is Price, then features.. once you define your range you can get a camera to match.

My favourte camera right now is the Fujifilm S602 Zoom.

Here are the reasons:

3.3MP (6MP Max)
CF, SM and Microdrive
5 shots/Second 3.3MP (40 shots total at 1.7/Second 1MP)
External Lens support (I have a Telephoto and a Wide Angle)
Built-in flash, but a hotshoe for an external one
Excellent Photos!
Shutter Priority, Apature Priority, Manual Mode
Macro mode rocks (no good for mountain biking)

And more.

Anyway, take a look, if you're a photographer that wants manual control over your shots, this is the digi-cam for you (And it's priced under the Nikon 5700, and well less then the D100).

Hope that helps!

Joe

Here are a few samples from my camera (Note, these are HIGHLY compressed), but you can get the idea:

I have a lot more, these are just some from a trials competition I was at a few weeks ago. I have some DH and XC too...

Galleries:

http://www.mtbkanata.com/Photo_Galleries/KL_05192003/index.html
http://www.mtbkanata.com/Photo_Galleries/Cornwall_05182003/index.html
http://www.mtbkanata.com/Photo_Galleries/Cornwall_05102003/index.html
http://www.mtbkanata.com/Photo_Galleries/KL_05032003/index.html
http://www.mtbkanata.com/Photo_Galleries/Kunstadt_04252003/index.html
http://www.mtbkanata.com/Photo_Galleries/urban_04182003/index.html
http://www.mtbkanata.com/Photo_Galleries/Hockey/index.html


http://www.mtbkanata.com/Photo_Galleries/Kunstadt_04252003/images/Kunstadt%20079.jpg

It does Black and White too!

http://www.mtbkanata.com/joesfolder/Andrew_Hockey.jpg

Thanks for the info and good recomendations. I just found a digicam website which really liked the canon powershot a70 for its full manual controls. I might check that camera out. Hopefully I can find something good for relatively cheap so I can still buy a boxxer race for my bike. I was about to buy one before my little incident, but maybe ill find a used one at the races.

Ive never been to downhill races before. Are there quite a few people looking to sell their equipment?

I bought my Jr. T at a race in winthrop from a guy who just bought a shiver, he had just rebuilt it and let me have it for about half the price of a new one. He didn't even have it for sale, I just started talking to him and he says hey, have I got a deal for you! So yeah, you may just find what you're looking for.
As to the cameras, I may return my canon g3 now as I think the fuji mentioned above sounds like more what I want for a much better price. I just got it at costco and you can return anything anytime.
mtbkanata.....My wife wanted the canon for the 8X zoom, will the 6X on the fuji make her happy? We are relative novices in this camera thing. Thanks....tom

tomkatz: Zoom is one thing, but you really need to look at Focal Length. The camera that I have goes from 35mm -> 210mm, and I have a 2.0x lens which increases it to 420mm. Best bet is to go to a shop (A good camera store) and test them both out. Even if you buy at a retail chain (Radioshack/Futureshop) do your reseach at the best camera store around. First, the staff will know way more than a retail, and you can try many different models.

Just a thought.. I mean all the cameras out there are very good in one way or another.

The main difference you will find in the G3 and the s602 is SIZE! The Fuji is a large camera compared to the G3. Advantages, well you can have CF cards (1GB+), and it fits in the hand better... disadvatages, well, it's too large to stick in your camelpack...

Oh, one more thing on the Zoom, the s602 is a Optical Zoom. It has on top of that a Digital Zoom of 1.4 - 4.4x (3.3MP - 1MP)

The G3 I think only has a 4x zoom, or 140mm, but it does have a 3.8MP CCD...

Decisions, desisions!! :)

I hope I helped and didn't just complicate things for you!

Joe

mtbkanata....good info thanks. I guess I was thinking of the nikon having a 8X zoom, that was the other one she considered. We will go to a real store and do some comparing. Size may not be a big deal as I carry our old HP camera while on the bike, it is a cheap one but it is small and still works pretty good. Thanks....tom ;)

I just ordered a Pentax Optio S after reading reviews on CNET:

http://electronics.cnet.com/electronics/0-6613935-1304-20796613.html?

It's 3.2 mp with 3X optical zoom (and 4X digital zoom = 12X) and has a slew of features, including movie recording, voice memos, 3-D imaging, night scenes, panorama ,etc. But the size and speed of this jewel is what sold me. It's smaller than a deck of cards so I can tuck it into a jersey pocket. It fires up ready to shoot in less than two seconds and has a very short lag time between shots (on my old digicam I sometimes missed shots because of shutter lag.) Expensive, yes, but I got a great on-line value through WalMart (they include a 128mb card for the camera-only price at other websites). I can't wait to get it.

You should just save and get one of the Canon EOS-10D Digital SLR for $4000.00 and for only a few hundred more you can get a lense:p

You should check out this site. Some good reviews on digital cams.

http://www.dpreview.com/

:beer:

Heh, you can spend so much in this! I want a Nikon D100 next... I think you can spend more on a camera than your bikes!! Imagine that! You know, any camera you get, I'm sure you will enjoy, it's 50% camera 50% photographer once your talking action... so keep playing and since it's digital, you can take 1000 photos and keep the 20 or so that work out.. :)

Joe

a lot depends on your budget

remember there is more to the camera than just the megapixel rating

the quality of the lens and ccd means a lot

i once owned a nikon coolpix 2.1 megapixel camera (semipro..it was expensive at the time...like a thousand bucks)...it actually took better pictures then my sony f707 which is a 5 megapixel camera with a "Zeiss" lens...Zeiss is a high quality maker but their cheap lenses for slrs cost a lot more than this entire camera

canon/olympus/nikon are all great makers in the hobby/semipro cameras. sony is ok by my experience. memory sticks are very nice though..much more convenient that flash cards or cds. the flashes suck on these cameras. for casual pictures they will work just fine though

if you step up to the pro cameras (like the canon d60 slr or nikon d1x or n100) you will get great pics but the cost is very high...and you have to buy lenses and a quality flash

also consider the software for photo editing. i have adobe photoshop 5.5 which is unbelievably expensive and not that user friendly.