off the fence

I love toys. I also hate spending money. Obviously the two impulses bump heads a lot. My usual solution is to deliberate so long on purchases that often they become moot. If you think about a certain model long enough--the manufacturer will stop making it and then you can't buy it. Neat, huh?

Well, I've been thinking about a new digital camera for 2 years now and I finally bought one tonight. It's a compromise. No surprise there! Instead of buying an expensive digital SLR I bought a compact ultra zoom. It's a little noisy at higher ISOs (well, even at 200) but otherwise pretty nice.

This is a picture of it. It's a Panasonic camera. The DMC- FZ7K. It's a 12X zoom (36 - 432mm equiv) with a 6 megapixel imager. It's got a 2.5" LCD screen but they cheaped out a bit here and it's very low res. Only 114k pixels. Their similar camera in their nicer line of cameras, the FZ30, has over twice as many pixels on a smaller screen. But it's several hundred dollars more so I decided the low res isn't so bad. LOL

I haven't bought a memory card for it yet and it only comes with a 16 meg one so that's my next purchase. I'll wait for something to be on sale. Of course. ;-) The camera should be delivered in about a week so there's plenty of time to pick something up...

Now my next big purchase will be a new vehicle. God only knows how long it'll take me to make a decision on something that expensive. But since my truck will be 7 years old in 3 weeks, I might have to hurry a bit on that decision. It still runs great but it's only a matter of time...

Comments

utenzi said…
Video noice, not audio, Teresa--though I suspect you're making a joke. (ha-ha) The panasonic chip has a problem with noise reduction and that combined with the small imager size means that higher ISO settings are barely usable. A nice dSLR can go up to ISO 1600 whereas this camera is limited to ISO 200 and below. Above that and the picture starts to smear or get very grainy.

The screen pixel density matters mostly in framing shots. It's not a real big deal but fine detail won't be visible.

You're right about the bugs--and I'll be taking lots of pictures of bugs and birds now that I'll have a big zoom. I can't wait!
10:28 PM
ninjapoodles said…
So jealous
no sentence
can make
*gurgle*
12:06 AM
Anonymous said…
Hey, congrats on the new toy, Dave! Looks like it'll be a lot of fun to play with.

I'm leaving my vehicles behind for a while now that I've sold my motorcycle... (or will, when the guy makes the final payment on it this week) -- Living downtown affords me the luxury of not needing one, and I share one with a friend when I absolutely have to have a car. God, my friend is so great to let me use it at leisure!
3:06 AM
kenju said…
Tell me about it! My 1997 car has 108K miles and I pray for it everytime I get behind the wheel!
9:30 AM
Lois Lane said…
She's a beaut! Can't wait until the pictures start popping up around here.
Good luck getting your next new toy.
Lois Lane
10:42 AM
Anonymous said…
Bumping head impulses. That could spur a poem you know...hm, hm.

Congrats on the camera.

A car you say. Get a Prius. Just sit in one. The dash is immensely gratifying and in the top 2 or 3 on gas, good handling and made by Toyota so repairs are not an issue.
3:30 PM
Anonymous said…
test.

Will blogger konk again mid-reply?
3:30 PM
utenzi said…
The Prius fails my interest test in two regards, Pearl. First, it's above my cutoff price of $20k, and second there's too much of a "trendy" markup. I'm not going to pay thousands more for a car just because it's the style of the moment. When the hybrid tech goes out to more of the fleet, then I'll buy in. Right now there's too much of a price premium on hybrids.
3:41 PM
Anonymous said…
Ooh, it is in the regular fleet. The Integrated Motor Assist is on some Civics if you go an extra $10. It's $20,010 (http://www.usatoday.com/money/perfi/columnist/healey/2002-04-05-civic.htm)
12:37 PM
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