Toronto Photography Meetup Group

I've been given a mission by a friend, he needs a camera that has decent low light performance and is small enough that it can be carried in a shirt pocket, the smaller the better. Must either have no flash or a flash that can be turned off by default. So far the list seems fairly short, the Ricoh GRIII and the Lumix LX3. Any opinions about either of these two or other suggestions.

There's also the Canon S90.

The Ricoh GRDIII is a very good street photography camera with its dedicated 28mm lens. There is no zoom, so it's for those who love wide and that's it.

It has a great set of manual controls with dedicated buttons + wheels for functions on the fly. The B&W mode is pretty good even at high ISO, comparable to maybe an earlier generation DSLR in terms of noise.

I have no experience with the Lumix or the S90.

Canon PS S90. Check it out, F2(not constant) zoom lens, and canons new enhanced sensitivity CCD sensor for low noise. Put them together, a fast shutter and good high iso performance(for a p&s) and you got yourself a winner. It's quite small as well.

I've been fighting the urge to get one for a few months now.

Find an older Fuji F10 or F30 (I think).

I use Fujifilm F70, really good low light compact camera.

I got both the F30 and the S90. I haven't done enough shooting with the S90 to really claim anything yet.

For me however, the S90 would win over the F30 just because the S90 has manual controls whereas the F30 does not. The Raw mode's also a nice touch for the S90.

I'll be using the S90 in Vegas this weekend. We'll see how it goes.

Fuji's F200EXR is supposed to excel in low light too I thought, although the lens is slower.


From what I've seen, the LX3 is still a bit too bulky compared to the S90. But I don't know how big your pockets are. Just so you know, the S90's only 430 tax included, and shipped to your door in 1 business day.

Hummm, I might have to give this S90 a look see. I've been looking at picking up a small/compact P&S camera and being able to shoot RAW is a HUGE plus. I have a $100 GC for BestBuy to use up.

The s90 has gone down in price recently .. but I think it's temporary so it may be a good time to snatch it up.

$394.99 at Aden

http://www.adencamera.com/prod-overview ... Category=5

I remember reading on gizmodo that samsung will have an LX3-like P&S with a F1.8 lens

I have experience with both the LX-3 and the Ricoh GRD II (the GRD III's predecessor).

There's not much difference b/w the GRD II and GRD III when it comes to usability/ergonomics. The lens on the GRD III is faster (clearly) and the ISO 1600 looks pleasing enough. My intent is to pick one up later this year as an upgrade to the GRD II.

That said, b/w the LX-3 and the GRD II I kept the GRD II and ditched the LX-3. I have become, over the past few years, hugely big on ergonomics on a camera. I can literally operate (save for popping up the flash) the Ricoh GRD II with one hand - I can adjust the ISO, exposure compensation, change focus modes, shutter/aperture etc. etc. etc. with one hand. That to me says something about this camera.

The LX-3, I could TRY to do that but the buttons were too scrunched together for even my fingers and thumb. The image quality was pretty good but I didn't like the fact that, without using SilkyPix (at the time) you would see distortion from the lens at 24mm (equivalent).
The 16x9 movie mode was cool though but I'm not about the movies per se.

I've looked briefly at the S90 but it too lacks the ergonomics that suit me. I've held it and played with it and thought it was "decent" but it lacks something that I just can't nail down so I remain with the Ricoh GRD II which has performed just fine for what it is

Cheers,
Dave

definately not the Nikon P6000 -- they were selling it as a good low light camera, and I was sadly dissapointed. Although now its an older model. Although I do like the geotagging feature.

no reports on the IQ, but specs-wise, the new Samsung TL500 has to get some consideration - it's a 24-60 zoom that goes from f/1.8-f/2.5. that's insane. Retail is $449 US

Panasonic GF-1 with a Zuiko 17mm F2.8. Small enough to fit in a coat pocket. Large enough sensor to out perform darned near all pocket cameras.

i'm all about portable shooting.

but after shooting aps, it's hard to compromise with image quality from a small sensor.

the canon s90 is very good small pocketable camera. the f2.0 lens was useful
if you like using flash and have more space in your pockets get a canon g11

micro 4/3 camera next , panasonic g1, gf1, g10, g2, olympus ep1, ep2, epl1

for myself i use a pentax k20d + 40mm 2.8 pancake lens

Glad you said "coat pockets" because I was about to say you must have pretty big pant pockets for the GF-1! I wouldn't consider it pocketable by the normal definition though.

GRD III seems like a very good choice. My wife is very interested in getting one of this.

But can any one tell me where i can buy GRD III in Toronto?

For the best, my picks are Leica X1, DPII, Fuji's F200EXR.
I don't have any of them.

I have an outdated Lx3, which is good for group pic because of 24mm, but not good in high iso.