Point and Shoot considerations..

[pbwing 0]

Thinking of making the transition away from a dSLR to a Point and Shoot for tandems.


Is there any decent P&S that has a lens wider than 28mm? I really can't find anything that is wider than that. Vast majority are 35mm.

What models are others jumping?

[DSE 3]

you can easily toss a lightweight wide adapter on a Canon G10, and it's a very impressive little cam. 2.5mm plug for bite/tongue/blow switch too.

[billvon 2,413]

>Is there any decent P&S that has a lens wider than 28mm?

DSC-V1 has a wide angle lens adapter that gets it to about 26mm. (Compared to a APS-C 18-55mm, which is about 28mm equivalent at its widest.)

[jimmytavino 16]

the sony dsc V 1 can be operated with a hard wired, hand held pendant which is multi purpose. it can turn the camera on and off, and has an amber indicator light, which TELLS you the camera is On.... it has a shutter activation button and a zoom "slide control"...but it is hand held...and hand activated,, ( i added a plastic molex coupling, into the approx. 5 ' long cable, and kept most of it in my jumpsuit sleeve, and the "plug into the camera " portion of it with the helmet..the pendant has a strong clip incorporated into it, which attaches nicely to the tube stow of my left hand mounted wrist altimeter...I can fully open my palm and Not 'lose the switch' and then simply close my hand around it and "find" the shutter button.. I did super glue a plastic button onto the shutter switch, so that it protrudes up enough to easily feel it...

But maybe better yet,, check with Laszlo about a small compact, Kodak V705. It has a built in wide angle, and he has adapted them to accept a standard tongue, or bite switch.

the Sony V1 has been around since '03, but it has great features and takes nice pics....though technically i think it IS discontinued...
attached are pics of the camera the pendant and the wide angle lens and 3 samples of the pcitures it takes...

Be sure to
check at laszloimage.com....for information about the kodak model. very small,, very lightweight, but nice photos, for tandem or close-in images...His contact information ( as well as TONS of great photos, can be found at his website.

good luck



jmy

[Skydivesg 6]

I bought a Sony DSC w 300. It's only 35 mm wide but I can deal with that.

My problem is finding someone who can open it up and wire the shutter relaease for a tongue switch.

Any one know who is familiar with Sony and can do that?

Be the canopy pilot you want that other guy to be.

[jimp 1]

This looks hot:

http://www.nikon.ca/en/Product.aspx?m=16681

Availability of a 0.76x aux. lens and geo-tagging capabilities. Maybe just the thing for flockers who want to log their distances.

Edit to add: It's on sale here at $450. CAD

[dynamite 1]

I have been jumping a Ricoh GX100 all last season and through the winter. I have spoken about it before here http://www.dropzone.com/cgi-bin/forum/gforum.cgi?post=3250233;search_string=gx100;#3250233.

It has a 24mm (35mm equiv) lens so no need for a wide angle adapter, although you can add one to it and get much wider.

It has a usb remote switch (CA-1) which can easily be adapted with a tongue switch. Much easier to modfiy a £15 switch than a £300 camera.

Six months ago Ricoh brought out the GX200 which has more mega pixels and a bigger buffer.

Like most compacts it is noisy at 200iso and above.

[guscabana 0]

Hi All,
I set up and jump a Ricoh GX200 for a week, and Im fine with the results, good and fast enough for tandems, 220 grams and minimal size.
After the CX105 any dslr looks too big...
Ill write a report later...
Gustavo

[Skydivesg 6]

I look forward to your report. In the mean time.

How many frames per second while shooting tandems? Do you know what the lag time is between shots?

Thanks

Be the canopy pilot you want that other guy to be.

[guscabana 0]

ejem, frames per second?
One and thanks... It keep you sharp on exit, you have only one chance!

[guscabana 0]

I tried in continuous mode on the ground, and with the release button pressed for 45 seconds, the camera took 61 pictures, thats 1.36 frames a second, not too bad....

[Skydivesg 6]

Thanks for that information.

As I understand when you use continuous mode on that type of camera it only shoots 2 or 3 migapixels. So continuous mode is not what you would want to use while filming tandems. Isn't that right?

What I am really wondering is: when you have the camera set up for taking tandem photos, (5 to 8 magapixels). How long does it take for the camera to write to the card (etc. etc.) and then have the camera ready to take another shot. In other words, shot to shot delay.

Be the canopy pilot you want that other guy to be.

[guscabana 0]

they are in full resolution, can be 12 megapixels, but I prefer the traditional 3:2 format (10.58 mpx), files size are 3984x2656, around 3.8 mb.
This is a nice little camera...

[Skydivesg 6]

So does that camera already have a shutter release input?

Be the canopy pilot you want that other guy to be.

[Jonntis 0]

Quote

I have been jumping a Ricoh GX100 all last season and through the winter. I have spoken about it before here http://www.dropzone.com/cgi-bin/forum/gforum.cgi?post=3250233;search_string=gx100;#3250233.


It has a usb remote switch (CA-1) which can easily be adapted with a tongue switch. Much easier to modfiy a £15 switch than a £300 camera.

Same switch works with GX200 and a bunch of other Ricoh cameras.

Did anyone try the CX1? Has manual fokus, 28mm wide, works with the USB-remote and "Images with the maximum number of pixels can be recorded at a speed of approximately 4 frames/second."

http://www.ricoh.com/r_dc/cx/cx1/

[dynamite 1]

I broke the USB port on my GX100 so while that's being fixed I have been jumping the Ricoh CX1.

I only have 4 jumps on it in perfect conditions but it is definitely fast at 4 frames a second and I am very impressed. Not only that but there is no buffer refresh time. You can shoot 4 frames a second for as long as you like, take your tongue of the trigger and then carry on taking pictures at the same speed.

Downsides are that to acheive 4 frames a second, you have to have it in it's fully automatic continuous mode. While you can set the ISO and focus, you can't set the shutter speed or f stop.

Of the four jumps I've used it on, it was absolutely impecable and I couldn't fault it. I normally use fully manual settings so going full auto was a bit nerve wracking for me.

However, I am yet to use it in low light on a cloudy day or towards the end of the day when compacts are traditionally weak and the full auto could lead to the camera selecting a shutter speed that's too slow.

You can overcome this by anticipating and bumping the ISO. As with all compacts, 400 ISO and above is grainy on ground test shoots.

Only 9 mega pixels to achieve the fast frame rate but it produces images more than adequate for tandems or fun jumps that blow up to A4 size no problems.

It weighs bugger all at 200grms too.

Like the GX100/200 you can turn the display off to take pictures saving battery life. I haven't pushed this one but have never had a problem with battery life on the ricoh. Fully charged a battery will see you through up to 7 jumps. With the faster shutter speed on the CX1 battery life might be affected but certainly not after the three I did on Saturday.

At 28mm it's narrower than the 24mm lens on the GX100/200 but that just means flying a little bit further away. The 28mm lens is much more similar to the raynox 0.5 on the Sony CX6 I use for video.

On a bright sunny day this is an awesome camera.

[Jonntis 0]

Wow, that sounds great. Exactly what I was looking for, thanks a lot!

Would be great to hear how it works in other conditions. Of course samples also welcome, whenever you have time.

By the way, it shouldnt be too hard to make your own trigger device for it. Check out the remote used for chdk-modded canon compacts.

http://chdk.wikia.com/wiki/File:Remoterelease1rastercy6.gif

The ricoh uses only 1,5V though, right? Otherwise isn't it likely the same remote would work?

If you put a 2,5mm jack instead of the switch, you can plug any mouthswitch into it, and wont have to remove the USB all the time, would probably make your USB port last longer.


CX2 is on the way too, don't know if it's very different from CX1, but its a little faster, 5pics/sec.

[dynamite 1]

Very interesting. The ricoh switch takes a AAA battery so yes 1.5v. I just modified the unit and then use a rechargable AAA as it went through batteries pretty quickly.

Samples attached. Difficult to give an idea of resolution when the images are compressed so i have included 50% and 100% crops.

All images taken at 200 ISO which gives a shutter speed for between 500 and 2,000 on a sunny day. It did tend to over expose the exits as it looks like it fixes the f stop and shutter speed at the start of the burst.

As you'll see the 28mm lens is just about wide enough for the student in the doro but leads to some cropping as I'm used to flying a bit closer.

Worth noting you can't set the shutter or f stop at all on this camera. A ricoh CX1 / GX200 hybrid would be an ideal camera.

[guscabana 0]

yep, thats confirm the manufacturers can do whatever they want, they just keep adding a few new things, to keep us buying new cameras all the time...
Still I think the GX200 is better, full manual, dng / raw, adapter for wide angle lens, etc. Except the slowness for adjust the exposure during a sequence, Im happy with it.
I promised a review...but later... for now some pics:

[dynamite 1]

I agree, I'll put the GX100 back on when it's back from repair as it gives me more flexibility.

Nice shots, just goes to show that it doesn't really matter what camera you have, it's the person behind the camera who makes the pictures.

[skykank 0]

Well said !!!

Blue ones

[Skydivesg 6]

We would sure like to see that review when you get time.

Be the canopy pilot you want that other guy to be.