Need an awesome (inexpensive) yearbook camera

Hi! Hopefully someone here can send me in the right direction! I am the

yearbook creator for a Junior High in Texas. Our digital camera just broke

and I have been given about $600 to spend on a new one. I need a camera

that takes excellent quality pictures I can crop. I do a lot of cropping. I need a

camera that can take CLEAR shots INSIDE the gym (basketball games) and

that can zoom in on a football field. I am mostly concerned with a camera that

can take good, clear action shots INSIDE (low lighting). Anyone have

suggestions on which camera to buy?

 

Kris

You either want a Konica Minolta Dimage A2 or a DSLR with a couple of lenses. The latter

will cost

you much more than $600 so it's likely out of your budget range.

<br><br>

The A2 is available as a refurbished unit from a couple of

sources (try <a href="http://www.butterflyphoto.com/" target=new>http://

www.butterflyphoto.com</a>, they seem to be decent) for under $600. It's an excellent

camera with a good zoom range and 8Mpixel imaging, plenty of room for cropping. The

camera has built in image stabilization and the lens will give you field of view from 28mm

to 200mm equivalent. It works well at ISO 64, 100 and even 200. ISO 400 and 800 get a

bit noisy but can be useable with a bit of work and cleanup.

<br><br>

The A2 also works well with Konica Minolta's dedicated flash units (the 3600 and 5600 are

the ones I'd recommend). When I did high school basketball pictures, a reliable, powerful

flash unit was essential to getting quality photos when shooting basketball and other

indoor activities for the year book.

<br><br>

Godfrey

Look to the viewfinder Olympus Camedia models. They're in your budget, and make relatively good action cameras. A friend of mine, photo editor of a large city newspaper, converted his whole newspaper staff to them a few years ago as being the best choice for the job, which is probably very similar to yours.

a lot of cropping... you'd probably want a lot of megapixels

 

inside the gym... you'd need fast lenses

 

football field... you'd need reach

 

action shots... you'd need fast AF and good focus tracking

 

With a $600 budget?? Good luck.

 

Check out dpreview.com to compare cameras and see what options you might have that fit your budget.

Try this Panasonic or its cheaper siblings:

http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/panasonicfz20/

 

It's got a 36-432mm 2.8 lens- unheard of in 35mm format.

 

If that fails, on your budget you might be better off with a film camera- used manual body plus fast 50 and 300mm lenses.

(I'm pleased with my Sony F828, but the noise at higher at ISO's in low light conditions would hinder you...)

 

The responses above about the A2 and the Lumix seem appropriate, and for a moment I was thinking the Lumix with the long, fast lens and image stabilization would be a good choice.

 

BUT the A2 has a manual zoom ring which is night and day different from a non-manual zoom. I couldn't imagine a more frustating way to lose action shots than because you were waiting for a motorized zoom to finish it's business before you could take the shot.

The Panasonic FZ10/20 have good, fast zoom operation and are not sluggish like some.

It's a good camera for the job, but it's somewhat lacking at the wide angle end of the

spectrum, often very necessary for yearbook pictures. It's not a great camera for flash

work either, although it can be done. Plus, the FZ20 is 5Mpixel which cuts back some on

cropping capability.

 

Overall, having done the yearbook photo dance, I'd pick an A2 and a good dedicated flash

anytime.

 

Godfrey

To get decent sensitivity for low-lught shooting, you need a DSLR, pure and simple. Small-sensor point-and-shoots simply won't cut it past ISO 400. The cheapest new DSLR, the Canon Digital Rebel, is $500 after rebate, but that's only if you buy two lenses from the list, and your budget would suffer. The Digital Rebel kit is $800 (search Pricegrabber.com). Alternatively, a used Canon D60 can be found for around $600 on eBay. You can start with a cheap yet razor-sharp $70 50mm f/1.8 lens (80mm after the 1.6x multiplier, ideal for portraits), and later add a telephoto lens like the 70-200mm f/4L for your sports shooting.

Agree with the last poster. SLR or DSLR. I know your requirement is digital but a film SLR and a decent zoom lens would satisfy the majority of your requirements. Does your school have a film scanner anywhere that you can use to convert your negs to digital files for post processing?

If all else fails, go for the used D60.

Good luck.

If you're shooting sports, don't bother with anything else but a DSLR, or a film SLR. Don't ignore film, since the initial cost is much lower.