G7 instead of M8

[andre_bosmans]

Just bought a Canon G7 as a first and intermediary step to M9/M1O. Will at

least wait for M9 until problems are solved. Any similar thinking among you? Is

a 35mm external VF possible on a G7? Thanks & Regards.

[ronald_moravec1]

I LOOKED AT ONE at a local electronics discounter. Nice heavy construction.

 

What soured us was the inaccuracy of the VF. It showed much more than the LCD display. Less would not be too bad, but more and you loose heads and feet in tight compositions.

 

http://www.usa.canon.com/consumer/controller?act=ModelDetailAct&fcategoryid=144&modelid=14321

 

copy and paste the link to CanonUSA page on the G7. It shows a hot shoe/accessory shoe. There should be no reason not to add an accessory finder.

 

Canon programing for my A610 has a custom function where you can repeat one previous SUITE of settings such as aperture mode, w w/o flash, manual focus and FOCAL length. When I select custom, the selected focal length is automatically set on the lens. I would presume this can be done on the G7 also. Make it match 35mm or 50 or 42 or whatever you want and use the accy finder.

 

I don`t know the amount of distortion you will get with 35mm setting. Mine is very bad and I resolved it with PTLens or the lens distortion filter in CS2. I have looked at my brothers new ELPH which is new. It has a wider range and far less distortion.

[kajf]

Well even ig the G7 is a really nice P&S it is very, very far from a M8 (-9/10...)

[jerry_kirkwood]

I don't get the rationale for the G7. It doesn't have as wide a zoom as many others with the same sized chip, and that fit in a shirt pocket. For the money and need to have it around my neck I'd probably be taking a serious look at the Rebel XTi. Too bad the Nikon D40 is only 6MP. What was Nikon thinking?

[rj]

The G7 seems like a good camera, one that is quick to use and at least feels sturdy enough. Its not a substitute for a good digital rangefinder camera in my opinion. The lens isn't wide enough, nor fast enough, the sensor is too small and the lack of RAW is a killer for me. Also the viewfinder is not all that great. As a shooter though, I think the camera can be used very effectively and it fits the hands pretty well, has a good control layout, you just have to accept the compromises that the camera offers, kind of like the my Panasonic Lx-1 or the M8. They all have compromises.

[harvey_trautenberg1]

The G7 interested me until I evaluated the Ricoh GRD. The GRD with an external VC finder

is an intuitive camera very linear to the original barnack in design-similar to me to a

Minilux with more manual control. Remove the VF and it is a small pocket Digi with great

amount of control. The G7 without raw is a failure in design IMO. I have the Dlux 2 as well

and the GRD is more Leica-like. I would welcome Leica to build a similar camera to the

GRD it would a DigiMinilux.

 

The G7 just seems similar to Leica in that both have a lens and a separate thing to look

through. To paraphrase Sen. Bentson "I know Leicas, Leicas are a friend of mine and

Senator you are not a Leica"

[janne1]

I have used the older G6 little bit, i liked alot about the

swinging lcd panel, it was very nice for shooting covertly:)

i hear they dropped this feature. The thing that annoyed me

most was the huge lag of the camera compared to the lightning

fast m shutter.

[Brad_]

Seens like a reasonable option. Or, the GR-D. They'll all make nice photographs. I'm sure the

M9 will be much more refined - why spend the $$$ now?

[harvey_edelstein1]

I saw the Dpreview test on the GRD and they were not impressed with it.

The high iso stinks and for me my F30 cheap Fuji is better for this.

 

If all you want is iso 100 to 400 then their are nicer cheaper and better performers out there.

 

I too liked the old GRV film camera but getting a low noise sensor for digital version has not happened for Ricoh and maybe next time but I advise getting something better.

 

The G7 is stripped down features the were the G6 which I would rather have. Raw was obviously taken out so the G7 would not compete with the low end Canon Dslr that sell for the same pricepoint as the G7.

 

Too bad since every thead here on PNET points out the lack of RAW as a definite non starter. Maybe the Sigma with the new sensor, starts with SD something will fill the bill.

[john_a.]

Ford focus VS Corvette

[michael s.]

I don't think of the lack of raw on a small p & s camera as a failure in design, nor as a non-starter, as Harvey and Harvey suggest. My older G2 from Canon offers raw, but the delay was for me too big a "price" to pay on that camera. And the jpegs from these various cameras are more than usable for the kinds of pictures I take.

 

Given a choice between slow raw and a responsive and reasonably good jpeg, I'll take the jpeg. But a scenic or landscape enthusiast might feel much differently, and I certainly wouldn't call her or him wrong.

 

(Incidentally, I think some of the Ricoh GRD users are shooting jpegs with that camera, even though it has raw, because the raw shooting is a bit too pokey. But I could be mistaken.)

 

I think the disappointment in the G7 is the absence of the pivot/swivel lcd -- present I believe on all prior Canon G series cameras -- which for me is an extraordinarily useful feature. I'd really miss that on a G7.<div></div>

[michael s.]

Incidentally, I did not mean to suggest that G2 was responsive enough using jpegs. Often it was not. (Raw was even slower, because of the write times, I gather.)

 

But the G2 came out back in 2001 or '02 (?), and nearly all the p & s cameras have become more responsive as newer models have replaced the old ones.

[al_gorman]

Michael i do like you photograph.

[michael s.]

Thank you, Al.

[fred_c1]

>The thing that annoyed me most was the huge lag of the camera compared to the lightning fast m shutter.

 

It's funny how people never factor in the time required for focusing, whether manual or auto, when they talk about "shutter lag."

 

If you pre-focus an AF P&S before releasing the shutter like you would a Leica, you'd find the "shutter lag" is close to non-existant.

[rj]

I agree with you Fred. When I shoot anything on the street or with people moving with my Lx-1 I set it to manual focus and prefocus for a certain focus range. This allows me to shoot with virtually no shutter lag and the small sensor/short lens allows a much larger depth of field so the zone focusing really works great. I don't see any reason why this can't be done with the G7. It also helps to have a quick write time to the card and this is where my camera, at least shooting RAW doesn't do so hot, shooting Jpegs is as quick as can be.

[g-man1]

"If you pre-focus an AF P&S before releasing the shutter like you would a Leica"

 

Impossible to focus a non-M like an M. It's the small differences that can sometimes make a huge difference.

[fred_c1]

Such wisdom! It's also impossible to bottom load a camera or lose/damage its bottom plate unless it's a Leica. What a world of difference indeed!

[blakley]

My daughter got very good results with the G5, and I expect the quality is better with the G7; the lack of a swivel screen and RAW mode are a pity, though. Trevor has been getting very good pictures with the GR-D; you can see some of them <a href="

<p>

I expect you'd better get a camera you really like if you're going to wait for the M9 - you'll have to live with your choice for a couple of years at least.

[chuck_fralick3]

Well the G7 is no M8, but clearly not meant to be. I recently bought a G7 and I'm

beginning to think DP Review is off the mark with some of their comments. I have no

problem not having a tilt screen. Overrated in my opinion. I had an Oly C5050 and a

Canon G5, and I rarely used their swivel screens. How many DSLRs ever had a tilt screen?

Never held back film cameras either. I don't find noise at ISO400 a problem, but it sure

gets noisy at 800. Then again, almost all small sensor digitals do. Below that I find the

images crisp, well exposed, and with good color saturation.

 

What I do find myself wishing for is a 28mm wide end. Not a show stopper and most of the

Leica world uses 35mm Summicrons and luxes heavily, but it would be nice for travel

shots. I hear complaints about the slower lens wrt to the G6. With the IS feature it's more

than been made up for.

 

My single real gripe is that there is what I think is too much barrel distortion at 35mm. In

most pics it's not really an issue, but when you have any kind of parallel lines or features it

is certainly visible. Zooming to 40mm seems to get rid of most of that. Aside from that

one gripe the camera is well built, offers tons of features, and at a street price of about

$500 is a terrific buy in my opinion. Rather than take a DSLR or an M6 kit, I now take a G7

and a Leica CM on travel. Small and scratches most of my itches.

 

Cheers

[g-man1]

Fred C. writes "It's also impossible to bottom load a camera or lose/damage its bottom plate unless it's a Leica"

 

True.

But my comments were specifically about focussing an M camera; using a rangefinder and the visual feedback of the coincident images, the clearly visible distance engravings on the lens,the depth of field markings, and the definite "end points" of lens focussing (i.e. it stops at infinity and 0.7m or 1m) and in some cases the presence of a focussing tab -- all of these allow pre-focussing to an ease and extent not found in any point and shoot that I've tried or are aware of.

[dstate1]

I have a G7 and it's a nice point and shoot, but sure as heck no replacement for a pro grade digital camera. It tends to blow out highlights that can not be recovered. The files are good relative to its size, but are a far cry from the quality level of say a Nikon D200 in both noise, dynamic range and resolution.

 

Of course, it's only $500 vs a lot more for the DSLRs out there so we have to be reasonable with our expectations.

[paul_m__austin_]

I have a G7 too, but I can't comment on how it compares to a Leica until I win the lottery. There are a few problems with this camera, but overall, I think it is very good. The lack of swivel screen doesn't bother me at all, probably because I've never had one. The LCD has an anti-glare coating that makes it surprisingly easy to see at sharp angles. It does blow out highlights much more than my D70s, but exposure compensation is easy to use. Resolution is not all 10 megapizzels would imply. I get more out of 6MP from my D70. Even under perfect conditions a 100% crop doesn't look sharp, but I don't really think you need that many pixels for most shooting, so oh well. When in manual focus mode the center of the LCD shows a magnified image to help you focus. Image stabilization will let you take a reasonably sharp shot at 1/8 or even 1/4 sec if your careful and at the wide end. Too bad it won't make your subject sit still. Contrary to what another person said, the optical viewfinder shows about 75% of the image. It does not show more. I agree less is better, but 75% is a LOT less.

 

I like it, but I didn't pay for it. I think it's a little over priced, but it's probably as close as we're going to get to a cheap digital RF substitute. I just don't understand why the camera makes can't get to work on that.

[nels]

I hear the G7 MarkII will be the M8 killer.

[Brian]

<P>It's funny that people are nominating the G7 as a possible Leica M8/M9 stopgap camera. Why would they do this. It's expensive for a digicam, which may be reassuring to the Leicaphiles. And it's true that many years ago Canon made a 35mm rangefinder that batted in the same league as the Leicas of its day - though it never achieved the same cult status. But the path that Canon has taken since then is a long way from Leica's, so that you could hardly say the G7 has an ounce of classic rangefinder inheritance.</P><P>The G7 has been a disappointing camera for many reviewers, because of the features that Canon left out: despite that it is a very good camera, but probably a fairly ordinary one as well.</P><P>I'm not a Leica owner in waiting so I don't have the issue of needing a stopgap. However, I already bought a digicam which is probably more near to the Leica concept than the G7 and that's the Olympus C-7070. This has a zoom which goes to 27mm equiv at the wide end, full manual control (including manual focus), saves RAW, uses CF cards, has a tilt and swivel viewscreen, and an all-metal body. Of course they discontinued it, so it's not that useful as a recommendation.</P>