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General discussion

Phote capture speed

Mar 15, 2005 3:11AM PST

I am looking into a new digital camera now. My only issue with my current camera (2.1 Nikon coolpix) is the speed to capture the photo - I get my kids posed and push the button and by the time the image is captured, they have moved and I missed the shot. Can some one tell me what the feature/mechanism is I need to look into for faster capture? Is it some sort of processor speed or a function of the memory? Any camera recommendations?

Note I am NOT yet in the market for an SLR - still love my Nikon 35MM SLR!

Discussion is locked

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There are two things which may help if you are not
Mar 15, 2005 7:06AM PST

already doing them.

1. When getting set for the photo, press the shutter button half way down so that the camera can lock in its focus. When you press down the rest of the way, it should snap the picture immediately.

2. Set your camera for the highest resolution jpeg image. If you use tif, for example, it will take much longer to do the capture than jpeg will.

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Shutter Lag
Mar 15, 2005 7:51AM PST

If you punch the shutter down, the shutter lag is the time for the camera to autofocus and store the photo.

Most of the time is for autofocus to lock.

Some older digital cameras had a shutter lag of over one second. Many newer cameras have a lag of 0.2 second.

Here is a list of those faster ones:
Konica Minolta - Z3
Kodak - DX7440
Kodak - DX7630
Kodak - Z730
Sony - L1
Sony - W1
Sony - P100
Canon - SD20
Olympus - Verve

There may be more.

There have been a lot of new cameras announced in February that have not been reviewed yet. Some of those will likely be faster too.

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old cameras slow
Mar 18, 2005 4:41PM PST

Yeah, my first digital was an early Kodak Easyshare (early 2002), a 3.2MP. She took beautiful stillshots, but the movement of a snail would blur the image.