Hunter - From the Canon D60

[Tronhard]

That WAS the EOS D60 not the EOS 60D. I had purchased a Canon EOS D30 as a historical artifact and found that it took excellent images. So when a D60 came available I decided to lash out and purchase a unit in excellent condition with battery grip, documentation and even the box for about $65US.
Taking it along to visit a friend I took a quick snapshot portrait of her grandson. When I processed the image and trimmed it, I was impressed with both the performance of the camera and the venerable EF 28-105mm 3.5-5.6. The Light box view might stretch its capabilities, but as an image viewed at face value (no pun intended), it holds up well I think.


NOT The Original - see my next post. This was pre-final crop


Mildly Processed and cropped.


The 28-105mm lens came free with an EOS 300X film camera I bought for $125NZ (about $55US). The results yield hardly any noise, and amazing clarity for a system that would have cost less than $100US.


If, like many, one simply wishes to put images on the web this setup produces acceptable images for a minimal outlay.

[Manfred M]

No surprises at all there Trev. The dynamic range of your image is quite constrained, so the sensor can capture everything reasonably well. There are no really deep shadows or bright highlights where those generations of cameras tended to fail. At 6 MP, you still have a lot more pixels that you can crop and still get good resolution on a web-based image.

Take shots that have a bit higher dynamic range or try making a print and we would be having a completely different discussion.

My first "real" digital camera was a Canon S40; so basically roughly the same generation and if failed miserably in most outdoor scenes when the light was at all harsh.

[Tronhard]

Correction. The 1st image in my post was not the unprocessed one. This is the Original...


I'm not sure I was looking for surprise actually, but I was appreciative that really old gear that costs very little is still a viable option for those posting on social media. We live in a world where we tend to disregard, or write off, older equipment. I think there is still value there.

[William W]

Actually, referencing post #3 there's quite a wide DR in the scene.

Interesting that the noise in the shadow area seems (more) exacerbated by the post production, than what it would be, if the same picture was made with a modern sensor. EXIF states ISO200 was used.

I guess that’s to be expected as we do understand how digital image sensors have progressed: but it’s very interesting to see it “in the flesh”, so to speak - at least I find it interesting.

Thanks Trev.

WW

[Tronhard]

Actually, referencing post #3 there's quite a wide DR in the scene.

Interesting that the noise in the shadow area seems (more) exacerbated by the post production, than what it would be, if the same picture was made with a modern sensor. EXIF states ISO200 was used.

I guess that’s to be expected as we do understand how digital image sensors have progressed: but it’s very interesting to see it “in the flesh”, so to speak - at least I find it interesting.

Thanks Trev.

WW

Thanks for the comments gentlemen! To be fair to the camera, I rather under-exposed the image to begin with (it was literally a snap shot), so that would have generated noise in the shadows in any case. Most non-enthusiasts will likely not go to 100% or anything like that, and in this case his grandmother is rather pleased with the image.

[William W]

. . . I rather under-exposed the image to begin with . . .

Glad you mentioned that . . . I've been thinking about many related matters today. I have been waiting to get to my monitor to have a detailed squiz. In the original the HISTOGRAM starts to peter out around 222, and there’s a count of 1, at 240.

As much as we can infer a result of what a different “exposure in the camera” would be – I reckon that +½ Stop would bring the highlights of the child’s hair just into the range of clipping.

So to be fair – yes for all general intent, you did underexpose: arguably many of us would have bumped one full Stop or even a Stop and a bit and let that area of his hair blow out ... so depending upon how much you wanted to blow out, then you didn’t ‘underexpose’ by all that much . . . anyway . . .

This brings me to what I have been thinking about . . .

How much ‘headroom’ does that D60 (and the D30) have? (i.e. the amount you can overexpose the highlights into clipping such that they cannot be recovered in Post Production).

A while ago I ran numerous tests with 20D vs. 5D, as did my friend in L.A. do the same – we found that generally we could push the 20D about ½ Stop beyond the “Blinkies” and generally be OK to recover detail in Post – yet with the 5D we could go sometimes 1⅓Stops beyond the first indication of the “Blinkies”.

I guess the other question is – what Post Image Integration does the D30 and D60 support – Histogram and Blinkies?

[rpcrowe]

I just sold a Canon XT (350D) body only with battery grip for$31.00 USD plus shipping. WOW!