New Digicam
As I mentioned in my previous post, I purchased a new digicam from the Aspen Grove Apple Store last night. Being, as I am, an owner and devotee of the Leica M6, I had originally planned on purchasing a Leica Digilux 1. After reading a review from Photo.net, however, I became concerned about the excessive amounts of noise (on ISOs higher than 100) and weird “pointilist” effect that people have reported when using that camera. At the same time, reading Derrick Story’s excellent article about covering MacWorld using a Canon S200 “Digital Elph” convinced me that I might prefer a compact form factor to the decidedly chunkier Leica. Combine all of that with a much lower price, and the fact that it can use the compact flash media I already own (as opposed to the SD memory used by the Leica), and Canon S230 started looking very attractive.
Unfortunately, the first S230 I got from the Apple Store had a dreaded
stuck pixel—actually a cluster of about 4-6 near the middle of the image,
all stuck on red. So, I had to take it back and endure the predictable
lectures about manufacturing “tolerances” and how if Canon had to ensure
that if every one of their CCDs was perfect, my camera would cost $10,000.
Whatever. Fortunately, after taking some test shots to prove my case, the photo geek Apple Store employees were persuaded to take my camera back, and I now seem to have a perfectly functioning version.
In the best Dean Allen tradition, my first subject was, of course, Wilco.
