Accessories for P&S-Am I the only one??

[stsinner]

Am I the only one who has ever bought accessories for a point & shoot camera? Before I got the good deal on my D50, I paid $499 for my Canon PowerShot A620 two years ago, and I LOVE the pictures it takes, so I never thought I'd upgrade. Never wanted a DSLR because I never realized how much I like photography, and the pictures from the A620, which is 7.1 MP, as compared to my D50, which is 6 MP, look gorgeous.



My question is this-am I the only one who actually loves his P&S enough to actually buy an accessory for it? In this case, I bought a flash for it that wasn't cheap, and it's been really great. It's wireless and mounts to the tripod mount.

 

[Kendo]

Nope you are not the only one. I am getting some lenses for my PowerShot S5 IS soon. Thanks for sharing. I think it looks cool.:thumbup:

 

[stsinner]

Nope you are not the only one. I am getting some lenses for my PowerShot S5 IS soon. Thanks for sharing. I think it looks cool.:thumbup:

That sure is a good looking camera, and it looks like it has two microphones for stereo sound??

One question, though. You said you're going to buy lenses? You can change out the lens?

 

[Big Mike]

You can't change out the lens, but there are adapters/filters that you can use to get 'telephoto' and 'wide angle' effects.

I've seen people trick out their Pintos and Chevets, so I guess it's not out of the question to buy accessories for your P&S camera.

 

[stsinner]

You can't change out the lens, but there are adapters/filters that you can use to get 'telephoto' and 'wide angle' effects.

I've seen people trick out their Pintos and Chevets, so I guess it's not out of the question to buy accessories for your P&S camera.

I do have a removable ring on the Canon which I never really looked into, and I guess that's what that's for. It removes just like the lens on my nikon-you can see the button in my pics. Maybe I need to trick out my Pinto with a wide angle adapter.. I like that idea, because sometimes I really just want to take that camera along, instead of lugging the DSLR.

I'll just sneak this in there... neener, neener

http://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/notcamera.htm

 

[mrodgers]

I originally had thoughts on teleconverters and other add-on lenses for mine. I learned here about how the cheap ones are generally junk and I'm not paying more for an add-on lens than I paid for my camera, so I let those thoughts slide.

How does that flash trigger? I guess from browsing through the threads I see here that you can trigger some flashes remotely with another flash? I would have no way of triggering a 2nd flash except with my own popup flash. The problem with that is redeye, everyone ends up with redeye with my popup flash. I'm not sure how I would rectify that.

My camera was $200. If I started to do add-on accessories, I may as well have bought a dSLR, though at that time they did cost a good bit more (thinking the D40). I bought a tripod to match my camera, ie. cheap. It's the $30 one at Walmart and it a fantastic tripod for a point and shoot or a superzoom. I looked at tripods available locally up to $150 and they were all junk in comparison. I wouldn't put a dSLR on it, but it's great for what I have.

I have a homemade monopod (which was my homemade tripod until I bought one.) It's just an old broken floor lamp. I was sitting at the computer searching out DIY tripods. I turned my head just doing some thinking and was looking towards the old lamp sitting there in the basement. A few moments passed by when the idea clicked in my head. There was my tripod! I just removed the lamp socket from the top, rigged an adapter to screw the camera down on and I had a tripod. It worked great for around the house until I bought a real one.

I now have a flash diffuser for my popup flash. I cut a chunk out of a gallon milk carton and was thinking of how I could get it to work without me needing to hold it. I cut some angles in one end and a tab in the other. Now it slips in the seam at the back of the popup flash and folds over and is held underneath the flash. Quite simple. It lays flat inside the camera bag or in my pocket and I can put it on and off in a fraction of a second. I have to get a shot of it with my other camera sometime to put it up here.

My superzoom is small enough to put in my coat pocket, though it's still bulky when in there. It's plenty light enough to carry around my neck or shoulder. There really isn't a reason to have a camera bag for it. My problem is, I have an old camera my wife's aunt gave us for my 7 year old and my old camera for the 4 year old. Every where we go, they want to take the cameras, but when we get there, it's the inevitable, "Dad, can you carry my camera?" So, I have a bag large enough to hold my camera on one side and theirs are stacked on top of each other on the other side. It has all my cables, memory cards, spare batteries (4 AA NiMH), can carry the charger, my tripod removable heads (or plates or whatever you call them), my DIY flash diffuser, and any small booklets or cheat cards I may make up and carry. It's just a $12 cheap bag I got at Walmart.

That's about it for accessories for me.

 

[Big Mike]

I agree that it's not so much the camera, as it is the photographer...but K.R. is still a knob.

 

[chrisburke]

i guess i just dont get it... i mean, you admit your self that that add-on flash was expensive... why not just save the money your investing in add-ons for a p&s and with flashes and lens' and just buy a SLR??

but K.R. is still a knob.

+1 that

 

[stsinner]

i guess i just dont get it... i mean, you admit your self that that add-on flash was expensive... why not just save the money your investing in add-ons for a p&s and with flashes and lens' and just buy a SLR??



+1 that

I have the D50, but before purchasing that I had no desire to deal with the complexity of a DSLR. I think that the pictures from my Canon rival the pictures from my Nikon, and the only advantage I see to the Nikon is being able to use different lenses. If I was only going to have the 18-55 and never buy a lens, the Nikon would be unnecessary, as it doesn't take better pictures. In fact, sometimes I just think the Nikon is a pain to deal with.. I'll need to get a shot of the kids and go to grab it and the 50 is mounted, so I have to change over to the 18-55, and by then I've lost the shot..

So when my Canon was all I owned, I was, and still remain, very happy with its pictures, so buying the $94 flash was easily justifiable. I like having the added flexibility.

As far as the homemade add-ons, no offense intended to anyone who does this, but I'd rather use nothing than to have that ghetto crap hanging off of my thousand-dollar camera.. That stuff is fine for playing around in the house, but I'd never let anyone see me with it.. I bought the Gary Fong Puffer, which mounts to the flash hot shoe and sits right in front of the flash to diffuse it. I don't understand spending all that money on a camera and then not buying the proper accessories.. Diffusers aren't expensive (relatively speaking). I paid $79 for the Lightsphere Cloud and Clear combo pack, and that covers just about any situation that I've read about where I'll need a diffuser, and the Puffer coveres the rest when I don't feel like dealing with the speedlight. I'm on just as tight a budget as the next guy, and probably even tighter since I've been laid off since July, but you have to set priorities, and if you want to be a professional, as you seem to want to be (I will never claim to be-I just like nice things), you need the proper gear.

 

[chrisburke]

As far as the homemade add-ons, no offense intended to anyone who does this, but I'd rather use nothing than to have that ghetto crap hanging off of my thousand-dollar camera..

this one will hit a soft spot with people in here... as a lot of us are DIYers.. and the reason is simple.... sometimes, yes its money... but sometimes, you can get just as good results with a home made product as one you paid money for... last week I maid a soft box.. it looks great (after I prettied it up) and it gets just as good results as a store bought softbox.. and it cost me nothing, as i made it out of things I had lying around the house... YES, i agree, some DIY stuff looks pretty junky.. and i wouldnt use something junky looking out in the professional world.. but thats why when I DIY i make sure it looks good, so its not embarassing, and laying question to my ability.

 

[stsinner]

this one will hit a soft spot with people in here... as a lot of us are DIYers.. and the reason is simple.... sometimes, yes its money... but sometimes, you can get just as good results with a home made product as one you paid money for...

Well, Chris, I sure didn't mean that in a derogatory manner, as it's just a matter of personal preference. I'm kind of a geek, so I like to have the store-bought stuff if I can afford it, and many times I can't. I don't think negatively about anyone who is the DIY type, and, in fact, I wish I was more easy-going and could be that way.. I'd be a lot richer...

 

[stsinner]

How does that flash trigger? I guess from browsing through the threads I see here that you can trigger some flashes remotely with another flash? I would have no way of triggering a 2nd flash except with my own popup flash. The problem with that is redeye, everyone ends up with redeye with my popup flash. I'm not sure how I would rectify that.

You're right that it's optically triggered, and it's pretty good at syncing. Here's a little blurb of a review I came across:

The Canon HF-DC1 high-power flash is a quite tiny, very pocketable and portable slave flash that will double the practical maximum distance flash range of any small digital camera's built-in flash. A small, fold-down bracket suspends the flash at the side of the camera body by attaching to the camera's tripod socket. When the slave "sees" the camera's flash fire, it will also fire, in perfect synchronization with the camera flash to increase the usable flash range considerably. There are two simple sliding controls on the back of the unit. One for "On Auto" or "On Manual." The other switch adjusts the output level to any of three levels. In Auto there is a built-in delay, which will not fire the slave with the cameras pre-flash, but will wait momentarily and synchronize the slave with the main picture-taking flash of most digital cameras. The supplied bracket is easy to attach to the tripod socket of most compact digital cameras, and the flash is so small and light, you hardly know when it's attached. The slave synched properly with both Pentax and Minolta digital cameras and really extended the maximum flash range considerably.

 

[zone]

Why post a link to this http://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/notcamera.htm

And then go on about needing top of the line gear?

As far as the homemade add-ons, no offense intended to anyone who does this, but I'd rather use nothing than to have that ghetto crap hanging off of my thousand-dollar camera.. That stuff is fine for playing around in the house, but I'd never let anyone see me with it.. I bought the Gary Fong Puffer, which mounts to the flash hot shoe and sits right in front of the flash to diffuse it. I don't understand spending all that money on a camera and then not buying the proper accessories.. Diffusers aren't expensive (relatively speaking). I paid $79 for the Lightsphere Cloud and Clear combo pack, and that covers just about any situation that I've read about where I'll need a diffuser, and the Puffer coveres the rest when I don't feel like dealing with the speedlight. I'm on just as tight a budget as the next guy, and probably even tighter since I've been laid off since July, but you have to set priorities, and if you want to be a professional, as you seem to want to be (I will never claim to be-I just like nice things), you need the proper gear.

 

[stsinner]

Why post a link to this http://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/notcamera.htm

And then go on about needing top of the line gear?

That was in response to Big Mike dogging people who trick out their Pintos and Chevettes (pont and shoots..)... It was a joke, and I by no means have top of the line gear, just store bought, as opposed to a milk jug diffuser. I'm not an elitist, just a consumer.

 

[zone]

That was in response to Big Mike dogging people who trick out their Pintos and Chevettes (pont and shoots..)... It was a joke, and I by no means have top of the line gear, just store bought, as opposed to a milk jug diffuser. I'm not an elitist, just a consumer.

Gotcha, sometimes it's hard to hear sarcasm over the internets...

I had never read that before and thought it was a great read and very true, that is why I asked.