Why is my new A230 not taking better quality photos?

[therealciviczc]

I finally decided to splurge on a lower end DSLR. I bought a Sony A230. After getting lackluster results I decided to take some photos with my old crappy Cannon point and shoot and compare them. In most cases the crappy old cannon looks better to me...

Sony:

Cannon:

Sony:

Cannon:

Sony:

Cannon:

Sony:

Cannon:

Now obviously the shots are not of an artistic nature. I was just trying to get different light levels and colors to compare. The cannon is 5+ years old, cheap, and beat up to the point where you have to shove tooth picks under the battery door to get it to work. The sony is brand new. Both are on auto. The sony is using the kit lens. I even did a blind test with a bunch of photos with my wife and she picked cannon on all but 2 photos.

Is this a user issue, or is the sony just not that great of a camera? I only have a few days to return it and I'm trying to make the decision.

 

[Big Mike]

I think that part of the issue is that, like most P&S cameras, the Canon is highly processing the image in-camera. It probably boosts things like saturation, sharpness, contrast etc.

DSLR cameras, while they can do this, typically don't do it as much on the default settings...and don't do it at all on the RAW setting. This is mainly because the type of people who shoot with DSLR cameras, are more likely to want to process their images themselves, on the computer...rather than having the camera just do it automatically.
So when you compare the two cameras like this....the P&S shoot photos may seem more 'finished' right out of the camera.

As for the blurry fence photos...I'd guess that it's either because you were moving too much when you took the shot...or you just missed the focus. The larger sensor in the DSLR camera means that your Depth of Field (DOF) will be shallower than with the P&S camera. So if you don't focus precisely on what you want to...it's much more likely to be out of focus. It is possible that your camera or lens has a problem...but it's much more likely that you just need to practice getting accurate focus etc.