My first digital camera. For once I got exactly what I expected for the
bucks I spent. One complaint, so far, detailed below.
I logged onto Walmart online and found a Vivitar 3710B. 3 mega-pixels.
Found a couple of reviews online and ordered the camera. It was here in
three days. See here for a description:
About 80 bucks delivered. It has a 16MB card built in. It has an
expansion slot for a SD card for more memory. When you add the
expansion card, all pictures are put on that card, not on the built-in
one.
I've had it a couple of weeks (as of mid-June 2005) and still playing
around with the various
settings shooting a lot of test shots to see what happens. There are
included cords to attach to a computer-- USB port-- or to a TV. The USB
hookup is just fine. Haven't used the other one. The CD included has a
photo editing program, etc., but I use Irfan, a nice little free
program that does a great job editing photos.
You can shoot normal photos, portraits, and real close, like for a
flower. There are three settings of a switch that control these. I
tried all three. Worked great!
One thing I did notice is the shutter delay. I clicked the shutter and
deliberately moved the camera while it was processing and the image
blurred. So, one little thing to remember. Hold it steady while it
processes. I think it takes about 6 seconds or so. So, I reckon if
someone wants to take a shot from a moving vehicle they would need to
set the lens at its highest speed-- assuming that is possible. I am
always alone in my rig so I ain't gonna be taking any shots while in
motion.
The automatic flash is a real problem! My sister shot some indoor
photos of a couple of us and the flash is way too bright. It washed out
the faces. But I had the camera set at normal brightness so it might
need to be set at the low light setting. Didn’t try that. You can turn
the flash off. One solution I can think of, if the low light setting
does not work, would be to fashion something colored to cover the flash
and reduce the intensity. Maybe some colored cellophane from candy,
after you wash it off, of course. For folks who are going to be using
the flash a lot, you might want to bypass this camera. Most of my stuff
will be shot
outdoors, so no big deal to me. If I were to do any serious indoor or
portrait work, I would get me a flash umbrella, some el cheapo portrait
lights, maybe a fill of some kind, etc. The camera does not have a hot
shoe.
On the front of the camera there is a sliding thing that covers the
lens and needs to be slid sideways before you can take pics. I notice
it is something that you want to handle with care. Some folks might
call it a bit flimsy. I don’t have any problem with it since I treat
all electronic gear or cameras with care and handle them gently. You
might not want to let any young kids get hold of the camera and play
with it like they would a toy. On the screen on the back of the camera
there is a notice if you have the slide over the lens. It has a
viewfinder and I did some test shots to see if what you see in it is
what the camera picks up. Most of the time, it did.
Specs on the Net page say no tripod mount but there is one.
There are a lot of bells and whistles on this camera but I won’t cover
all of them here. Some of them I haven’t even played with and some I
may never use.
The CD has the manual on it, but it was missing a couple of pages so I
reverted to using the paper manual.
The Walmart page gives you some extras to choose from. I put them in
the shopping cart just to see how much extra shipping charges there
would be. A lot! I got just the camera and went to a local Walmart for
the other stuff I wanted.
Here is what I got:
The camera comes with two regular AA batteries. I got a Digital Camera
AC/DC Rapid Charger with 4 Nickel Metal Hydride AA Batteries. Model
number CH-3900N. It has separate cords for AC and DC charging. I found
the charger to work well with the AC cord (have not tried the DC cord)
but did have a bit of a problem with a couple of the batteries not
staying fully charged when out of the charger and in my camera bag. I
left all four batteries in the charger for a couple of days when I was
not using them and the shelf life between charges seems to have
improved. Price: $16.82. I’ll be getting at least a dozen additional
batteries to have plenty if I do some serious photo taking. Nice bonus:
they work in my beard trimmer, too.
A Lexar SD card, 256 megs, for around thirty bucks. Put that in the
camera and it showed on the screen that at normal exposure setting I
could take 1199 pictures and store them on that card. The card also has
a lock mechanism so you can assure none of your pics will be deleted
after you pull the card out of the camera.
A tripod, MX1000 for around twenty bucks or so. Have used it, it is
great!
A small camera bag: three bucks, or so.
Would I buy the same items again? Yep!
I put a copy of a pic I took, of Sis snoozing, on my Web page. It is
not linked to any other page but you can see it here for a while:
UPDATE ON
SHUTTER
DELAY: I received an email from a person who learned that the speed of
the expansion SD card affects the shutter speed. The faster the card,
the less shutter speed delay. I went on the Net and did some research.
There are regular write-speed cards, like the one I purchased, Then
there are high-speed cards and super high speed cards. Been pricing
256MB high and super high speed cards and trying to find one locally to
try. When I get one, will do an update here as to experience with it.
bravenet.com