Sonys Cybershot F828 is one a grouping of digital cameras that sit somewhat in between the average - "point and shoot" and digital SLR's used by professionals. What the F828 and those that fall into its category aim to do is to provide as many features as the amature is able to use, allowing the user a lot of room to play with apature, speed, exposure settings to name a few.
All the basics are included with the Camera, strap, lens cap, lens hood, USB and TV cables, instructions and two software CD's. No memory card though - i reckon they've substituted in the lens hood instead. Its more practical as you normally have to buy a new card anyway - what good is a 32 MB card anyway???
What makes the F828 stand out from the crowd though, is its design. It weighs in at roughly a kilo, finished a meanacing black finish, but what is really diffeant is its lense system. The lens can be found at the left handside of the camera, making up most of its bulk whilst looking more like a side mounted cannon than a lens.
The
lens itself is pretty good, designed by Carl Zeiss for Sony, and then put into production by sony in Japan. It has seven times optical zoom (fully manual) controlled by the larger of the two rings on the barrell of the camera. The smalller one that sits behind it is a focus by wire design, which is handy - there are some things that no autofocus will ever like dealig with. Of course you can turn this off at the by pushing a distinctive switch at the side, so you can easily toggle between manaul and autofocus. Alongside this , you'll also find the controls for nightshsot, macro mode, burst shots, and the button for a manual flash eject. The flash for your information, sits above the lens/barrell combination, in its housing. When it needs to be used, it pops up of its own accord, powerd by a small motor. Another feature of the lens/barrell combination is that you can rotate it up and down,. To give an example of what one might use this for - if your taking a picture over a crowd of people, raise the camera above your head and point the barrell downwards so you can see the screen. Alternatively, rotate the barrell all the way up so you can look directly down at the screen - this can help when you want to take pictures without being overly obtrusive. An individual pointing a huge 828 at you can be menacing!
The grip of the camera is an improvement over its predecessor - the F717 , it fits snugly in your right hand with four buttons on the top - your regular trigger finger button, one for adjusting the exposure, one for adjusting the white balance, and another for operating the light on a top mounted LCD display - which displays some basic information about the camera - it saves you from having to check the screens all the time.
Under the grip lies the battery compartment, and at the side is a door flap that has been integrated into the grip design - don't worry, its comfortable! This flap hides the slot for inserting a microdrive or compact flash card. The battery door at the bottom of the grip can be opened by pulling a switch sideways, and pulling the compartment door forwards, - its spring loaded and will do the rest itself. Inside you'll find your battery - a Sony Info lithium. Its the NP FM50, which powers many of Sony's digital cameras, camcorders. A second one is worth getting if your going on extended trips without access to a powersupply. Sitting beside this is a slot for Sony's own media format - "Memory Stick". If i have one piece of advice for you regarding this camera and "Memory Stick" its to but the "Pro" version. The regular version has a max capacity of 128mb, (123mb when formatted) - if you decide to open fire with the cameras 8 megapixels your going to have to change cards pretty often. I've done a review of memory stick pro - this may help you in making up your mind on whether you want to go down the Memory Stick Pro or Compact Flash storage route : http://www.ciao.co.uk/SanDisk__Review_5497913
The back screen of the camera is the usual high end sony one - high contrast, good in bright light, all the usuals. There are also a number of other buttons, below the screen and a number above it. The ones your going to be using most often are the one to switch from EVF (electronic viewfinder- located top left hand corner of the camera), the review (shows last picture taken) and the three controls clustered by the users right thumb. These are a jog dial (press and hold a button say white balance then rotate the dial to select the appropriate setting) 4 way joystick for navigating menus, and the menu acess button.
A number of modes are available :
Auto - the camera does all the work Apature - primarily you control the appature, white balance etc Speed - same as above except you control the speed - note from the specificaions that this camera has a huge range in both speed and apature M- closest thing to full manual controls
and SCN - this allows various pre-sets to be selected, such as portrait and landscape modes.
Then of course there are the old reliable - view pictures, set up and a movie mode.
The movie mode is worth mentioning - its rubbish. It consumes memory at a huge rate and any use of controls can be heard - forget about it.
Anyway, in terms of other features, the camera carries nightshot - this is an infra-red beam that has a range of about 5-8 meters at night and allows the camera to take pictures in the dark. This can only be acessed in Automatic or in movie mode.
Image quality - the F828 is more than capable of taking some great shots, with plenty of detail. There have been widespread Internet reports about "purple fringing" that occurs in some shots taken with this camera - true, but you need to be looking carefully to see them. You can choose the cameras picture resolution, with a choice of VGA, 1,3,5 or 8 meaapixels with the option of a 3:2 ratio mode as well. As one can imagine 8 Megapixel shots will take up a lot of space - consider a 256 MB card the absolute minimum if your intending to shoot at this resolution. As has been documented on the Internet - there can be quite a bit of noise (pictures look grainy) when the camera is used at high ISO speeds, - its an area where it doesnt perform as well as its predecessor the F717 - my old camera.
You can also shoot in RAW or TIFF that professionals use - although if you were to ask me, there isn't much point. These modes take up too much memory space. They're the equivalent to say................a negative. Unfortunately because they're so large, the camera will lock up for 10-15 seconds while it processes the date, writes it to the card etc. Not great. A previous review on this site has commented that only Sony's own RAW editing software can be used due to the RAW mode using encryption - this has now been sorted out with Sony releasing the code to Adobe. If your going to be changing white balance, doing extensive editing etc. I imagine you'd be better with a Digital SLR - there's greater modularity, more megapixels, a variety of add ons etc.
To sum up - the F828 is for the amateur who wants more than average - wants to play with manual settings, but can sit back and let the camera do all the work. It has a versatile apature and speed range, an excellent white balancing system. It will also be a pretty good compromise when a digital SLR with all its lenses would just be to awkward- perhaps on a backpacking trip. And compromise is what this camera is all about - you've enough features to take top quality pictures if you want, but not enough to be overwhelmed.
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pefidler : I'm aware of the editing power shooting in raw gives. However, with the time it takes to process a raw shot with the 828 its just not worth having the feature. It needs bigger memory buffer if its to write data faster.
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Advantages: Very good photo quality, 8 Megapixel resolution, Amazing low light focusing abilities, Full manual controls Disadvantages: Can't save favorite settings to mode dial like other cameras, No memory card included, Can't save favorite settings to mode dial like other cameras
Advantages: Very good photo quality, 8 Megapixel resolution, Amazing low light focusing abilities, Full manual controls Disadvantages: Can't save favorite settings to mode dial like other cameras, No memory card included, Can't save favorite settings to mode dial like other cameras
Apr 19th, 2005
(Apr 20th, 2005)
very helpful by (100%):
