A85

[sharibrat]

I posted a few days ago that I was deciding between the Nikon 4100 and the Canon A85......I spent yesterday taking identical pictures with each and then went to Wal Mart and got them developed. The Canon clearly had the better pictures overall. Better balance, brightness, detail.

The Nikon was nice in it's size, weight and very easy to use and navigate menus. The Canon is larger and definately harder to navigate........but the bottom line is the pictures. gotta go with great pictures!

As for the backlight question I posted.....I was disappointed there was no specific backlight setting on the Canon (as on the Nikon) so I took some backlit pictures yesterday.....some on the Auto setting and then I started playing around with adjusting the AE and the metering. WEll much to my surprise, the pictures on the Auto setting were the best! The setting changes I made actually made the lighting worse! The Canon fared better on Auto in the backlight situation than my 35mm film Canon EOS !

I'll be returning the Nikon 4100 today....with some sadness. Loved the size and the ease. Anybody else want to share good things about the A85? I've read the reviews and they seem pretty good.

I find myself comparing these cameras to my good 35mm and you just can't do that or I find I am always disappointed. i want the convenience of throwing the digital cam into my purse or pocket but I guess I'll still be using my big clunker for important stuff!

[Bodryn]

From what I hear, all the A series Canons get pretty high marks. I have an A70, have taken over 6300 pix with it and it's been very good. I love the fact that you can see immediately on the screen whether the picture came out or not. One shortcoming is that the viewfinder shows a different view than you actually get so you need to use the LCD to see what your pic will show. I used mine on Auto for a long time, very happy with those, but eventually I went to the P setting where it still works as point and shoot but gives you a lot more options. Another shortcoming is that you can't set the manual focus except in Manual mode. So I ended up with a number of out of focus shots taken from inside a car when it focused on the windshield rather than the scene. As a convenient camera to carry with you, it's hard to beat.