Which Caplio to buy?

I can buy the R4, 5 or 6. Or 7 soon, it seems, but I'm not interested in pixel racing. I am tempted also by the Fuji F31FD but the lack of zoom is a major drawback. And the Panasonic TZ3, but it's more expensive and there seem to be question marks over image quality.

I had an R4 and unfortunately dropped it just after the guarantee ran out. I liked it a lot, for the lens, size, and general travel-friendliness (that's when I take 95% of my pics), tho of course would have liked aperture/shutter control. Also found the zoom a little annoying, as it was hard to get just the right distance. And the battery cover and lens mechanism seemed rather flimsy.

So I'm looking again, and can get 4, 5 and 6 at fairly similar prices. I guess they are basically very similar, tho I believe the R6 has a different zoom mechanism.

Any comments?

The R3 was well liked but would be hard to find now.

The R4 is very good but can sometimes suffer from fine banding usually at full zoom and high noise (high ISO) situations.

Some R5 have difficulty focusing and also the zoom button is inconsistant and can be too heavy to operate.

The R6 is fairly well liked but does have a slightly less effective macro I have been told.

The R7 untested so far.

I have 2 R4s and use them for travel and hobby shooting.
Brian

i would go for the R4 (but look for deals on the TZ3). I am 'away' right now, and do appreciate the longer zooms when out in nature.
--
Rube
http://www.flickr.com/photos/71881102@N00/

If you are in the UK, or maybe within posting distance, then the R6 can be found at amazingly low prices right now. I think fotosense have them for £153 with free UK delivery. Now thats a bargain.

I had an R4, which I thought was excellent, and indeed miss it really. A colleague at work wanted to buy it for travel, so I 'upgraded' to an R6, which has a nicer finish, very nice LCD, and I'm very pleased with it. I would be even more pleased if I had only spent £153 on it!!

I also have a F31fd, which has truly impressive image quality, and is built like a tank, with a very long lasting battery. But compared to the R6, the spec' is average, so the Ricoh is a better all-round camera.

A friend has an R5, and despite it's lowly reputation among R-series owners, I rather liked it, and may yet buy one as they can be had for £125 in the UK (it shares a battery with my GRd). Same 7mp sensor as the R6 in a re-designed R4 body, though the zoom control isn't clever, it works reasonably well.

The R7 seems to be a very nice redesign of the R6, but I would wait for the price to fall from launch price, so overall I think the R6 wins for now.
Enjoy whichever Ricoh R you choose.

A

I have a R5 and a R6. My R5 had a few of the known R5-problems, but all of them have been fixed now except the one where image stabilization doesn't start until half a minute after the camera is powered on. My R5 doesn't have a severe focusing problem, but it does miss focus more often than R6, although I haven't tried the latest R5 firmware which is said to fix that problem.

I like the R6 better because of its build and body design. The buttons (especially the zoom lever) are better placed, and the body is slimmer and feels tougher. The only thing I really miss from the R5 is R5 had noticable faster shutter response (and so does R3/4, I think). R(3/4/)5 can both (often) focus faster and has shorter hals-press-lag. I haven't actualy tested this side by side, but I felt it wery strongly when I started using R6, and the spec says R6 has more half-press-lag. Both (all) cameras are pretty fast though.

Some pros of R6 (over R3/4/5) is the custom modes are easier to access. The movie mode is harder to access though, buried in the menue where the custom modes used to be. R6 can write to the SD-card via USB (not so R3/4/5). All four adj.-button positions are customizable (only two of them on R3/4/5).

Some cons of R6 are the image quality is more smeared and processed. R3 is said to be the best, and R4 better then R5/6. What R7 will be like is hard to know. R7 has more megapixels, and R5/6 already had too many, which is why they produce smeared and processed images. This is the way of compact digitals these days -- make a lousy sensor but with good marketing figures, and try to rescue the poor result with image manipulation. Sensors should of course get better (although most obviously not at the same speed MP count has increased), so if the image manipulation is always successful the result should have more detail. I don't think the R7 IQ will be better than R6, but who knows -- Ricoh did use "only" 8 MP where competitors have 10 or 12 MP. You can't focus as close in tele end of zoom with R6( 7), and the lens is a little "slower", which I only have a vague idea of what it means technically. Another con I've noticed with R6 is Black&White is a scene mode with restricted setting possibilities, so you can't for example set ISO to 1600 in B&W (which is a cool effect if you want grainy pictures).

As with all digital cameras, the image quality is steadily getting worse as they add more megapixels. Sure the resolution for pixel peepers may be improving, but the dynamic range is suffering and the noise is increasing. To combat the noise the plastic look is increasing due to the heavy noise reduction involved.

So it all depends on what you want to do with the images. If only ever looking at images on a computer monitor then all you need is a 2 or 3 megapixel camera, but they don't make those any more.

If only ever printing to postcard size then about 3 megapixels is fine, but they don't make those any more. Heh, heh, I've got a 3 megapixel Olympus C-730, slow to use but excellent quality.

If printing to A4 size (about 8"x10") then 4 or 5 megapixels is all you need, but those seems to have faded away as well. But I've got the slow Olympus C-5060 and the Ricoh R3 for 5 megapixels. Nice.

Now at this point the printing rules show up and the fact is if you can print a good looking 8"x10" then that same file can be printed to any (larger) size and still look good - as long as it is viewed at the appropriate distance for the size. To allow for some artistic cropping, and to come closer to what 35mm film can offer and to make nicer large prints maybe 8 to 10 megapixels is ideal, but not in a pocket camera.

But landscape photographers have problems with pixels and some trees seem to turn to "mush" under some conditions due to interaction between the pixel count and the size of the leaves and the action of the interpolation needed to turn the Bayer RGBG pixels into the individual RGB pixels for the final image. They maybe need 12 to 16 megapixels to solve their problems.

Once you go past about 5 or 6 megapixels in a pocket camera those individual pixel sites get too small and can't store enough electrons (generated by photons hitting the pixel) so dynamic range suffers and noise increases.

At that point you need to go to a bigger sensor like the 4/3 system DSLRs (Olympus/Panasonic/Leica) or the sort of APS sized sensors of Canon/Nikon/the rest. Then you are getting a decent image at (currently) about 10 megapixels being offered. But still the dynamic range and noise is worse than on the earlier lower megapixel DSLRs. The old 5 megapixel Olympus E-1 DSLR gives images to drool over.

For best performance you need bigger pixels and that comes with the 24x36mm sized sensors in the most expensive Canon and now Nikon DSLRs. That level of performance kind of equates to the old film days of medium format cameras. Reserved for pro use really due to cost and kit weight.

Things won't get better until camera makers realise that more pixels do not necessarily make for a better image. It will take some new technology in sensors to surface to fix the situation. Nikon has a patent on a new sensor design that effectively becomes a 3-CCD type of sensor in one package and removes the need for the Bayer RGBG filter layout. That should improve things.

There's rumours that the upcoming Olympus E-3 DSLR may have a new technology Kodak sensor that also may have the RGB sensors all in one pixel design as well.

This is the future, a better sensor and hopefully a lower pixel count, which with the new design will give a big increase in resolution and truth in colour.

Plus of course with all cameras those woeful rear LCDs that can't be seen properly in Aussie sunlight, they have to go and a new technology is needed to make them properly usable.

So when that better sensor comes along with that better rear LCD, then digital cameras may have matured.

Meanwhile, my advice is to stick with the R3 or R4 as a camera to use until the real one comes along.

Regards.............. Guy

I was considering Fuji f40, but decided upon the Ricoh R6, should I wait for the R7 and see what the benefits are compared to the R6 or wait for the price drop of the R6 which should follow the introduction of the R7 and get an R6?

guzziando said:

I was considering Fuji f40, but decided upon the Ricoh R6, should I
wait for the R7 and see what the benefits are compared to the R6 or
wait for the price drop of the R6 which should follow the
introduction of the R7 and get an R6?

Click to expand...

The R6 seems to have generated very few problems, maybe some occasional issues of lens quality and soft corners or soft sides. So it is a current useful camera. The R7 is very slightly different/better?, but maybe not enough to buy it if the R6 is seen at a decent price as they become "obsolete".

In Australia the R6 price dropped a bit a few weeks back and may drop further as they clear out stock.

A current bargain here in Oz is the R4 if you can find one - Target stores as a Father's Day special have it for a silly price, Oz$269 where previously it had been Oz$477 then at Oz$427 and seen at Oz$399 once. The R4 is still a good camera if available, and that will tide one over until the pocket camera market matures some more. The R3/4 has 320x240 video and the R5/6/7 has 640x480 video if that's important. Give the R5 a miss if you see one as it has had a sometimes troubled life, unless it appears at a really silly price

Regards......... Guy

Guy,

Very nice summary! I particularly appreciated the explanation of why a camera that performs well otherwise can sometimes have problems with trees - I had never thought of this leaf size/pixel interaction before, but this explains why all my R6 test photos (e.g. taken of test cards) come out sharp as a tack, but nearly every photo I take of the trees in my front garden look mushy when compared to my lower resolution Fuji.

Thanks,

Ross.

An excellent explanation, Guy, and I mostly agree with it.

One exception re sensor resolutions and and print sizes, though. There are cameras that make fine looking 8 X 10s that cannot hack larger sizes. In practice, people don't always back up to keep photos occupying the same fraction of their visual field until the photos start to get really large. The rule of thumb that seems to work fairly well for me is that for a print up to about 12 X 18 to be viewable even at near distances and look nice, it needs a minimum of about 200 dpi from the camera. For an 8 X 10 print, allowing for borders, that means that a 3 MP camera should be adequate; 1500 pixels divided by 200 is 7.5" for the narrow axis. In practice, I have found that with some subjects you can go down to about 130-150 opriginal pixels per printed inch and have a print that looks good as long as you use high quality interpolation, like Genuine Fractals or a program that does Sync or Lanczos interpolation. These don't add information, obviously, but do a better job of keeping the illusion that there is more information there.

The result of all this is that it is entirely possible to make nice 11 X 14 prints from 3 MP images. It depends on the subject--I have a few landscapes taken at 5 MP that don't make nice 11 X 14 prints, because of the problems Guy mentioned with leaves and pixels. On the other hand, I have some macros of frogs taken at 3 MP that make beautiful 11 X 14s. Noise is also important; when it is low coming off the sensor it seems to be possible to make larger prints from a given resolution. If heavy NR is needed, however, the maximum print size drops, and it is often better to allow some noise than to lose lots of detail.

I do suspect that, as Guy also said, somewhere around 10-12 MP is practically enough--12 MP is good enough to make a 12 X 18 or even 15 X 20 print of a landscape that looks good with your nose touching it, and anything larger would be ridiculous to view from that close, so no more resolution is needed.

Guy Parsons said:

...
So it all depends on what you want to do with the images. If only
ever looking at images on a computer monitor then all you need is a 2
or 3 megapixel camera, but they don't make those any more.

Click to expand...

Really, for today's monitors anyway, all you really need is a 1.2 MP camera, or 2 MP even for HDTV type monitors. That really does limit you, though, the biggest decent looking prints you can make are about 4 X 5 inches.

Guy Parsons said:

If only ever printing to postcard size then about 3 megapixels is
fine, but they don't make those any more. Heh, heh, I've got a 3
megapixel Olympus C-730, slow to use but excellent quality.
...

Click to expand...

See above; I think 3 MP is major overkill for postcard (3.5 X 5") size, it gives you about 500 dpi on paper, which is 2-3 times as much detail as people can see even from very close up.
--
Ross Alford
http://www.pbase.com/northqueenslandphotos

My guidelines for how many pixels for what purpose was deliberately a bit sloppy for there's always the inevitable cropping or attempt at digital zoom in camera to distort the situation.

In my old camera club days people were printing too large with low megapixels, and to get some "bite" were over sharpening, and that led to some awful digital looking images. The situation (for 11""x14" prints) didn't improve until the first 8 megapixel cameras arrived on the scene. At that point I knew that should buy an 8 MP DSLR and proceed with some confidence. Hence my Olympus E-300 DSLR.

From my own camera plus print experiments I found that my absolute low limit was 180 camera pixels per inch of print. Any interpolation to improve the situation just makes the image smoother but cannot add any detail at all, so at some point the image just looks plain soft. At 150 camera pixels per inch it is definitely soft. Using Qimage those prints were always automatically interpolated to 600 dpi with good algorithms.

So my own low limit is really 200 camera pixels per inch and anything better than that is a bonus, and as I said, allows some small amount of cropping to take place.

The point with view distance is that the "rule" is to view from 10"(254mm) or the diagonal of the print whichever is greater. That sets a standard to work to. That also makes it a fact that a good looking 8"x10" can be printed to any size.

Now if the print is hanging in a hallway then noses will get closer, so more resolution is needed, but if hanging over a fireplace then the resolution can be based on that good 8"x10" like I said. You need to know the viewing audience and print situation when printing.

Another experiment (in 5 megapixel camera days) was to simulate ever increasing megapixel cameras (by small increments in zoom) and compare the result with the same scene taken with 100 ISO 35mm print film. My conclusions then were that about 10 to 12 megapixels will easily be equal to film in resolution terms. But other effects like the "cleanness"of digital images makes that 10 or 12 megapixels actually look a lot better than film, it enlarges better for big prints. Film even at 100 ISO has a lot of noise, film really is pretty dreadful stuff - it just has the advantage of randomised "pixels" so never gets Moire effects, and doesn't need the anti-alias filter (that's in all digital cameras) to blur the image a bit.

The simulation at 16 megapixels is way past what ISO 100 35mm film could deliver. We don't really need to go that far unless it is large group photography or careful landscape work. Think medium format film or a huge number of pixels to get a good result then.

The "trees of mush" came from that same experiment period, where I was photographing a waterfront scene with a hill and trees behind. I was surprised to see in some shots that just one tree out of hundreds had that mushy look. It was obviously a "foreign" tree that hadn't thought of its leaf size too carefully and caused that weird mush interaction in the jpeg.

As for peering at prints closely and what dpi (original camera pixels per inch of print) is required..... aiming for the range of 240 dpi and above is good and safe. With a good printer some say they can see a difference between a 300 dpi image and a 400 dpi one, but it needs a printer with very fine ink dots for that. Remember that photo lab machines like the Fuji Frontier print at 300 dpi, and some Kodak/Noritsu machines are either 300 or 400 dpi.

Regards.............. Guy

Thanks for all this. Very informative, and any conclusions have just confirmed what I've read elsewhere. Makes me even more annoyed that I managed to break my old R4 :-(

So it comes down to R4 for IQ or R4 for better build, I suppose. Prices are about the same, it seems, in UK at the moment - R5 is cheaper, not surprisingly.

suiko said:

Thanks for all this. Very informative, and any conclusions have just
confirmed what I've read elsewhere. Makes me even more annoyed that I
managed to break my old R4 :-(

Click to expand...

Yup, care is needed with any camera. They are fragile beasties.

suiko said:

So it comes down to R4 for IQ or R4 for better build, I suppose.
Prices are about the same, it seems, in UK at the moment - R5 is
cheaper, not surprisingly.

Click to expand...

The R4 is a good one and will serve well until something a lot better eventually is made. The R5 is a possible problem child, and seems more likely to deliver out of focus results at unpredictable times. I very rarely get any out of focus shots with the R3 or R4, but the R5 did something odd to focus quite often and usually just when you didn't want it to. If the R5 is very cheap and used with care and caution, it probably would work out OK. But I did find the R5 did deliver slightly over-processed results at times. It did seem good when doing macro, but scenery sometimes looked a bit plasticky.

With all the R3/4/5/6/7 the shutter release has priority over focus, so too quick a shutter press and you may get out of focus results. Plus of course the flash relies entirely on accurate focus to get the flash output right - so pausing at half press for proper focus confirmation is the way to go with all the R cameras.

I've deliberately blocked the fast focus window on the front of the R4 to cause 100% CCD focus all the time and the very slightly slower focus confirmation is good training for me to always wait a little at half press. No real conclusion if CCD focus is always better than front window focus, but whatever, I'm used to it now. The R6 and R7 use CCD focus only, so it must work.

Regards............. Guy

I wonder how much of an issue this smearing thing is with the higher pixel count. I won't be printing much above 6x4. Is it worth going for the R4, given the stronger build of the R6. Btw, is there any difference in the battery cover construction?

And then there's that TZ3.... which seems to be hard to find on the high street now, so I can't get a feel about the size difference with the Ricoh. I take a lots of pics in hot countries and like to wear lightweight linen-type trousers, so this is a definite plus for the Ricoh.

Ah yes, another thing I found annoying about the R4 was its inability to capture blues. I tried lots of things with ultramarine-type blue flowers (think gentians), but they always came out more purple than blue to my eye. Don't suppose the R6 is any better on this?

Did you try custom white balance?

I really like the R6... imo > R4

The build is much better, extra features, external af assist light etc.

To be honest, you will like the R3/R4 & the R6 so you cant go wrong, although if I was to choose out of the three, the R6 wins for me.

By the way, the days of CCD will be over eventually, CMOS will take over as Sony/Canon have spent alot of r&d on it, so we should see an improvement in IQ. I wonder if Sharp has put $$ into cmos? Hrm...

Yes, I seem to remember that was suggested when I asked about this a year or so again, but still couldn't get the blue!

It isn't really the fault of the R4 per se. Digital sensors are quite sensitive to both infrared and ultraviolet light. Some lens designs let a fair amount of UV through, while others don't, and it is pretty upredictable which will be which--in general, more elements and multi-coating reduce it, but I have found, using UV-bandpass filters, that it isn't that simple--the Canon S70 and Nikon CP995 are quite sensitive to UV, while the Nikon CP 5000 is almost totally insensitive, for example.

Infrared gets through lenses pretty well, and CCD sensors are very sensitive to it, so all manufacturers put IR cutoff filters in front of their sensors to reduce the amount of infrared that gets recorded, but they don't completely eliminate IR; it can't be done perfectly.

The color rendition problems happen when things that look blue_ to us actually also have high reflectance in the IR and or UV. Different digital sensors differ in whether the red, green, or blue pixels will respond the most to these forms of light. Often it is red that responds the most to IR, and blue to UV, but often both IR and UV activate all three sensors to some extent, since the red, green, and blue microfilters aren't designed to sort out these wavelengths particularly effectively. So, in sunlight, the colors of some objects just inevitably come out odd. Blue flowers are notorious for this with all brands of cameras; many of them reflect a lot of infrared, and come out looking purple. Many flowers actually have color patterns in the UV range that differ from their patterns in visible (to humans) light, which can be seen by birds and insects; sometimes you can even partially discern these patterns in digital images, and they can be revealed by using a UV-pass filter if your camera's lens lets UV through. High UV reflectance can also cause flowers to look too blue, depending on the lens, camera, lighting, and sensor.

suiko said:

Ah yes, another thing I found annoying about the R4 was its inability
to capture blues. I tried lots of things with ultramarine-type blue
flowers (think gentians), but they always came out more purple than
blue to my eye. Don't suppose the R6 is any better on this?

Click to expand...

--
Ross Alford
http://www.pbase.com/northqueenslandphotos

Thanks - so it would be just the same with the TZ3? Strangely enough, I never had this problem with my pre-digital P&S cameras.