your preference/ experience = Swivel or Tilt LCD ?

I like the flexibility , the added creativity made possible with swivel LCD, had one in my Canon G6. But I've been wondering if added perspective of a swivel screen is not (over) compensated through slowness in taking aim at a subject. The shooting line is not parallel to the aiming line. Therefore catching the target on screen can be rather slow, leading to missed shots. Hope I make myself understood.

Anyone with a tilting screen, what is your experience, which way would you go now for a new camera, tilt or swivel??

A screen which both tilts AND swivels is awesome; been using them for years in bridge cams. A real boon if you like to shoot landscape and urban themes. The next system camera I'm aiming to buy will very likely have a fully articulated screen; I find the ones which merely flip out and merely angle up or down are not as useful as the flip 'n twist variety. I don't really shoot video and rarely do 'action' shots but if the camera's AF is fast enough you can pull that off too. Put me down as someone who appreciates this development in the camera world. I notice it's slowly but steadily gaining traction.
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Max

Maxly said:

A screen which both tilts AND swivels is awesome; been using them for years in bridge cams. A real boon if you like to shoot landscape and urban themes. The next system camera I'm aiming to buy will very likely have a fully articulated screen; I find the ones which merely flip out and merely angle up or down are not as useful as the flip 'n twist variety. I don't really shoot video and rarely do 'action' shots but if the camera's AF is fast enough you can pull that off too. Put me down as someone who appreciates this development in the camera world. I notice it's slowly but steadily gaining traction.
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Agreed. I use DSLRs for most of my work, but low level shots are very painful that way, so I migrated to an old bridge camera, the Olympus C5050, for its tilt screen. It's very useful, saving my knees and back a lot of agony.

Yester--whoops, Sunday--I picked up a slightly later version, the Olympus C5060, which has a tilt-swivel screen. The articulation is not as good as in newer cameras (eight years makes for a lot of adjustments), but oddly enough, it's fairly easy to use, offers an astounding amount of control for a bridge camera,and is solidly built (so is its older brother).

I don't want to run two systems, but my first owned digital camera was an Olympus C2020Z. I was impressed with the fact that editors sometimes took shots I'd already cropped a little bit, cropped off a third and ran them at 2/3 page size (magazine). Olympus has always been noted for its sharp lenses, and the various C line versions were no different. For five MP, this camera is impressive as all get-out.

Oh, yes...it's also very light, adding little to the bag weight.

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Charlie Self
http://www.charlieselfonline.com

What you are saying speaks for a swivel again. Any tilters out there who would like to join in?

THAICM said:

Therefore catching the target on screen can be rather slow

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This is true, but it allows as many shots that you wouldn't start to get as it leads to shots missed. I use an Olympus 5060 with tilt-swivel and wouldn't be without it. I have used a nice Fuji with tilt screen landscape only. It's fine for landscapes but half-baked for anything else and I fail to see why anybody would prefer it to the real thing.

I prefer tilting screens despite the added versatility of swiveling ones that also tilt. Swivel alone wouldn't work for me at all - it's either tilt, or tilt and swivel.

I find tilt and swivel just feels awkward - having the LCD out on an extended arm, not in line with the camera, doesn't feel right ergnomically to me. About the only advantage I can see with tilt and swivel screens is the ability to turn the LCD around to face inward for protection. But purely for shooting ergonomics and my own styles of shooting, it's tilt that I use far more than swivel.

Mostly, it comes down to the reasons I need to maneuver the LCD screen from the camera. I shoot mostly optical finder on my DSLR, and live view only gets used when I'm doing odd angles or when doing lots of tripod work with slow shutter or night shooting. For that type of shooting, I find the tilt satisfies 90% or more of all my conveniences, and does so in a way that feels very natural - holding the camera waist-level like a medium format, dropping the camera down by my feet to shoot under a fence, or holding it directly over my head. Rarely would I need to hold the camera out to my left or right, so the swivel doesn't come into play even if I have it. And I don't like some camera designs that require the LCD screen to be swiveled out before they can be tilted...I'd prefer the tilt as the priority, and the swivel secondary.

About the only time I could see occasional use of swivel would be for portrait-orientation tripod shots...I can't say I run into that need very often.

So I'm a big fan of tilting LCDs, which are wonderfully convenient for me when needed, and if swivel is going to be incorporated I prefer the designs that can always tilt up or down first, with swivel secondary, as opposed to the kind that must swivel out before they can be tilted.

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Justin
galleries: http://www.pbase.com/zackiedawg

nickoly said:

THAICM said:

Therefore catching the target on screen can be rather slow

Click to expand...

This is true, but it allows as many shots that you wouldn't start to get as it leads to shots missed. I use an Olympus 5060 with tilt-swivel and wouldn't be without it.

Click to expand...

Got the same Olympus about two days ago. It's taking me some time to get used to it, but it is also starting to be fun to use. I basically bought it for two things: the tilt/swivel LCD and as a needed prop in a book I'm working on. I may sell it, but, again, it can probably join the SLRs and similar film cameras that are stuck in odd corners here. I bought the C5050 first, and discovered it has a tilt, but doesn't swivel.

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Charlie Self
http://www.charlieselfonline.com

I use LCD screens only when on tripod or steady rest and not even full time then. Otherwise I use eye-level TTL viewfinder or EVF depending on camera. Using an LCD for action shooting is technically inept IMO.

A. C.

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I've taken a vow of poverty. To annoy me send money.

Target acquisition has not been a problem for me. Getting everything plumb and square, though, can be interesting.

Bear in mind that some of those shots with plumb and square weirdness would not have been attempted without a flip and swivel LCD. Besides, with practice it becomes only a temporary amusement.

HJ

Cameras with LCD only have the distinct disadvantage that precise composing and quick framing is a contradiction in itself. Plus most of the shots are are taken from the same perspective,.

I think for my shooting style I prefer a tilt display. But because I live in Thailand I must consider the bright light causing glare. Can you add a word to that too.

I have three Canons; A620, G9, and G11. The G9 does not have the articulating LCD, while other two do. I missed not having the moving LCD when I upgraded to the G9 from the A620, but I adapted over the three years I've had it. When I got the G11, I learned to prefer the swivel LCD again. I do use it in portrait orientation on about half of my shots, depending on the situation.

I use anti-glare LCD protectors on the LCDs, but like the swivel LCD when I can adjust the angle to minimize direct sunlight. When the sunlight is too much to deal with, I will resort to the optical viewfinder, but it only displays a 77% view and no shooting info. It's better than nothing, usually.

Dennis

Sure!

I used a tilt swivel screen wile visiting Malaysia, including Saba on Borneo. The tilt swivel feature sometimes allowes me to position the screen to avoid glare.

BTW, I live at just over 40º N latitude in coastal California and found glare to be less of a problem in Malaysia. In tropical and equatorial latitudes the sun is closer to the zenith more of the time so there is less low angle sunlight, which I think is the major cause of glare.

Is there some reason why Thailand is particularly bright of which I am unaware ?

HJ

I find that a wireless feed from the camera to my neural implant which superimposes the image directly onto optic nerve, tends to work best.

Oh wait......

The first word I wrote on this forum

http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1008&message=7407574

THAICM said:

I must consider the bright light causing glare. Can you add a word to that too.

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I love your idea, it solves ever including the out of line shooting problem.
Cheap and efficent! Thanks for sharing !!
ThaiPhuket

I prefer a fixed LCD, the smaller overall size of the camera is worth it. Its also one less thing to break.

eav2k wrote:
Its also one less thing to break.

Well, life has its risks and given the chance of a more intersting shot, I take the risk anytime. Plus breaking off swivels/tilts hasn't been much of a subject on any forum.