Hier ein Bericht des Fotografen Thomas Kachadurian. Ob es ein Gefälligkeitsbericht war, für den ihn Canon belohnt hat, bleibt dahingestellt.
"I have only had my G7 for one day, but I already know that it’s almost the perfect pocket camera. I may have a different view of perfect than others because I am a photographer with many camera and lens choices at my disposal, so I am looking to this camera as a small portable camera that will still allow me to be a photographer, and interact with my camera as I am accustom too working on my daily life.
IMAGE QUALITY: With the sharpness set to the lowest setting the images are very much ready for post-processing, without in-camera artifacts. I’m not sure what others expect from a camera, but the lens yields clear, detailed images that are as ready for publication as many of the images I have made with digital SLRs, and in many ways better than even a really good scan from 35mm film. In an image with fine details like tree branches there is no question that the details are outstanding. I have made images with a 1Ds and a 17-40L lens that have much higher levels of purple fringing. In fact the G7 images I made today seem free of color artifacts.
Up to 200 ISO the images are 100% clean. The slight noise is no worse than the film grain on ISO 100 slide film like Fuji Reala, and way better than any 200 ISO chrome film. I have no server with bandwidth to post big images, but if you want samples I’d be glad to email them to you.
BUILD: This camera is a beauty. Solid, well made and very much a $600 camera. The comparisons to the A series cameras are ridiculous. I briefly had an A710IS, and it was not anything like the G7. The A710 is light, too light and plastic, all plastic. The images from the A710 looked like P&S images—flat color, weak corners sharpness, over-processed. The G7 reminds me very much of the Nikon 28Ti or Contax T2 film compacts. It’s a camera a photographer accustom to SLRs will feel comfortable holding and using.
The user interface is pretty intuitive. I sat down for an hour and read through the manual and today when I went out shooting I found the controls easy to use and where I expected them. The ISO dial is great. The command wheel allows easy control of settings.
G7 v. S3-IS: There is one advantage to a camera like the S3 that I haven’t seen discussed. I need IS to keep my shaky hands steady. Since the G7 optical viewfinder is not through the lens, the IS has no effect and the psychological effect seeing the stabilized image is gone unless you use the display. Because the S3 has an Electronic Viewfinder you can see the benefits of the IS without using the LCD.
G7 v. Panasonic LX2: The G7 is a far easier to use camera than the LX2, more intuitive controls. The G7 has more of a real camera layout and less of a push buttons and find menus feel than the LX2. The LX2 is much smaller, for me, this is a bad thing. For others it may be a bonus. I like the heft of the G7, which is substantial without being bulky. I just could not find a comfortable way to hold the LX2. Final, all the Panasonic images have a processed look to them. At any ISO there is unreal smeary quality that gets in the way of post processing. I’d much rather have one of the good JPGs from a G7 than even a RAW file from the LX2.
RAW: It’s not a deal killer for me, but I have a 100% raw workflow in my normal shooting and the addition of RAW would make this a perfect camera. We should continue to push Canon to try to address this with a firmware upgrade. That said, the JPG files can be exposed to give an excellent balanced image right out of the camera. The live histogram and easy to use exposure compensation made getting a perfect exposure simple. It also seems that the Digic III processor does something to keep the dynamic range within the histogram limits. My point, I’d love RAW, but the G7 JPG implementation is as good as it gets.
I know there will be the usually G7 haters weighing-in. But if you are looking for a great pocket camera that complements your DSLR this might be the camera for you.
Tom
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http://www.kachadurian.com
Thomas Kachadurian has been in publishing since 1985.
Kachadurian is author and photographer of three books: Views from the Sleeping Bear was released in 1998 and Views of Mackinac Island was published in 2000. His new book Traverse City, from Farmstead to Lakeshore premiered in 2006.
He has been art director for more than 20 books as well as for Traverse, Northern Michigan's Magazine. He continues as the art director for Mackinac Living magazine.
In Addition, he has been the photographer, either primary or contributing for several books.