Jeff Hellige writes: Not to burst your bubble, but compgeeks.com has them for $37 (and less): http://www.compgeeks.com/details.asp?invtid=KG-JC3B-CS I got mine for $20 at a thrift shop. I think you'll find the quality of the pictures it takes is just "okay", and then only for well-lit outdoors shots. It's not that great for indoor stuff or close-up work. It also burns through batteries fairly quickly. Apparently every time you turn the camera on, it charges the flash. There is a setting to turn the flash off, but turning the camera off will cause it to forget that setting. However, on the bright side... if you run Linux, you can use gPhoto 2.0 to download the pictures from it. http://gphoto.org/

Agreed. My point though was that for quick shots, such as checking layouts without the time spent waiting for film or other types of things that people would generally use a Polariod for, it's a good deal. With one of the MMC cards, you also get quite a large number of shots, approx. 300, without carting all the film around. I imagine for serious work, my A-1 will do me for quite a while yet. Jeff -- Home of the TRS-80 Model 2000 FAQ File http://www.cchaven.com http://www.geocities.com/siliconvalley/lakes/6757

I like the Canon SLR's myself. I've had this A-1 for well over 10 years. The newer models are easier to use but most of them aren't as flexible. If only it was like the F-1 and would work without the battery. I used a Hanimex-Practica SuperTL (early 70's East German SLR) prior to getting the A-1 but it's electronics started going out. I also have a couple of Zeiss-Ikon Ikoflex medium format cameras I like to shoot on occasion. They certainly look like nice cameras, which I would expect photography I'd certainly be looking at something along it's lines, or better. To get the quality and flexibility of my A-1 in a digital camera it would cost me a great deal, as reflected in the Coolpix 5000's suggested price of $1099.00. I don't shoot enough to justify spending that kind of money to switch. Another thought on the ultra-cheap digital cameras out there is as parts donors for the tinkerers on the list. Possibly some cool projects for classic comuters and/or robotics... Jeff -- Home of the TRS-80 Model 2000 FAQ File http://www.cchaven.com http://www.geocities.com/siliconvalley/lakes/6757

Hi, "Fred Cisin (XenoSoft)" <cisin(a)xenosoft.com> said: You mean like Silicon Film Technologies (e)Film?? A 35mm cassette with a 1.3 MPixcel chip that fits a number of SLRs (but unfortunately not my old A1...). I believe thy're having problems getting it to market, but it'll come. Surely Canon A1s are on topic, they're over 10 years old and contain a computer ;-) -- Cheers, Stan Barr stanb(a)dial.pipex.com The future was never like this!

Hi, Ben Franchuk said: My A1 plus motor drive and Vivitar Srs.1 28-90 Varifocal lens is heavy enough to _need_ wheels ;-) -- Cheers, Stan Barr stanb(a)dial.pipex.com The future was never like this!

A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text Size: 1852 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://www.classiccmp.org/pipermail/cctalk/attachments/20020110/3fc031a8/at…

On Thu, 10 Jan 2002, Tony Duell wrote: C mount was most commonly used for 16mm movie cameras, and later for TV cameras. Later on, when "zoom" lenses became popular, lens interchangeability faded away, with the assumption that nobody would ever want anything other than what came with the camera. Kinda like the early Macs. D mount was used for 8mm movie camera. Like C mount, it was replaced with non-removable "zoom" lenses. Oh, well. Most people would. I reserve the word "large" for 5 x 7, 8 x 10, and above. There are uses for both. There are some situations appropriate for each. For example: low res, TEMPORARY pictures, for web or email can be done more conveniently with a digital. But I'm NOT about to get rid of my old 35mm cameras and lenses, nor medium, nor large format cameras.

Rumor has it that Fred Cisin (XenoSoft) may have mentioned these words: [Mach-2-Flyby camera snippage] I'm with you WRT this way of thinking, Tony, but for those of us who don't have darkrooms, the reproducibility of digital is quite nice... I was taking pictures on Christmas day, printing 3 copies of each picture that the family wanted on my QMS color laser printer (which don't look as good as my Epson photo, but it's not set up currently) and they're also archived on CD and in my safety deposit box. I'll admit that they didn't look perfect [color laser != photo proofing studio] , but if a fire hits my home, I still have the memories. I can't say that WRT all of my pictures of Germany when I was there in '91. I'm working on scanning all of my pictures, tho. ... And you'll have to pry my Canon T50 from my cold, dead hands, too. But with the purchase of my new house, the ability to go in and archive everything visually myself without needing 40 rolls of film, and be able to take pictures during my renovation & archive to CD will probably justify 1/2 the cost of the camera. With 5 Megapixels, 2 memory sticks & 2 batteries, I can archive a lot more information in 1/10 the time by myself than watching Wal-Mart fsck up 1/2 my film - and yes, the point I've not seen on the Megapixel versus film quality didn't take into account urine-quality developing. [We don't have a decent film lab here - Wal-Mart, K-Mart or jump the bridge to Canada, which gets expensive...] I've never seen better than 5 Megapixel photo quality come from any roll of film of mine from Wal-mart. This is not a slam on the film, or the camera... That's allz I know... Roger "Merch" Merchberger -- Roger "Merch" Merchberger --- sysadmin, Iceberg Computers Recycling is good, right??? Ok, so I'll recycle an *older* .sig. (circa 1997!) Why does Hershey's put nutritional information on their candy bar wrappers when there's no nutritional value within?

At 09:07 AM 1/10/2002 -0500, John Allain wrote: I agree, but I'm still shocked that I can walk into a Shopko and have a choice of three or four blister-packed $50-$80 digital cameras. - John

John, A phrase I coined some time back is ... "While you hope to get what you pay for, you can just about be assured, you won't get what you don't pay for" John Allain wrote:

I used SLR's for years. The point is a bit moot with digital cameras, all you have to do is turn on the LCD display. Everyone has a price point where they'll start compromising, I guess. John A.

I bought the cheap digital camera to play with and use for the same type of thing one would use the Polaroid instamatic cameras for. It won't be used for work that requires clear photos, such as showing stuff on my website. For clarity, I prefer an older medium format TLR camera shooting 120 roll film at relatively slow speeds. Jeff -- Home of the TRS-80 Model 2000 FAQ File http://www.cchaven.com http://www.geocities.com/siliconvalley/lakes/6757