[Scribus] quality images for press (digital camera? cheap/freeonline stock s? scan?)

[Steve deRosier]

There's another reason to be wary of Nikon cameras at the moment:
http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/04/25/0511241&tid=93&tid=155

I would think that the audience of Scribus would be concerned about supporting a manufacturer that seems to be setting the ground work to "own" _your_ photos by keeping a closed and DMCA protected format and not providing the specs to either open source developers nor even the most mainstream photo editing application.

Personally, if you're looking for a new camera and you've got a pile of money to spend, I've been looking at the Canon 1Ds.  I love Canons (I've had an AE-1 working beautifully for near on 30 years), I love digital cameras, and I love the idea of a full-frame sensor.  But, alas, since it's not my profession, I don't have enough money lying around to justify it.

I bought my first digital camera several years ago, and it's just a 2.?M pixel HP job.  It takes beautiful shots (see: http://www.textureandlight.com/) even under difficult lighting (lighting too contrasty for my film camera), although I can't do half with it that I want to since the manual controls are nearly impossible to use and it needs lots of light (fastest setting is equiv to 200 ASA).  But I print 8x10 and 11x14 from it regularly and some shots still look ok (but not as crisp as I'd like) at 20x30 inch.  Thus proving that pixel count isn't the most critical factor.

If you go for a "cheapie" digital camera:
* Optical zoom only.
* Go for one made by a camera company, they work like cameras.  Those made by computer companies work like computers.  Also, those made by camera companies have much better optics.
* I like those with RAW or TIFF capablity, not just jpeg.  Granted I almost always shoot jpeg, but having the option to keep each and every pixel the way it was shot is critical.

- Steve

Craig Ringer wrote:
> On Thu, 2005-05-05 at 01:19 -0400, Marvin Dickens wrote:
> 
> 
>>I second Leica lens quality. In the event you can't afford/get a Leica lens,
>>Nikon is my second choice.
> 
> 
> My work had a Nikon D1 before we got the more recent Canon EOS 10D. The
> Canon was a massive step up in quality, performance, and reliability.
> It's not as solidly built or "nice" a camera, but unlike the D1 it works
> reliably.
> 
> It wasn't just one particular faulty D1 we got, either. Before we gave
> up on them we had three TOTAL replacements. They all just went flakey
> and died.
> 
> I was also never particularly happy with the D1's ability to handle
> weird lighting. It was extremely prone to colour casts and incredibly
> sensitive to exposure in some lighting conditions. I had to "fix" some
> truly ghastly photos at various points, especially things like shots
> inside art galleries. Unfortunate, as it *did* produce beautifully
> sharp, clear shots when it wasn't playing funny business with the
> lighting.
> 
> Perhaps Nikon have improved the D1 since then - we did start out with an
> early model. Hopefully they've improved the software too, since it's was
> worse than the Canon software we have (but don't use) now.
> 
> Ah well ... it's entirely possible I was unlucky, or that the
> photographer at work is somehow intrinsically destructive to Nikon
> digitals. Still, my experience with the D1 wasn't a good one.
> 
> 
>>Also, as someone else pointed out, digital zoom is absolutely worthless. This
>>technology, like image scanners that claim 2400 x 2400 DPI resolution (Or 
>>better), is based on digital algorithms that enhance by guessing what the 
>>image should look like if enlarged - In fact, the algorithm produces an 
>>enlargement that is hocked off to the user as a magnification. The quality,
>>as my high school aged nephew would state: 5ucks.
> 
> 
> The worst thing is it's just one of the many dodgy scams in the
> business. Those resolution claims don't usually even come with a little
> (* interpolated; physical resolution 2400x1200 dpi); similarly dodgy
> scanners rarely say (* theoretical; measured dynamic range approx 3.0).
> 
> I laugh when I see scanners claiming "Dynamic range of 4.2!". For why:
> http://www.scantips.com/basics14.html
> http://www.photo.net/learn/drange/
> 
> It seems scanner manufacturers really must have discovered the "new
> black" and "new white" :-P
>