On 05/17/2005 11:19 AM, Jeri Moxley wrote:

> I’m shopping for digital cameras for general use by our staff
> (registrars, curators, art handlers, conservators, etc.). They’d be
> used for general identification shots, packing & crating
> documentation, as well as for detail shots when needed. We’d like to
> get something simple, but at the same time a camera that will produce
> dependable results under many different lighting conditions. For ease
> of support and training, we’re hoping to purchase the same general use
> model across departments. These images will land in our TMS database
> for internal use/reference.
>
> Are there any camera recommendations in this crowd? Anyone have a
> camera that you & your staff love?
>
For these convenience cameras, I wouldn't stress too much about the
decision--they're all different but similar. For us the most important
thing is, how do you turn the flash on/off? The Canon Powershots we have
make this pretty easy, but I don't really know if they're better or
worse than similarly-prices Sonys, for example. These are consumer
products that compete heavily so it's mostly six of one, a half-dozen of
the other. If you do spend a lot of time picking the perfect one, it'll
be out-of-stock and replaced by the next model before you're ready to
buy :-).

My main recommendations, since you're going to be sharing these cameras, are

a) don't install the software that comes with the camera, since this is
annoying in many ways (training, platform-dependence, installation
effort); instead
b) invest in a lot of USB reader devices for whatever kind of storage
the cameras uses. These are pretty cheap ($25 or so).
c) And of course, try to stick with cameras that all use the same kind
of storage. CF seems to be the most common, and I wouldn't be afraid of
SD, but Memory Stick is too proprietary (Sony only, AFAIK).

So if you buy cameras that store pics on CF cards, buy a lot of USB CF
card readers, and have your people transfer pics to the computer using
tools built-in to the OS. All modern desktop OS's handle USB card
readers very well (plug and play is pretty much perfect), and have
built-in tools for easy transfer to a hard disk, if you even need them
(copy-paste works fine and everyone already knows how to do it!). And
you can leave the USB card readers plugged into the computers you use
for this, so you can pre-empt irritating problems, like someone losing
the cable that came with the camera.

For more versatility, you can buy card readers that support all the
formats (CF, SD, Memory Stick, plus whatever the other one is) for a few
dollars more.

--Matt