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Photos By Michael Dubiner

   

      

The new Olympus Digital Stylus 810-the Mini-Digital for the Street Photographer
(Street Photographers will really like it and love to get rid of it)

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With writer, street, documentary photographer Michael Dubiner.

Olympus Stylus Digital 810 Review

Hi!! I have been gone from here for a while. In the meantime, I have had the chance to try out several of the new pocket sized digital cameras to determine what to carry for Street Photography.  For Street Photographers, digital cameras, with their miniaturization, higher ISO's and "image stabilization" are really raising interest.  The prosumer camera that has the feature set that most suits my needs is the Olympus Digital Stylus 810.

            Since my last article, I have been using the Fuji 10 I wrote about.   Its successor, the much anticipated Fuji E900, was a dud, at least for the short duration of my testing.  The camera was exceedingly slow in the RAW mode and oversized to boot.  That was the end of   that camera.

            The Olympus Digital Stylus 810 is about the same size as the Fuji F 10 and the newer models of the Canon Elph.   Smaller here, larger there, it is a pocket sized camera. Not as cutes as some of the competition such as the Sony-T9 or some of the Casio models but still it significantly smaller than the Canon S70.

            This camera uses an eight mega pixel 1/1.8" CCD sensor. I would have hoped that Olympus would have used a larger CCD to reduce noise as they did in some of their less expensive models.  The camera is "digitally stabilized" using a gyroscope, providing in-camera adjustment of the image. Also, if you are willing to tolerate the considerable noise inevitable with this number of pixels crammed onto a very small chip (and inherent in high speed photography-film or digital) you can obtain amazingly good low light images.  You can even shoot at ISO 3200 if you are willing to settle for a three mega pixel image.   I need to get the image and worry about the rest in the post processing stage.  This camera does that remarkably well.

            Many of the new cameras that fit into this class are using larger CCD's with a lower mega pixel count.  It will only be when the major testing sites such as DP Review and Steve's Digicams start their testing that we will learn whether the larger CCD or the higher mega pixel count win in the tension between higher resolution, higher ISO's and unpleasant noise.

I was most concerned with testing the cameras' low light features.  It was fortuitous that the day the camera arrived I had seen a sign alongside the road announcing the Garcia Mexican Tent Circus.   I discovered that that this was the last night before the Circus moved on to Miami.   Off we went to the late show which was sparsely attended.   The audience was mostly, but not exclusively Hispanic.  Spanish was the first language, with English spoken so that the few Anglos could follow the action    I was hoping to follow the Circus and crowd action with the camera.

The image of the crowd and the balloons above shows what this camera is capable of when used in less than perfect conditions.  Look at the light on the faces.  It was pretty dark in there.  The lighting rivals what I have been able to do with film in low light situations.  The image was shot with the camera set on auto, flash forced off, and digital anti-shake on.  I processed in camera for the digital shake (a stupid necessity as this should be automatic).  I checked the metadata in Photoshop as you can check little in the camera.  I learned that the camera set itself for ISO 1250 and the image was shot at 1/10 of a second at f2.8. 

And while there is grain aplenty, the image is brighter than it was in that circus tent.  WOW!  In my opinion this camera rivals high speed color film in extremely low light situations.

The digital anti-shake, already used in digital camcorders provides an in camera solution for some camera shake in the Digital Stylus 810.   As I learned, a good percentage of images, maybe upwards of 50% cannot be "digitally stabilized", even when there is obvious movement.  On the other hand, this technology can really improve some images dramatically.  Unfortunately, the anit-shake automatically takes over and often boosts the ISO beyond what is necessary for conditions.  The result is that some images are taken at a higher than necessary ISO,   when a lesser ISO would do.  Lower ISO=less grain, all things being equal.  That being said, it certainly is nice to have that high ISO available.  Until I can fully test the ISO-noise tradeoff of this camera, I will manually set the ISO at 800 in low light situations when I am not using the digital anti-shake.  Of course, I would use anti-shake all the time if I could adjust ISO and aperture with it turned on, which you cannot do with this camera.

Beware of cameras that offer image stabilization but have a maximum f-stop of f 3.5.  In low light situations, you immediately lose 1 stabilization gives you because of the slow lens.  Also beware of camera that offer "digital image stabilization" that is nothing more than an ISO boost.  The Olympus 720 SW which came out the same time as the Stylus 810 is just such a con.  I called Olympus to confirm what I suspected from the specs.  The 810 has a gyro and the 720 SW "digital image stabilization" is nothing more than the camera automatically setting a higher ISO.  Pretty bad but true.    

            I am still in the learning stage with this camera because Olympus designed it as a point and shoot, apparently deliberately omitting features that are even found in older, less expensive cameras. This requires one to overcome the camera's limitations and then find a fix around them.  The camera manual takes great pains to be brief about the cameras' limitations.  I am learning what the various scene modes automatically do to the camera.  These scene modes, whatever their name, adjust the camera by boosting ISO or lowering depth of field, etc.  With the Olympus 810, there is even a menu which shows actual images in camera that were presumably taken at setting named in the menu.  Once you know what the various scene modes do in camera, you can use them as if you were changing the aperture or shutter speed manually on a camera because, in essence, that is what the camera does internally when a scene mode is chosen.  I am not justifying the lack of manual controls on the camera.  It is almost criminal.  I am simply explaining the fix around this.  Whenever you have to use a "fix", you must necessarily have a problem

            Besides taking over the ISO control by setting "digital anti-shake" the camera will "auto" your controls in other ways.  If you manually set 3200 ISO you will automatically set the camera to the 3 mega pixel mode.  I presume, but have not confirmed that in low light situations, it will also open the aperture, to the extent possible, to let in what available light there is in the scene.  This is not necessarily bad; it is again a situation where the camera was not made with a feature to overcome this automatic setting.  I still have not fully figured out how to set the continuous mode, but the manual indicates that the image quality is automatically reduced to 3 mega pixels at that setting.

            I wanted to test the sharpness of the Stylus 810's lens and its general picture taking capabilities in the daylight.  My Wife and I went to Fairchild Tropical Botanic Gardens in Miami, Florida.  The place is more magnificent than it was when I last visited, in the late 1970's.  It has a major Chihuli exhibit that is outstanding.  While there, I took plenty of images of flowers.  I think the image of the iguana that was freely roaming the grounds best shows off the Stylus 810s' daylight abilities.  The camera was set to auto and the image was shot at 125^th of a second at full telephoto (105mm) at ISO 100 using digital image stabilization.  I then processed the image in camera for digital shake and then as I would typically in Photoshop and then zoomed in to get a good close up of a portion of the image.  Pretty sharp I would say, with good color rendition.  The out of camera image lacked contrast, but that does not bother me as all of my images require some post processing anyway.  I do not yet have enough experience with the camera to know if this is something that is true with all, some or only a few of the cameras images.

            The camera is sealed with O-rings so that it is rainproof.  It's less expensive counterpart is the Stylus 720 SW which is waterproof to 10 feet and also shockproof, withstanding a drop from 5 feet.  What could be bad?  A Street Photographers dream camera, right?  Almost-so.  All right, it is close, but not close to perfect by any means.

            I am going to provide a list of my perception of the downsides for this camera as they will scare many away. I will not go into much length in my explanations.  If you are looking at a class of camera for a specific purpose, comparing each of its features and the camera's actual ability to utilize the features is a must.  I have listed some features that I think the camera needs.  For some people the lack of one or more features may deter you from purchasing this camera.

Cons

            JPEG only-No RAW-Bad!

            Professional quality features, beginners ability to change settings-bad!

Slow as far as shutter lag. I bet when the camera is tested by those that know it will rate much worse than many competitors.  Certainly the Fuji F10 is faster-bad

Digital anti-shake takes over ISO and sets it higher than necessary in some situations.

Noise-some is to be expected when putting so many pixels on such a small chip.  It is also inherent in any type of low light photography.

            Layout-there is no place to put your thumb.

Battery life-I shot until the battery died which were 108 images with much viewing and manipulation but no flash.  This is well below what is advertised.

The camera is produced only in silver.  I will be black taping the entire front of the camera to make it less conspicuous.

This is the best prosumer digital camera I have used for low light Street Photography.  But, there is a parade of image stabilized competition, most of them optically stabilized, on the way, with several available right now.  The Stylus 810 has the best feature set for me, even though it is woefully inadequate in some respects compared to older digital cameras that I have owned.  I would rate it sharper than the Fuji F10 with better low light capabilities, even without its digital stabilization.  It has a fast lens for this type of camera although it is by no means unique in that regard.  Add the fact that is splash proof so you can use it in the rain and it is going to be tough to beat.  A better camera will come out with the positive features of this camera without all of the downsides mentioned above.     When that is manufactured, I will be very happy to get rid of this camera and "upgrade".  After finishing this review I decided I would actually keep the thing and I hope to get rid of it soon.

My email address has changed to duby@bellsouth.net.

(The author, Michael Dubiner is a professional image maker and lawyer who lives in Wellington, Florida. His articles will appear twice monthly on PixiPort. His work can be seen at PixiPort.com and at his web site, duby.com.)