Most camera companies seem to have an 18 month upgrade cycle, whereas I seem to come in at 24 months - for compact cameras that is! I have been reading great things about this puppy since it hit the stores back in September '07. Whilst I still love my Ricoh GRD, the unique selling point of a fixed 28mm lens was beginning to wear thin and I hankered after the long lens end of things. The Canon G9 has a 35 - 210mm zoom and if I need to shoot wide, I simply shoot overlapping frames and stitch in Photomerge in CS3 - example below of a 7 frame comp.
The main reason for upgrading to the Canon G9 was the reinstated RAW capability - apparently this was dropped from the G7 to great dismay. Predictably, I went straight to manual exposure and the RAW mode but found the files not particularly sharp or easy to correct. Almost by mistake, I shot some frames as JPGS and have shot JPG and Programme mode ever since! The Auto exposure is spot on, needing only minor tweaks in LightRoom and the camera is even more responsive and capable of recording many more images on the SD card.
The two aircraft images were shot at a privately owned Mosquito Aircraft Museum near Shenley, Hertfordshire that I was "allowed" to find on our Bank Holiday Monday afternoon drive. Our stay was all too brief as we wandered in without paying and we didn't want to push our luck too much - £5 each for adults and £3 for Hannah - too much for a small collection especially with two girls in tow that have little interest in aircraft!
Above is the result of a fast panning shot where I had been shooting long lens details but heard the Police car's siren and was able to zoom out and grab the image . . .
Overall - having collected the Canon G9 last Friday - I find the camera intuitive to use, just the rights size and weight and built like a tank! I have ordered an extra battery, another 2Gb Sandisk SD card, a lens hood and a stick on handgrip - so my commitment to the G9 is obvious. I now need to work its use into wedding use - possibly as a silent camera through the ceremony?
Now to clean up the Ricoh GRD and move it on through eBay!
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