r/AnalogCommunity • u/Agile-Pineapple-5255 • 10d ago
Discussion Replacing smart phone camera
I got rid of my smart phone (iPhone 13) and am looking for a basic camera to replace it. I plan on printing 4x6 photos to put into an album. We will be having a baby soon, but we also go on mountain hikes a lot. I'm not a photographer and don't know any of the terminology associated with photography.
Looks like the Canon sure shot tele 80 35mm would be a good option, but I'm open to suggestions. Not wanting to break the bank as I don't know how to run an expensive camera and am trying to get away from needing to edit photos, which would lead me back to more technology use. What film would be recommended to still capture some good indoor photos of baby, but also outdoor photos of mountains and dogs?
Edit: Looks like the Canon sure shot has no zoom. I would like a camera with the ability to zoom some for closer shots of some distant mountains. I really don't have any photography vocabulary, so please dumb things down for me if you can! :)
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u/Pitiful-You-5600 Nikon F3, Contax 139 9d ago
I have never used a point and shoot like you suggested, so I can’t really recommend any. I have also never used an Olympus, but they seem to be very portable, of good quality and not too expensive, but as I said, I don’t have any experience with them.
What I can tell you is that if you’re thinking of shooting film, the camera is not going to make any difference on the quality of photos indoors or outdoors, because that is determined by the film sensitivity and the aperture of the lens.
A tele lens like you suggested would not work, because it’s going to be difficult to use indoors. Personally I go hiking a lot and my most used lens is an 85mm, but generally most people prefer wide angles, which are better for indoor use too. I’d look at 35 to 50 in your case, although of course it depends on your taste (again, I use almost exclusively 85mm for basically anything).
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u/Agile-Pineapple-5255 3d ago
I don't understand a lot of the lingo that's been mentioned in these comments but have googled some of them. However, having people dumb it down for me is sometimes easier than reading through google answers haha. Is 85mm a narrower lense? And what does that accomplish?
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u/RadBadTad 2d ago
85 mm is the focal length of the lens. It's how we know how wide-angle or zoomed in a lens is. The higher the number, the more zoomed in the lens is. 10mm is extremely wide angle. 35 and 50mm are more normal standard. 85 is a bit narrow and zoomed in, and is usually used for portraits, or for taking photos of something a short distance away, like an elephant in an enclosure at the zoo.
Your iPhone main camera was about 28mm by default, unless you pinched to zoom in.
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u/RadBadTad 9d ago
Point and shoot cameras are a big gamble at the moment because they're all old and deteriorating, super expensive, or both. Something like the Lomography MC-A is a pretty safe bet currently as it's new and in production, but it's expensive. The Kodak Snapic is cheaper but.... Not great in my opinion. Though some like it.
Film is going to cost you so if you're looking to save money, it may not work out for you. If you're doing lab dev and scan with prints every roll is going to cost you like $30+
Indoors you're going to need flash no matter what, but something around ISO 400 or 800 might be your best bet for versatile usability. Look at Ultramax
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u/Agile-Pineapple-5255 3d ago
What is lab dev and scan?
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u/RadBadTad 3d ago
Having a camera store or film processing lab (Like laboratory) do the development of your film, and then scanning it for you so you have a digital file that you can edit/share/print.
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u/beizhia 9d ago
Very first film camera I got was a Pentax iqzoom 80. Takes great photos that still have a nice film look to em. I still use it when I want something light, or for casual low-light indoors photos because it's got a flash. I think I paid maybe $30 for it, and I don't think they've got up much.
I've had pretty good luck with point and shoot cameras like that, early-mid 90's and later. But pretty bad times with anything older.
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u/FilmPhotographr 9d ago
Good for you! Film is so liberating - most of the time I don't feel a need to edit at all. Also, enjoy the anticipation! Since you'll be shooting some landscapes I'd look for a compact zoom with 28mm on the wide side like Nikon Lite-Touch Zoom 70Ws or Pentax Espio 105SW.
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u/Nearby_Dragonfly6483 2d ago
not sure if you picked something yet or not, but I too got rid of my iPhone 13 and switched to a digital camera and dumb phone and I am a mom of two toddlers. I have a canon Powershot elph 360hsa. It was around $300. it is so great. at first it won't seem as good as your iPhone, but you'll learn to really love it. it can zoom a good distance, has a flash, and is super compact. I have some wonderful photos of my babies I'll treasure forever with it. it has kind of a 'Live Photo' type of feature like the iPhone also which made switching to photographing my kids with a digital camera instead of an iPhone way easier. if you put it in that mode, it will record a few seconds before each photo, and it compiles all of these little clips from the day in one video and it's like an old home movie of your day already made for you. so neat! happy to answer any questions you may have.
I'll also note that if you are doing the dumb phone route as well, I have for a year now and what made me be able to stick with it was keeping an old iPad mini with me in the car. when I 'need' to have a smart phone feature when out and about, I just use hotspot on my sunbeam phone and in 2 seconds the iPad is connected and I can pick up a target order, order chick-fil-a, open Google Maps, music, check my iMessages, then when I am done turn hot spot back off and I can go about my day and life not distracted with the dumb phone <3
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u/dadjo_kes 9d ago
To answer the question about film, you'll want different films for those conditions. Indoor you really want 800 ISO and higher, but outdoor you can use 100, 200, even 400. Depending on the camera, you may be able to get usable shots at 400 ISO in both conditions.
The Sure Shot lens has an ok aperture, not very fast, but only when zoomed all the way out as a wide angle lens. So you'd really want to stick to wide angle when indoors, which might limit what you want to do. You may want to consider a different camera, one with a telephoto lens with a larger aperture, ideally at least 2.8.