GOING DIGITAL FOR THE PATRIOT PACKAGE
The Canon G10, my new toy, and it should be yours too!

For those who know me, I am a die hard film fanatic. I love the quality of film, it's ease of use, it's look, color accuracy and saturation, you name it. So when I say I have a bias toward film, you know I really mean it. But as the world turns, even I realize that soon or later, film will be a thing of the past. It would be a sad day whenever that day comes, but also there would be a need for celebration, as digital would have caught up or exceeded the quality of film. That day is nearing close.

For the past month, I have changed my patriot package, to digital coverage, and no prints, just a CD. The price of the package has remained the same at $295. Changing to digital coverage helps me preserve profit margins, while maintaining quality, and affordability for those on a budget.

The camera which prompted me to change was the Canon G10, a point-and-shoot camera on steroids, which was designed for the professional photographer on the go. It shoots a 14.7 Mega pixel image, which is extraordinarily sharp.

Here is a full frame picture of my cat, Junior

Here is the exact same shot....just enlarged.... The quality of the G10 is amazing. Look at the quality.

There are literally hundreds of reviews of the G10 by professional digital photographers who swear that the picture quality of the G10 is equivalent to their $20,000 medium format digital cameras when comparing side-by-side 16x20 prints. Take this into mind. These camera men can see a difference between their 35mm digital SLR cameras and their $20,000 medium format cameras, but cannot see the difference between the point-and-shoot G10.

From the first time I touched the G10, I could tell that this was made for a professional. Even though it was much smaller than a SLR, there were easy to use adjustment rings for the aperture and shutter speed. Flash power, iso selection, were also easy to adjust on the fly, just like my film camera. The shoe mount on the top of the G10, allowed me to attach a powerful external flash, or adapter for a sync cord. Very nice. For the amateur photographer, there were a handful of computer settings, which performed perfectly for me under all situation. So perfect, I'll probably end up using some for my weddings.

Being a film photographer, I could tell you that there was a noticeable difference in quality when comparing the G10 shots to film. Film, had more punch, more color, naturally. Digital could come close in matching the quality of film if you color corrected it and added a little contrast. Put you could still tell the difference.

What'd bad about this camera? Well, it's digital. If you're shooting on manual, you need to treat this camera as though you are shooting on slide film. Slide film, for those of you who don't know, is a very sensitive to shoot. Exposure must be right on. If you over-expose your picture in film, you lose detail. So, if you're in manual mode on the G10, and you're not careful, you can over expose your shot and get no image. When I shoot on negative film, the more I over expose a shot, the more detail I get. In fact, the pictures that you're looking on my site are over-exposed by about 2 stops!

I'll treat the G10 like a regular film camera and use an external light meter when shooting on this camera in manual mode. I'll probably also use an external flash when shooting sunset shots.

THE VERDICT: The G10 is an excellent camera for professionals and your everyday person. It's also the perfect way to document your honeymoon in Hawaii. The only drawback to this camera is that it's not as portable as those other point-and-shoots that are the size of credit cards, but the quality is amazing.

With all that said, what really determines whether or not one can get great photos? The photographer...not necessarily his equipment.

Steven Young
The Hawaii Wedding Reporter
http://www.dreamweddingshawaii.com/