S90 at the Playground

Shooting with P&S has its advantages.

Rather than having to lug around 1kg or more of gear, a mere 165g was all I needed for some action shots. And, the capability to sync flash at higher speed also meant that I did not have to scratch my head to get the flash to work to freeze motion. Think 1/500s. With a DSLR, I definitely need to get the external flash to work in FP mode. That's additional weight and size on the already heavy camera & lens setup.

6mm, f/7.1, 1/500s, ISO80, -0.7ev

It was about 10.10 am, and the sun was still low to get some shadow effects. I got the camera at higher angle, which was easy with live view (DSLR live view still can't beat P&S, except for the E-330) and focus on the shadow positioning. The sun was strong, and I needed to reduce the contrast. I simply set the fill flash to Auto with -2/3ev flash exposure compensation to get the balance right. As for focusing, all I needed was to pre-focus on the location of the subject, and just wait for her to move just the right moment for the composition.

Oh, yeah.. to get similar results with the 135 format the focal length would be 28mm with f/32 aperture. Or with the 4/3 format, it would be 14mm with f/16. To get 1/500s, the ISO would higher, too.

Hmmmmm...