On Mon, 02 Jul 2007 12:57:36 +1000, veritas wrote:
> I have seen recently that there are some compacts that have the option
> of screwing on a new lens to archive a wide lens ( sort of like an
> slr is able to do ) .
>
> Which compact digital cameras are these ?
>
> I am thinking of getting a Canon Powershot 850 IS .
Download Canon's manual for the 850 IS, but I think you're going
to be disappointed with that model. I just checked the manual for
the relatively similar PowerShot SD600 and there are no lens options
available for it from Canon. These cameras were probably
intentionally designed without the ability to add conversion lenses,
since "smallness" was perhaps the prime consideration for these
cameras, and add-on lenses are usually quite bulky.
This doesn't mean that no add-on lens is possible. Canon doesn't
make any add-on lenses for my old, small PowerShot S10 and S20, but
there was a company that made a Rube Goldberg-like contraption for
it that held an adapter lens in front of the camera's own lens.
Many of the slightly larger Canon cameras are designed to mate
with add-on lenses, and Canon sells these for models such as the
PowerShots A540 (but not for the similar A530), A610, A620, A630,
A640, A700, A710 IS, G7, etc. Your best option, though, especially
considering the added cost and added bulk, would be to get a small
camera with a much wider range zoom that includes the focal length
range of the PS 850IS as a small subset.
Conversion lenses have what some people might consider to be
severe drawbacks compared to wider range zooms. Without the
conversion lens, you can use the entire range of the zoom's
available focal lengths. But when a wide angle conversion lens is
mounted, you often get poor performance when zoomed to the long end
of the zoom. Similarly, when telephoto conversion lenses are
mounted you often get poor performance when the camera is zoomed
towards the wide end of the focal length range. Also, the
conversion lenses are usually available with only modest
multipliers, to maintain image quality. For Canon's A620, the wide
adapter is 0.7x and the tele adapter is 1.75x. If these were
available for the 850IS's 4x lens, they would change the camera's
zoom range to 5.7x (wide) or 7x (tele), but not as well as a camera
that has a normal 6x or 10x range, since to be able to go from one
end of the extended zoom range to the other would require attaching
and detaching the add-on lens. Quite inconvenient.
But perhaps a bigger drawback is that because of the size of the
wide angle conversion lens, it usually blocks at least part of the
camera's flash output, creating horrible dark areas in large parts
of the image. If you want a really wide zoom range, I'd suggest
something other than Canon's Elph/Ixus line of cameras. Canon's G7
is slightly larger, has IS and a 6x lens. The Powershot S5 IS is
much larger and has a 12x lens. These currently sell for about
$500. You may be better off checking out Panasonic's 10x DMC-TZ2
and DMC-TZ3. They're larger than the PS 850IS, but still reasonably
small and reasonably priced, about $300. They also go to a wider
28mm, versus the 850IS's (I think) 35mm on its wide end. A 0.7x
wide adapter lens would only reduce the 850IS's focal length to
26.6mm, not a great deal wider than TZ2 and TZ3's 28mm.
>> Stay informed about: extension lenses and compact digital cameras 
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