Ricoh Sean Reid reviews the GRD4

Andrewteee said:
I saw the Snap Focus - Auto setting but have not tried it yet. I wonder why Ricoh removed the ability to change it on the fly and not change it back in a FW update?

I will try the Auto Snap Focus mode this weekend and see how it pans out.
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Thanks Optica Agent. Andrew, I look forward to see how you find it as I'm thinking of the GRDIV vs GRDIII and snap focus was a feature I was really looking forward too. based on the email Opticagent received in reply, I don't see how ricoh couldnt allow us to snap focus using both options? :confused: However Ricoh have always been good with UI, so I hope Auto snap focus will be good. Too bad I won't be able to try the GRDIV myself as the stores near me don't stock much ricoh, only the GRDIII :(
 
opticagent said:
Hi Paul,
However, for your case, would you try the following setting.
Focus > Snap
Snap Focus Distance > Auto
Click to expand...

I'm working with the Auto setting for Snap and I find it works quite well (actually, I'm kind of surprised). I haven't missed any shots so far and it is actually convenient in that I would sometimes fail to change the snap setting in the field. Not that the snap distance matters a whole lot in practical terms. I found that I could afford a one distance setting offset from the actual distance and still get great results (due mostly to the deep depth of field with a small sensor camera).

In summation, the Snap focus setting was my last bothersome detail regarding the GRD IV and I think that if Ricoh never put the old Up Button/Front Dial Snap distance feature back in, I could live with the Auto Snap setting and just deal when I need to set the snap distance to something specific. I suspect however that Ricoh will give us the capability back in a future upgrade. They have always been very responsive in the past (just look at the great features added from firmware to firmware version for the GRD 3).

Also, this has promoted me to part with my GRD 3 (see the For Sale section here on SC). Yup, I like the GRD4 enough to part with my beloved GRD3. For those of you who know me, you will also know that I'm basically a one-camera kind of guy anyway so this is consistent with my past camera usage. Anyway, you can't go wrong with either the GRD3 or 4 so just get one and enjoy!

Paul
 
Paul Giguere said:
I'm working with the Auto setting for Snap and I find it works quite well (actually, I'm kind of surprised). I haven't missed any shots so far and it is actually convenient in that I would sometimes fail to change the snap setting in the field. Not that the snap distance matters a whole lot in practical terms. I found that I could afford a one distance setting offset from the actual distance and still get great results (due mostly to the deep depth of field with a small sensor camera).
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Paul, thanks for the post. I am glad to hear that the auto function is working well. I am expecting delivery of my GRDIV tomorrow and can't wait to check it out.
It's interesting to hear you are pleased enough with the GRDIV to be selling your III. I am torn if I keep or sell the III, should the IV be all that. I've been pondering on passing it on to the wife... keeping it in the family! :)
How do you find the image quality on the IV with the reduction of the AA filter?
Any other things about the IV that standout to you over the III?

cheers,
shawn r.
 
norman shearer said:
I've just received the GRDIV and find it a worthy upgrade from the GRDIII. Only used it in auto snap at ISO800 so far but that's enough for me to know the GRDIII is going on Ebay soon.

6411573571_a4e388ffa8_b.jpg

Untitled by norman j shearer2010, on Flickr

6405377897_43676eef58_b.jpg

Express yourself by norman j shearer2010, on Flickr
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I have not had a GDR camera before, and am interested. Given that I can get a GRD III used for roughly half the price of a GRD IV, I wonder if the differences are really that profound for shooting street. Does someone who made the switch want to make the case for getting a new IV versus a used III?
 
So, is the consensus that the ability to change the snap distance on the fly really isn't needed with this camera? I've been thinking about moving up to the 4, having decided against the GXR, but this lack of a feature I use basically all the time on the GRD3 is bringing me up short. I'm SURE that it wasn't left off by accident - its too integral a part of Ricoh's approach to just accidentally leave it off. So they must think the auto-snap focus distance thing works well enough to make it counter-productive? What's the feeling among those of you using it. Do you need to have the "pre-AF" turned on for the auto snap focus distance to work? If so, what happens if you turn this pre-AF off, does the snap just default to 2.5 meters??? This sounds like a deal breaker unless their implementation of auto-snap distance is really good. What a concept, and AUTO Zone focussing camera?!?!?! The other thing that just doesn't seem right to me about this, as I think about it, is for shooting from the hip (which I do a TON of with the GRD3), the whole point of snap focus is I don't have to worry about where in the frame the camera is trying to auto focus - I just have to aim well enough to frame the shot, but if the subjects are slightly off to the side, it doesn't matter because you don't have to worry about the AF locking in on something off in the distance. So with AUTO-SNAP, doesn't this same problem come up when its pre-focussing enough to select a snap distance? Do you have to have the AF set to multi-area focus rather than spot to avoid this problem?

I'm initially appalled by this whole idea but if you folks are using it and finding it changing snap distance on the fly and getting it right, well, I could reconsider.... I'd really love that extra stop of sensitivity when 800 just isn't enough on the GRD3 but I don't trust 1600...

-Ray
 
Well, Norman and Paul seem happy enough with the "auto" setting, so that's encouraging. And just setting the "My 1", "My 2", and "My 3" up with different snap distances sounds like a good workaround if I turn out NOT to be happy with it. I tend to shoot in 1, 1.5, and 2.5 most of the time. At the 2.5 meter setting, you're already at about 4.5-40 feet of DOF at f1.9, so I don't see any need to use 5 meters for the kind of shooting I do. And it just gets deeper from there. And in better light when I can use an aperture of 2.5 or smaller, I'll usually use 1.5 or 1 meter for really tight shooting in crowded environments. So, with that workaround as a possibility, I think that concern is allayed. I never used those "my" settings on the GRD3, so those settings wouldn't be displacing anything else.

-Ray
 
Just caught up with this thread again just now, thought I'd add some experiences of auto snap since my last posts.

I was initially happy with auto snap because the images I was getting were pretty sharp but I'm now getting better results with 2.5m snap, consistently better results. This tells me auto snap is seldom falling back on 2.5m snap if it fails to lock focus, so it seems to be locking focus fine but I think it is often locking focus behind the subject as the buildings etc are a tad sharper. It's not always easy to tell because of the large DOF this sensor gives anyway but my keeper rate has improved since switching to 2.5m snap.

The advantages that auto snap offers that I can tell so far are:

1) The auto snap focus area is quite big, presumably to improve the chances of it catching the subject if they are a little off centre.

This reminds me a little of my Panasonic Lumix G1 - you could vary the size of the single point af and I used to make it as big as possible when shooting from the hip. Seemingly I'm more than a little off-centre quite often! Personally I'm wondering if multi area af would capture the subject more often, after all that does tend to focus on closer subjects so is less likely to focus on a building behind the subject for example.

2) Speed - it is quicker. It is constantly checking focus and will amend the focus distance as you move the camera around. and that is with pre af turned off. I think it uses the external sensor only and I don't hear the lens moving so assume unlike pre-af which uses both af sensors and constantly adjusts focus, this just tells the camera at what distance to focus when you press the shutter.

Will this drain the batteries some? I suspect it will a little but not as much as when you have pre-af turned on or focus tracking. Battery life seemed very good when I was using auto snap so either it has been improved a lot over the GRD 3 or this feature doesn't have a significant effect on battery life.

3) You can enable AF distance display so it will show you at what distance focus has locked.

Not much help when shooting from the hip but I guess if you shoot using the LCD then that info might give you some comfort?

To sum up, auto snap has benefits but mostly for those that shoot with a VF or the LCD. For those that shoot from the hip you have to be damned good at aiming that camera to reap the benefits of auto snap. If, like me you are a bit sloppy with your aiming then I think it is best avoided. Call it a feature to aspire to!
 
Thanks Norman. I tend to flip back and forth between 1.5 and 2.5 on the GRD3 a fair amount, with the occasional use of 1 meter when I'm shooting really close in crowds, usually in very good light. Of course, that was when I believed the DOF scale on the camera and thought I NEEDED to switch a fair amount. From looking at an actual DOF table, it looks like I could really stay at 2.5 meters pretty nearly always, from very low light at f1.9 (about 4.5-40 feet) up to about f2.5 (where it hits infinity at the long end) and up to f4.0 (where its good from 3 feet to infinity). Three feet is close enough for just about anything and in low light I'm not nearly as close as I might be in bright midday conditions, so 4-4.5 should be more than fine as a near end. I'll try just sticking in 2.5 meters for a while with the GRD3 as a test and see if there are any conditions where it does NOT work? If I'm OK with not switching around a fair amount, I may check out the GRD4 at some point. There's something built into my DNA that just resists the whole idea of an AUTO snap focus setting. Its sort of an oxymoron, like jumbo shrimp. Even if it works it would make me nervous, like something was out of whack with the universe...

-Ray
 
Ray said:
Thanks Norman. I tend to flip back and forth between 1.5 and 2.5 on the GRD3 a fair amount, with the occasional use of 1 meter when I'm shooting really close in crowds, usually in very good light. Of course, that was when I believed the DOF scale on the camera and thought I NEEDED to switch a fair amount. From looking at an actual DOF table, it looks like I could really stay at 2.5 meters pretty nearly always, from very low light at f1.9 (about 4.5-40 feet) up to about f2.5 (where it hits infinity at the long end) and up to f4.0 (where its good from 3 feet to infinity). Three feet is close enough for just about anything and in low light I'm not nearly as close as I might be in bright midday conditions, so 4-4.5 should be more than fine as a near end. I'll try just sticking in 2.5 meters for a while with the GRD3 as a test and see if there are any conditions where it does NOT work? If I'm OK with not switching around a fair amount, I may check out the GRD4 at some point. There's something built into my DNA that just resists the whole idea of an AUTO snap focus setting. Its sort of an oxymoron, like jumbo shrimp. Even if it works it would make me nervous, like something was out of whack with the universe...

-Ray
Click to expand...

I like the idea of the camera choosing the snap distance, saves me changing. Unfortunately the way it decides is flawed if shooting from the hip.

I was gonna have a few sessions using snap distances closer than 2.5m but now you've mentioned the DOF that gives I'll probably not bother and instead I'll try and get familiar with other features. Do you ever use AEL when shooting from the hip? I need to try and nail the exposure more. I could take a few shots and check the histogram and adjust as necessary but the light can change so quickly I can never keep up with the adjustments. I tend to set the camera up on +0.7 EV and accept a certain amount of the highlights will be lost. From looking through a session on the LCD it indicates clipping in the sky etc but generally the people I've shot are exposed quite well. I set the exposure mode to centre weighted usually, the theory being that that will ignore a little of the sky detail and give me a bias that better favours the people I'm shooting.
 
norman shearer said:
I like the idea of the camera choosing the snap distance, saves me changing. Unfortunately the way it decides is flawed if shooting from the hip.

I was gonna have a few sessions using snap distances closer than 2.5m but now you've mentioned the DOF that gives I'll probably not bother and instead I'll try and get familiar with other features. Do you ever use AEL when shooting from the hip? I need to try and nail the exposure more. I could take a few shots and check the histogram and adjust as necessary but the light can change so quickly I can never keep up with the adjustments. I tend to set the camera up on +0.7 EV and accept a certain amount of the highlights will be lost. From looking through a session on the LCD it indicates clipping in the sky etc but generally the people I've shot are exposed quite well. I set the exposure mode to centre weighted usually, the theory being that that will ignore a little of the sky detail and give me a bias that better favours the people I'm shooting.
Click to expand...

I haven't messed with AEL on this camera. I keep it on center weighted and play with the exposure comp as needed. I'm not terribly concerned with blown highlights - I'm using processing for fairly high contrast B&W with this camera anyway. I sweat the focus and aperture and shutter speed tradeoffs and don't worry too much about exposure, particularly on the street. On the rare occasion I'm trying to do something ELSE with the GRD3, I'm somewhat more careful. The more I think about it, the more I think I'm just gonna stick with the GRD3. The 4 is no doubt a slight improvement in low light, but I don't think it'll match the X10 (let alone the epl3 or X100) and I don't need this camera to do all things well. And I just don't think I'd be gaining much for the way I use the GRD to jump from the 3 to the 4. And I just can't quite get past the idea of not being able easily change the snap distance on the fly. I sometimes get in REAL close and being able to adjust quickly is occasionally important. This shot, for example, was taken within about a foot or foot and a half from the subject and I'm sure I flicked it down to a snap distance of 1 meter, while generally shooting at 1.5 or 2.5 that day...

View attachment 46042

-Ray
 
Have to say that is a really interesting picture - I am sure I've seen in before, but this time around the textures, colors, lines and the woman's hair and hand stand out extremely well!
 
Great shot Ray, while I can see that the ability to change snap focus dist. is now slower, I decided to upgrade for the faster AF, better screen and stabilization the IV offers and my III is staying around anyway. The GRD I is on display with the rest of the miniature camera collection in my office, the GRD II sits in my truck the GRD III will probably live in my car, the GRD IV goes in the brief case everywhere.

You are also probably right that the X10 will fill in for those features that the GRD IV added in their upgrade. My X10 will be my grab and go camera, where the GRD IV is always in my bag for when I work or travel
 

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