New camera - some reading required

I picked up a Canon SD1300IS last week. I decided "small pocket size" trumped "tons of features" given that I have and SLR also. I would probably not be able to live with this as my only camera; for that I'd probably go to the SX130 if not the G11.

Even though I've used Canon cameras for 10+ years, I'm finding that it is well worth the time to read the manual. On this tiny camera, they've compressed a lot of functionality into the few (4 + shutter + directional, 9 total) buttons. Some functionality is not in plain sight, though I think in the cases I thought about they've put it in the best place they could.

One example: exposure compensation is on the "up" directional button. OK, and it's labelled. I use that a lot, though perhaps I'll just let the "auto" deal with that in the future, if it works. "They" say the "auto" mode is really quite good on the new models and it'll deal with backlighting and such properly.

But when I was reading through the manual, I got a bad feeling; I wasn't finding an exposure lock like you'd use for shooting panoramas. I do shoot panoramas, quite a lot actually. A dozen or so most vacations. And I don't always have the SLR with me to do them. I could do manual exposure compensation, and I think Hugin may do this automatically, but it's never exactly right.

There is a single exposure lock which I saw immediately. But eventually I did find it. You hold the shutter halfway and click the up button (remember, that's for exposure compensation?). So it kind of makes sense; a half press is what you use for focus/exposure lock on a frame, and then you chord it with the exposure compensation button. That puts you into AE Lock mode for multiple frames. It is a bit awkward to press both buttons at once on this camera, but if I wanted easy to press buttons I would have gone with a larger camera. Or use the SLR.

I'm thinking about taking a look at the CHDK project to see what kind of skillz I has to haz to do the port for this camera. I'd really like to have it.

Today's weird behavior observation

I've gotten three emails recently at work CC'ing me the news report that a cyclist was hit and injured by a hit-and-run driver here in Dexter. No other text, just a copy of the news article.

I don't know exactly what people are saying by sending me these. After all, I don't send emails to everyone I know that drives a car every time someone is injured or killed in the area while driving a car; I'd be sending out dozens of emails to hundreds of recipients every year, and I'm sure they wouldn't appreciate it.

My best guess is that these are the people who feel that riding a bicycle on the road is wrong / dangerous / stupid, and think that this will convince me of the same. I really doubt that me sending them similar messages about people getting killed while driving would have that effect on them.

OK, ONE more purchase...

I ordered up a new taillight. It's from the Chinese company that makes my headlight, which is the best headlight I've had and at a great price. The taillight promises the same; more light and better dispersion than the $120 taillight I'm running with now, plus it runs off the same battery as my headlight (with a Y adaptor) and it's totally waterproof (the other one has a water-vulnerable battery pack) for $29. I should be able to sell the old light for at least twice that and wind up with a better lighting system, where I only have one battery pack to worry about. Currently I have to bring the taillight pack in, take the 4 AA cells out of it, recharge them and replace them every 2 days. This will be an improvement in several ways, won't add any net items to my pile of stuff and should actually net me money.