What is the best digital camera for taking intraoral shots as well as portraits (using a ring glash)?

A friend suggested the Olypus D600L. What do you think?

-- James Kim (jameshk@usc.edu), July 10, 1998

Answers

Well, I'm not qualified to answer your question, except to say that my efforts at an oral self-portrait (with a D-600L) after I chipped a tooth left quite a bit to be desired. If I had recruited some help I might have gotten acceptable results -- my problem was with aiming, not focus or exposure (I was trying to shoot the "inside" side of a molar). I suspect that you'd be better off using a less bulky camera with a pivoting lens and a good LCD viewfinder, such as the Nikon Coolpix 900.

I've had no trouble with portraits, but I have no idea what a ring glash is!

-- Ben Jackson (ben@ben.com), July 10, 1998.

They haven't been marketing it "openly" (at least in common public forums) for a while, but Fuji's old DS-220 VGA-res digicam has a *fantastic* macro attachment with dual-tube flash available for it. The resolution is only 640x480, but the macro attachment makes all the difference, particularly the shadowless lighting from the two tubes. At last contact (maybe a year ago), I understoody that they were leaving it in their active product line, specifically for people looking for a good intraoral camera. The macro gadget was very expensive (don't recall exact $$), but there was nothing else like it available on the market.

Best suggestion to track it down would be to call their Taxter, NY headquarters, ask for someone in digital marketing.

-- Dave Etchells (hotnews@imaging-resource.com), July 18, 1998.