need new camera advice please......

hey guys i need some advice....i have a canoon powershot sd1000 right now...i think it takes pretty good pictures......my friend wants to buy a new fancy shmansy camera.....for the honeymoon to hawaii,,,,,i have no idea about cameras....all i sue on my camera is turning the flash off and the macro setting for closeups....i need something if it exists that could possibly take a better picture than what i got....she is pretty set on getting a camera so i need a suggestion!.....i really have no idea about settings etc but i am willing to learn a little...i aint building a friggin darkroom or anything so....please keep any replies in english....not camera talk!....thanks for any suggestions......budget is up in the air right now......at least a couple hundred....maybe more depending on the laws of diminishing returns.....ryan

I got my wife the Cannon S100 for Xmas...it's a compact camera, so it fits in a pocket easily and takes the best photos of any compact out there (if my research is correct). On par with an entry-level dSLR in a wide range of conditions.

We've been quite pleased with ours...esp since it's small, so we frequently have it with us.

My $.02

"We've been quite pleased with ours...esp since it's small, so we frequently have it with us."

It is hard to overestimate the importance of this for a traveling camera.

How much are you wanting to spend? Whoops just saw a couple of hundred.

i would say on the high end...if u asked her she'd say a thousand....if u asked me...id say 4-600.....if it'd be worth it...by worth it i mean better quality pictures....i don't know how much better the quality would be than what i have...ya know...ryan

We just purchased this one after reviewing point and shoot cameras:

Panasonic Lumix ZS15

I would look at the Nikon 1 series for a small camera in your budget, that I am sure would capture some excellent photos.

PowerShot SX40 HS is under $400. It is point and shoot, with a lot of high end features.

If you want one of the power-zoom cameras, i.e. you want to take a picture of a whale off Kauai while standing on the beach in Maui (just kidding...) the PowerShot SX40 or the Lumix FZ150 are both nice from what I hear with the Canon a bit cheaper (but the Lumix has a Leica lens, and since most of my family worked for them at some point, they are much better, of course ). But they are bigger cameras.

For something cute you can put in your pocket, the Lumix ZS15 or ZS20 look like a great travel cameras. And unless you want to see your pictures on a 84" screen or print large posters, that should be all you need. I actually prefer the ZS15 because of the maximum shutter speed of 1/4000 sec. That means that in the very bright light in Hawaii, you will get very short exposure times - less likely to overexpose your pictures.

The Canon S100, Olympus ZX-1, Lumix LX5 or 7 are one step up in picture quality, but they have less zoom to catch far-away objects and instead let you do all kinds of fancy manual things you may not have much interest in. All of those have a point and shoot program, I use a few Lumix cameras and they call it 'intelligent auto' - works like a charm. You can switch on face recognition, so the camera recognizes that there are people and automatically focuses on faces - also works great (I assume most have this now, but I know that it works really well in Panasonic cameras). Personally, I would not go for the Nikon 1 series in your case because then you would have to get different lenses and fiddle around with that.

So, if I were to recommend or give one to my Dad as a replacement (which I may do for Christmas) that requires little maintenance and is easy to handle, I would go for the Panasonic Lumix ZS15. But in the end this is like the question 'Which knife should I buy?'

My 2 cts.

Stefan

Canon t4i 650d.... that camera is great and you can record good full hd video with it.

[video=youtube;pfINGg4w6XM]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pfINGg4w6XM[/video]

sw2geeks said:

PowerShot SX40 HS is under $400. It is point and shoot, with a lot of high end features.

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What do u mean by high end features and would a normal person who's not a professional be able to use them efficiently?....Ryan

Just in case you are still researching, I found this site helpful:

http://www.cameralabs.com/buyers_guide/compacts/best_compact_digital_camera.shtml

thanks i still am searching...i just have no idea what to get!....ryan

sudsy9977 said:

What do u mean by high end features and would a normal person who's not a professional be able to use them efficiently?....Ryan

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A friend of mine has this camera that he uses to shoot pictures and videos for my papers motorsports blog. He is not a photographer, so he wanted something simple. But he needed something that could shoot long and wide and work good at night. He also needed to be able to shoot HD video. So far this camera has worked great for him. The image stablisation has also work great, even when he is in the long 800mm range this camera has. He is also impressed with the battery life.

ok so after a lot of reading i think the powershot is for me....now for the next question....will this card be ok

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B003P3MCXW/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20

how many pictures can it store u think?.....it is a class 10 card so its capable of using it for hd video right?.....also how the hell do u see the pictures?...can i plug this camera into my usb(iMac) just like i do with my other camera......also any other last minute advice?...i don't need an extra battery right?...i mean how long do batteries last in cameras like this?.....i'm scared!.....i goth a buy this soon though cause i wanna practice before i go away with it....any advice on a bag for it?...how the hell do i know if it'll fit?...are bags made for specific cameras?.....ryan

sudsy9977 said:

how many pictures can it store u think?

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My S100 is also a 12.1MP, doing some math based on all photos taken with it since I bought it, I would guess you are going to be able to get 10k photos in 16:9 JPEG mode (a bit less in 4:3). If you use RAW, it will be....less....much less. can't estimate that though, I don't use RAW.

Also, this is the card I got, I've not regretted the choice for a second:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B002UT42UI/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20

I usually take less than 200 photos at a time though, and when I get home they automatically upload to my "processing directory" on my home server...no cables, no finding an available usb port, no teaching the spousal unit how to connect the camera and transfer the photos...or wondering where she actually put them....this time.

Make sure it's compatible with your camera.

PowerShot SX40 is a ok camera not high-end at all just a superzoom camera. picture quality in daylight is okey, but poor quality indoors with less light or night shoots. but you wont find a better camera for that price i guess. the t4i 650d is a real system camera and much better, but cost 3 times more since u need 2 good linces one for distance and one for closeup.

10k photos...***....i dont really think i need that kinda storage but what about if i use it for video?....i thought i needed the class 10 card....rya

Mr.Magnus said:

PowerShot SX40 is a ok camera not high-end at all just a superzoom camera. picture quality in daylight is okey, but poor quality indoors with less light or night shoots. but you wont find a better camera for that price i guess. the t4i 650d is a real system camera and much better, but cost 3 times more since u need 2 good linces one for distance and one for closeup.

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yeah 3x as much aint gonna fly but i appreciate all the advice.....is it poor quality if you're used to much worse...im no pro by any means so its hard reading all of the advice online by professional camera users....ryan

sudsy9977 said:

10k photos...***....i dont really think i need that kinda storage but what about if i use it for video?....i thought i needed the class 10 card....rya

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Sorry, no clue on the video

sudsy9977 said:

10k photos...***....i dont really think i need that kinda storage but what about if i use it for video?....i thought i needed the class 10 card....rya

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The card should be fast and large enough. But I am a bit paranoid about these cards, the CAN die on you, so I definitely would take a second one as a backup. Or you can pick up one at Costco in Maui if you need one... I just try to spread my photos on a few cards until I have backed them up somewhere. That way, if a card breaks, I don't lose all my pictures.

Stefan

sudsy9977 said:

yeah 3x as much aint gonna fly but i appreciate all the advice.....is it poor quality if you're used to much worse...im no pro by any means so its hard reading all of the advice online by professional camera users....ryan

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It's a good camera if u stalk ppl. Quality is ok on the photos but not close to a system camera IMO. But for regular joe use its a ok camera but you can get that same quality shoots with a smal camera. The 40 is just a big distance shooter.

I just looked, and unless I mixed that up, your Canon SD1000 was released in 2007. Pretty much EVERY decent brand camera today will be better than that on almost every level (I know, there are small points to argue, but nothing of relevance to the normal consumer IMHO). Compact cameras are a bit weaker when the lighting situation is bad, you won't be able to take a very good pic of a black cat hiding under a dumpster on a starless night - but the pic you will get with the Powershot will still be better than with the camera you have now.

I had a 'bridge camera' like the Powershot a few years ago and loved it - can be used everywhere, no fuss with changing lesnses, excellent quality with daylight etc. Then I got more interested in photography again. Bought a camera with changeable lenses, bought about 60 lenses until I figured out what I wanted. Spent days on ebay looking for lenses, read book after book and website after website on photography. Played around a lot. Years later, my photography skills have improved by an estimated 20%, and on my computer screen it is hard to see a quality difference between the pictures I took with a $400 bridge camera compared to a $2000 set-up. Again, of course a more sophisticated system will let you do a few things more if you are willing to go through a learning process about photography. If you want to produce art, you may be better off with a DSLR. But something like the Powershot will cover 90-95% of all the 'normal shots'.

Not trying to talk you into anything, just rambling and throwing out my 2 cts again....

Stefan

i have 2 16gb cards and have never filled them both up but i also dont liek having more then about 400 shots on them (i shoot raw+jpg) i know for fact that shooting that way i can get more then 1500 shots per card

If you're looking for an awesome compact point and shoot, I love love love mine. There are so many different functions on it and I believe someone told me it was one of the best on the market. It's a Canon S95, they have a S100 out now. It's about $400.