Ah, I wasn't sure if they tended to be more consumer focussed. Thanks for the clarification.
Any recommendations for which segment to look at if wanting the best pictures without needing to manually adjust settings?
Is it stupid to use a pro-level D-SLR on full-auto?
If you're new to this, or unsure of what you're doing, take any of the cameras, put in auto mode and take a picture. Play it and look at the settings. See what you would want to change in the picture (too bright, too much motion, too much in focus, etc). Then go to the manual setting and start with those settings and make small changes. Take another pic. See the change and the direction you went in.
If I'm shooting public events or something not very "composed", I'll often just be lazy and leave it in automode, lol.
Basic manual primer.
-Start off in manual at 250 ISO, 250 shutter speed, F8, White balance to Kelvin 5000 (roughly daylight temp).
-take a pic
-look at pic and decide what you want to change. Fix what's wrong with it first, then adjust the other settings to compensate your changes.
*Higher ISO means a brighter image, but means more "grain" and less detail when blown up. Shooting at beach at noon, ISO 125. Shooting at night to capture stars, ISO 32,000. Picture looks all white and blown out, lower the ISO. The higher the ISO, the brighter the image is.
*Everything blurry from motion, increase film speed. At your preferred ISO but picture too dark, lower film speed to let the shutter stay open longer and let more light in. You can usually shot handheld down to 80, but below that you need a tripod. The higher the speed, the better at capturing things in motion (without the motion blur). You want to capture the second a ball hits the swinging bat, you'll need to be at 500+. Want to capture the whole batters swing with that smooth motion blur, shoot slower at 4-60. The lower the speed the longer the shutter is open and the brighter the image is.
*Want the subject in focus but the background blurry? Lower the Fstop from F8 to F3 (or as low as your lens goes). Still not enough, back up and zoom in more on the subject. Not enough of the background in focus? Raise the Fstop. The lower the Fstop, the less is in focus, but the brighter the image.
*Shooting in the winter and picture too blue and cold looking? Raise Kelvin to 7000 and see the difference and how warm and golden it now is. At the beach and it's too yellow? Lower Kelvin to 4000 and see how much cooler the image appears.
*Got your settings you like but image is still too dark? Add a flash or external light source. Most people get frustrated because they think they have the settings they want and then have a black image. It's because there's just not enough light. Add a flash, or raise the ISO and suddenly the picture is bright again.
*Shoot in RAW setting. Use Lightroom program from Adobe to process. You can use a sliding scale to "develop" your images and see how they would have looked it you had your exposure (shutter speed) set higher or lower. Adjust your white balance and change the temperature.
"Best Pictures" is a relative term to what you consider best. I may prefer a picture shot more artistically with the subject in focus and the background falling off quickly into a black blurr. You may prefer a more analytical picture with the entire room well lit and in focus. Neither are wrong, it's what you want. In auto mode, you're most likely to get the well lit room and everything in focus. You'll need to manually adjust almost any camera to fine-tune and get the image you want, just practice and get comfortable with those settings.