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Need a small point and shoot....

I've tried Casio, Canon, Panasonic, Olympus, Nikon, GE.. And found that going for the megapixels and price is about the only criteria necessary.
They're all very good.
My last walk-around was a Canon Powershot, now it's a Casio Exi-Lim.
Lots of megas, and good video.
 
sol invictus said:
It's just an impression. But I'm willing to bet that sales of P&S cameras have plummeted over the last five years, and I think it's because of cell phones. And the better cell cameras get - and they're getting better rapidly - the smaller a market will be left for dedicated P&Ss.
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The thing is I have not seen a cellphone with an optical zoom. I have seen tiny p&s cameras that have a 12x zoom.
 
If you're looking for low light performance, Fujifilm has the best sensor (or, at least they used to).
 
Cuddles said:
But for people who actually want decent holiday pictures and the like, phones are still a long way from being a substitute for a real camera.
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I certainly agree that the best phone cameras are a long way from being as good as a real camera. But no point-and-shoot can challenge quality of a "real" real camera - an SLR with a high quality lens.

SLRs are big and heavy, because glass is. The niche that point-and-shoots occupied is people that don't want to lug around a big heavy camera all the time and are willing to compromise on quality - and it looks to me like that niche is shrinking year after year as cell phone cameras improve. Not to mention that people pretty much always have their phones on them. Who wants to carry yet another single-purpose device that's only a moderate step up from something you always have with you?

ponderingturtle said:
The thing is I have not seen a cellphone with an optical zoom. I have seen tiny p&s cameras that have a 12x zoom.
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With improved resolution that matters less. As megaresp points out, "digital zoom" is just another word for cropping. If you have resolution to spare, you can crop away and not lose image quality.
 
I do like regular batteries. I had one time in Paris where is was BITTER cold. Got terrific shots, but had to keep a spare set of batteries in my glove. The batteries in the camera would get cold and not work! So I just kept changing them out.

ALso all the tourists were inside keeping warm (and out of my shot).

But I'm willing to just carry some spares, I need to save weight and space.
 
sol invictus said:
With improved resolution that matters less. As megaresp points out, "digital zoom" is just another word for cropping. If you have resolution to spare, you can crop away and not lose image quality.
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Not quite. You can't crop optic limitations away. Even with enough resolution, you will find that the picture gets fuzzy at some point, due to the optics.

I do agree that the window for compact point and shoot cameras is narrowing, but I think it is quite a long way from closing, partly because they keep getting cheaper. Also, many of the compacts evidently share their basic software with the high-ends, and come with a lot of functionality that you don't get in a phone.

Of course, in the long run, we will no doubt see Swiss Army Knife devices that can do everything with acceptable quality, but they will always have the weakness of universal tools: They are handy, but will never work as well for each application as a dedicated one.

Hans
 
kittynh said:
I do like regular batteries. I had one time in Paris where is was BITTER cold. Got terrific shots, but had to keep a spare set of batteries in my glove. The batteries in the camera would get cold and not work! So I just kept changing them out.

ALso all the tourists were inside keeping warm (and out of my shot).

But I'm willing to just carry some spares, I need to save weight and space.
Click to expand...

My present SLR (a low end Sony Alpha) has a dedicated battery :(, so I bought an extra one (expensive :mad:), but my older digitals both used AA type. Of course I mostly used the rechargeable, but knowing that I had a pair of extras and could always get some more, was a great comfort. Even if you never actually need it, the spare battery ensures that you don't forego a good shot because you fear running out of power. (Same goes for memory, BTW: Be sure to have enough.)

Hans
 
I love my Panasonic Lumix. I have one from a couple of years ago and have taken some really fantastic shots. Low light really is not bad and you can adjust the exposure pretty simply. And a bit of time spent on selecting scene modes you're likely to use helps also. Very versatile and the Leica lens is slammin. I see there are a few upgrades to the range since I bought mine, which rather make my mouth water.
 
MRC_Hans said:
Not quite. You can't crop optic limitations away. Even with enough resolution, you will find that the picture gets fuzzy at some point, due to the optics.
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That's true of course - but it's also true of optical zooms.

I suppose it's a question of whether cell phone cameras are "optics limited" or "resolution limited". There wouldn't be much point in increasing resolution if you're already optics limited, so I was assuming they are resolution limited - but that might be a bad assumption.
 
kittynh said:
I do like regular batteries. I had one time in Paris where is was BITTER cold. Got terrific shots, but had to keep a spare set of batteries in my glove. The batteries in the camera would get cold and not work! So I just kept changing them out.
Click to expand...

I've got a Nikon digital SLR, and the battery (the one that came with the camera) is simply amazing. I can take on the order of 1,000-1,500 photos (and view them moderately on the large display) over several weeks before it needs a charge.
 
sol invictus said:
I suppose it's a question of whether cell phone cameras are "optics limited" or "resolution limited". There wouldn't be much point in increasing resolution if you're already optics limited, so I was assuming they are resolution limited - but that might be a bad assumption.
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I think it's actually both. It's easy to tell the difference between two cameras with the same optics but different resolution, and between two cameras with the same resolution but different optics.

I think there are two important differences that tend to lead to the focus on resolution. Firstly, it's simply easier. Chips are constantly getting smaller and faster, so it's little more than a matter of putting the new CCD where the old one used to be each time a new one comes out. Upgraded optics, on the other hand, appear to be rather more difficult to develop, and will presumably be harder to integrate since there can be huge differences in size and shape.

Secondly, numbers. How many people buying phones and cheap cameras actually know anything about what any of the details mean? If you can put "Now with eleventy billion pixels" on the box, it's going to look more attractive to the average consumer than if you put "Now with some slightly fiddled lenses that improve colour contrast a bit depending on the situation". OK, so they'd probably try to make it sound a bit more attractive than that, but the point is there's not really any simple "This number used to be 8 but now it's 12" for the optics, but that's exactly how they sell newer cameras by pointing at the resolution.
 
I bought one of my kids a $30 "video camera" at the grocery store. The resolution isn't bad, but the images lack contrast and tend to have a bluish cast because of the cheap plastic lenses.

My first digital was an early "coolpix" and had massive optics. I see the images come up in the screensaver slideshow and am astounded how much better some of them are than images from a newer camera with "more megapixels" than the nikon had.

With those in mind I went to the pawn shop last year desperate to replace the latest mysterious camera failure, with an eye toward the biggest piece of front glass in the display case. Ended up with another "coolpix." Nikon's optics were the best in the store. I like the camera so much I went to another pawn shop to find one for my wife.

Good glass makes a big difference.
 
sol invictus said:
I certainly agree that the best phone cameras are a long way from being as good as a real camera. But no point-and-shoot can challenge quality of a "real" real camera - an SLR with a high quality lens.

SLRs are big and heavy, because glass is. The niche that point-and-shoots occupied is people that don't want to lug around a big heavy camera all the time and are willing to compromise on quality - and it looks to me like that niche is shrinking year after year as cell phone cameras improve. Not to mention that people pretty much always have their phones on them. Who wants to carry yet another single-purpose device that's only a moderate step up from something you always have with you?
Click to expand...

In fact, the opposite appears to be happening. Camera makers are actually expanding and intensively engineering new lines of professional quality compact cameras. They seem to be trying to either address or create a demand for high-quality cameras that will potentially fit into a pocket (unlike SLRs). There are now a variety of pocket cameras that are in the $600-1200 range which use interchangeable lenses (same as SLR), have 1080p video (true full HD) with stereo mics and are much smaller and lighter than SLRs.

Some are:

FujiFilm Finepix X100
Nikon 1
Olympus PEN
Sony Alpha NEX

The term "point and shoot" is kind of meaningless now because all digital cameras are PAS with the Auto Mode (auto-focus, auto-shutter, auto-exposure) whether they be big SLRs or tiny compacts. What most people mean when they say PAS is actually "compact" or pocket-sized.
 
dogjones said:
I love my Panasonic Lumix. I have one from a couple of years ago and have taken some really fantastic shots. Low light really is not bad and you can adjust the exposure pretty simply. And a bit of time spent on selecting scene modes you're likely to use helps also. Very versatile and the Leica lens is slammin. I see there are a few upgrades to the range since I bought mine, which rather make my mouth water.
Click to expand...

LUMIX DMC-FX78 is supposed to have good low-light performance, I have read.
 
sol invictus said:
I've got a Nikon digital SLR, and the battery (the one that came with the camera) is simply amazing. I can take on the order of 1,000-1,500 photos (and view them moderately on the large display) over several weeks before it needs a charge.
Click to expand...


My first digital compact was a Fuji 4200. It used 2 AA cells.
Using standard Duracells, I got 2-3 shots if I was lucky!
NiCads were far better, but even 1300mAhr ones only achieved about 40 shots. I always carried a dozen!
The cell also "leaked" even if the camera was switched off; a full charge would fall to zero in two days, so I got in the habit of removing the batteries.

The replacement (also Fuji- an F810) had a dedicated battery that would last 2-3 days of moderate use. Someone pinched it at TAM V.

When I fell down a cliff a couple of years ago, I landed on my Olympus 400 DSLR, buggering the electronics, among other things (I landed in shallow water) , but I salvaged the battery. The nice insurance people replaced the camera with a 420, which takes the same battery, so I always keep one on charge and one in the camera. I find each is good for 4-500 shots in daylight. I don't use flash much, but autofocus on moving targets takes quite a lot of power. Turning that off doubles battery life.

The Olympus compact I keep in the car also has a Lithium cell that is good for several days of moderate use and holds charge when off for at least a month.
So batteries shouldn't be an issue nowadays, butof course AA's are handy for lots of things and when travelling it's often the multitude of chargers that can be a nuisance.
 
William Parcher said:
In fact, the opposite appears to be happening. Camera makers are actually expanding and intensively engineering new lines of professional quality compact cameras.
Click to expand...
***SNIP***
The term "point and shoot" is kind of meaningless now because all digital cameras are PAS with the Auto Mode (auto-focus, auto-shutter, auto-exposure) whether they be big SLRs or tiny compacts. What most people mean when they say PAS is actually "compact" or pocket-sized.
Click to expand...

William- I couldn't agree more. This is what I meant earlier by saying it depends what's meant by "point and shoot".

Digital cameras are evolving. It's likely that what we will have by 2020 may be very unlike an SLR (analog or digital). For instance, if advanced processors can do digital correction in camera do we need interchangeable lenses at all?
At the moment, yes, of course we do, but will we always?

Olympus have hinted that the 5 series may be the last actual TTL monitoring DSLR they will make. Now I reckon that's daft, as LCD screens just are not good enough in many light conditions, but I'm a dinosaur.

People who grow up with mobile phone cameras will expect a "real" camera to handle like that. And probably to browse the internet .
 
William Parcher said:
There are now a variety of pocket cameras that are in the $600-1200 range which use interchangeable lenses (same as SLR), have 1080p video (true full HD) with stereo mics and are much smaller and lighter than SLRs.

Some are:

FujiFilm Finepix X100
Nikon 1
Olympus PEN
Sony Alpha NEX
Click to expand...

That's a very interesting set of cameras - thanks! I wasn't aware of them.

But I'm not sure they invalidate my point: those don't exactly look small enough to be "pocket" cameras, they've got interchangeable lenses, and they cost as much or more as a decent digital true SLR.
 
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