I want to get my husband a nice point and shoot digital for Xmas. Preferrably with a lithium ion battery, preferrably in the $150-$250 range. I am a babe in the woods- I have no idea what I’m doing. We have a crap-o Poloroid that eats AA batteries and we both hate it, I know that much.
What makes this Canon $100 less than this Nikon? What’s the difference? Is the Nikon really $100 better?
I don’t want to spend a whole lot because the Mr. has a habit of loosing things. But I do want to get something as nice as possible. Help!
I don’t know much about either of those cameras, but my suggestion is to head over to Steves-digicams.com and look at the reviews. He get’s pretty in depth but read the “in conclusion” page. Also, be sure to check out the time between pictures. I don’t care how good the camera is, when you’re just a point and shoot type person, you’ll be disappointed with a camera that takes 7 or 8 seconds between pictures.
Oddly, I couldn’t find either of these cameras listed there. You might poke around on that site and check out the cameras that came out just before and after those one though.
I tell you, I’m a Canon DSLR fan. When my Lumix (by Panasonic) mini died, I thought, “I’ll get a Canon subcompact camera.” I miss the Lumix, and it was old. What I wouldn’t do to correct that mistake now. Go for one with rechargeable batteries, and a good, wide angle. Don’t worry about digital parts of the zoom (you can do that in iPhoto or Picasa or Pickyerpoision). The shutter response was fantastic, the quality was decent (granted, no real control like a DSLR), and boy, do I miss that Lumix.
I have quite the collection of Canon pro gear (1D, 1Ds, 1V HS [film!], a bazillion L-series lenses, and a CPS membership to go with), just to give you an idea where I’m coming from…
I have a pair of Fujifilm point-and-shoots, a F80EXR and the newer F300EXR. They’re quite amazing for the price. One theory is that since Fujifilm has no DSLR business to protect, all the cool features go into their point-and-shoot models. These models are known particularly for their low-light capabilities. The 300 has a bunch of whiz-bang features (phase detection focus being one) that don’t work in low light, though, so that isn’t the best measure of their overall performance.
Here is a blog post I made which has a number of pictures from the Rush Time Machine tour. The ones credited as “S. Forte” are from a 300, the rest are from an 80.
I’ve been taking the Fujifilm camera with me a lot - it is a lot easier to carry around than even the bare minimum 1D kit, and a lot less obtrusive. I still use the Canon gear, but not for day-to-day things.
Regardless of which point-and-shoot you get, give serious thought to an extra battery. You will likely run out of battery before you run out of room on the memory card, particularly if you’re using the flash.
Before you compare cameras, you have to decide what it is you are planning on using the camera for. In broad terms, you can’t compare cameras in different classes (like in the OP) because they aren’t designed to do the same thing.
IMO, for a pocketable, high quality, P&S you won’t do better than the Canon SD1300 or SD1400. They are solid, good performing, cameras without a huge number of bells and whistles. No camera in the $150-$250 price range are going to be very good in low light, you will need a flash, and they all have fairly weak flashes, so you will have to accept that restriction. It means that you’ll need to be within 10-15 feet of your subject in low light/indoors.
AA batteries are fine but you would want to get NiMH Low Discharge rechargeable batteries. They will last a long time in a digital camera, but the easily pocketable cameras won’t use AAs, they will use proprietary LiIon battery packs. If you want a second one expect to spend $50 or so for a brand name, $20 for a 3rd party.
Lots of zoom is nice if you are going to be shooting outside. Indoors, they aren’t very useful since the camera won’t have enough light to take clean shots. Are you going to be shooting sports or other scenes where you can’t get close to the action? If so, the Panasonic ZS-5/7 or the Canon SX130 would be my choice. They’re fairly small (although bigger than the SD1300 mentioned above), have a good amount of zoom, and are top notch performers.
Something else I’ll mention. I love my Nikon DSLR, but I’ve had really bad results with Nikon Point and Shoots. When it comes to P&S, I prefer Canons. For some reason, Nikon P&Ss take a really long time between shots. Sometimes as long as 10 seconds if the flash is on. And, as I mentioned above, if your a P&S type person, something like that tends to be a deal breaker.
My first Nikon has the same form factor as that one. While it was a great camera, the problem is that it’s so big and bulky. Plan on bringing a case and a neck strap anywhere you go with it. This camera won’t fit in your pocket.
But thin enough to slip easily into a jeans pocket.
Size is definitely a consideration. Often, smaller and lighter is better than bigger and heavier, but some people find some cameras too small, not just to hold but to use the controls. Also, performance is an issue: in general, smaller cameras are slower at taking the shot, slower between shots, have poorer low-light performance, and the quality of the photo will not be as good as that from a larger camera (technical detail: sensor size), but the difference probably won’t be noticeable with typical snapshots.
A few more thoughts:
Megapixels don’t matter any more, so it’s not worth it to pay extra for a point-and-shoot camera that has more than 10 megapixels. (Even 7 mp is fine.)
For casual snapshots, wide angle is more important than a big zoom ratio. The zoom is usually expressed as something like 28 - 110. The lower the first number, the wider the angle, which means that you can capture more of a scene or fit more people into a shot, especially indoors where you’re limited to how far you can back up.
For travel, a big zoom ratio is nice. Often, you can’t get close to various buildings, animals, or performers and having a 10X zoom (or bigger) can come in handy for getting “up close”.
Canon is the major player in good quality point-and-shoot cameras, and the SD 1400 is a nice choice, but, as postcards suggests, it’s best to go to a store to get a feel for the camera. You might even find someone who can make sensible recommendations …
I have always liked Pentax cameras, so I bought a Pentax Optio T10. It is a good camera with a touch screen. It is only 6MP, but seems to be adequate. Worth looking at I think.
As was mentioned above don’t worry about megapixel ratings. Even the Barbie with a camera in her neck has enough megapixels to enlarge shots to 11x14.
Optical zoom is real, digital zoom is just software enlarging and cropping that you can do yourself in any number of free programs with a lot more control. Never pay for digital zoom.
People overlook form factor and comfort way too much. Controls should be easily reachable for the size of hands of the main user. Heavy cameras for kids or teeny tiny cameras for large hands are both going to reduce the amount of enjoyment the users gain from them.
I’m a Canon DSLR user, but my favorite point and shoot is an Olympus. It’s small enough for a pocket but it fits in my hands nicely. It’s waterproof to 10 feet so I can take it out in the rain or in the pool without worry. It’s also shockproof to a 5 foot drop so I can hand it to a kid without worrying about anything other than the inevitable memory card full of butt shots.
This one is under $200 but there are others in the Stylus Tough line that are more expensive. If the waterproof/shockproof isn’t important to you there are less expensive Stylus models that have the other features
I came on to say this exact thing! I bought a Nikon P&S about a year ago and it was incredibly slow. I couldn’t get used to it and I returned the camera.
Nikon, after starting off with some of the best P&S cameras in the early days of digital, went through a long period of, well, utter crap. They’re just beginning to come out of that chasm now and have produced a few pretty good models. But in general they lag behind Canon, Sony, Panasonic, and Fuji (and even Samsung) in the compact P&S market. All have their strengths and weaknesses, but until recently Nikon’s strengths didn’t outweigh their weaknesses.
Again, you really need to figure out what you want to do with the camera, because no single model or maker has a clear lead in all instances. Every camera is a series of trade offs.
That behavior is why I hate my Canon P&S (despite loving my Canon DSLR). I don’t recall the model number, but it was top of the line last year. It’s just. Too. Damn. Slow.
That’s why anytime someone asks me for a camera recommendation I always send them to Steves-Digicams and tell them to check the time between pictures. Most people in the market for a P&S will happily have not-as-good pictures as long as they don’t have to wait more then a few seconds and the controls are easy to deal with. And, frankly, that’s understandable. You friend’s are all out at the bar, everyone is laughing, you pull out your camera, snap a picture, but you want to get a second one for some reason…by the time 5-10 seconds have passed, the moment is over.
BTW, when I say “not as good” I don’t mean ‘bad’, I mean, maybe the faster camera doesn’t do as well in low light, or sunlight, maybe it tends to blur if people are moving around a bit…etc, but that’s okay if you can take a picture every three seconds instead of every 8 seconds.
Once you take the next step up, to something like a Coolpix 5700 (incidentally,I believe this was my first ‘real’ camera after my first P&S, looks like it’s selling for about $200…I paid $900 for an open box at Best Buy.) you become much less worried about speed and more concerned with things like sharpness, shutter speed, aperture, etc… Then with the jump to DSLR, you go back to thinking about speed, but not how fast it goes between pictures, but how fast it can put the light on the sensor (max aperture*), of course, with these cameras comes the ability to take pictures much faster as well.
*I’m currently drooling…drooling I tell ya over a Nikon 50mm F/1.4 prime lens.
