Digital cameras

go for a canon, ixus 60 in an excellent choice if you don't want to fiddle with f-stop and aperture settings. If you want more manual control then something in canon's powershot range.......also couldn’t go wrong with a fuji or nikon. Some of the others are a bit up & down with value for money ie: sony & panasonic. If it were a video cam you were after sony is the best, closely followed by panasonic.
some sony & panasonic still cams r great value and others are mediocre value

these are my opinions only
you might also like to check out the choice mag website

steve

The new Panasonic TZ-1 "WOW"

$485.00 on ebay.

There was a post about week two weeks ago about this a search my find the info you are after.

I use a Canon 300D and find it takes a good photo ..... daughter uses a 350D and gets better shots ........ I'm sure thats because of the camera not the person behind it LOL :).

The powershots seem to be a nice camera as well was considering one as a second one.

Brian

This is a good site
www.dpreview.com/
This is worth while joining
Site Link

Hi Barnsey, we have a Fuji s602,it has 6X zoom and can be wound up to 6 meg if needed ,we only ever usally shoot at 3 meg.However there is the new Fuji s5500 & 5600 on the market now and have a 10X zoom and also can be used on full auto or you can select your own shutter speeds etc, something you cant do with a "box brownie" digital. Good if you want to slow the shutter speed down to give the effect of water fall in full song.They are in that price bracket now too. Cheers and have a great trip.

How long is a piece of string?

The only real good advice that I can give you holds for a lot of expensive toys - go for a brand or dealer that you are confident will give you good service if your toy stops working !

Peace of mind is worth heaps, there is nothing so frustrating as having a dealer drop you like a hot potato when you want some service.

G/day Barnsey,i have Kodak easy share Dx6490 10xzoom & 4.0 megapixel.At the time i bought it , it was about 5/600 bucks it has & still does great shots & also movie as well,i think kodak still have a great range of camera for your dollar.
Cheer's bob.

here is the link to the best cameras in all categories.

www.steves-digicams.com/best_cameras.html

Another website to checkout is steve's digicams www.steves-digicams.com/

Features I reckon you need are 10x zoom - forget about digital zoom
Big memory card. If you have a laptop you can dump your pics to it but back them up to a cd. If you don't have a laptop maybe one of those portable hard drives to dump pics to.

Leroy

Barnesy
Go for the Fuji 5600 and you will be very happy. 10 times optical zoom and 5 megapixels and selling for $399. You will not get a better camera for your money.
It is not a compact camera and has a feel like the SLR cameras. Go to your camera store and get them to give you a demo.

Stephen

Actually the best feature i would have loved to get with my digital camera was not the optical zoom, rather a wide angle lens. When travelling, the views are always spectacular, however i find the camera just doesn't do it justice as i would expect. I would aim to get a camera that could accept a polarizing filter and/or wide lens.

Though price range may not work :-(

Andrew

Fuji F10 Small, powerful, durable a good all round camera (6.3 megapixels, Total Zoom 18.5x (3 x optical, 6.2 x digital) 2.5" LCD screen, movie with sound, HD, continuous shooting etc) . I paid $759.00 for mine about 14 months ago has never let me down. I think that they sell for $350-$450 now. Depreciation doen't affect me as I can claim it as work expences (TAX).

Good Luck,

Dirty

Hi Barnsey
I think we had a long conversation on another thread recently.
Here are what I reckon are the issues. optical aoom mmore important than megapixels. You don't need more than 6 meg unless you are going to do BIG blowups (bigger than A3 size paper) and very few people do.
No one camera does the lot unless you but something very expensive with lots of eeven more expensive lenses,
What do you want to photograph? Do you want landscapes, people/family snaps or wildlife? I would give different camera recomendations for each of these. So-you can get very good results in you price range by getting a camera by getting a camera that has strenghts in one of these fields. If however you want a general purpose camera to try to do all of these, I would suggest getting some extra software. Most landscape photographers want a wideangle lens. You can get over this by stitching photographs togetherin your computerafter you have taken the shots. Go to www.autostitch.net for info about how to do this and a free program that does it brilliantly. Other programs are also availableto do this, but this one is the fastest and its free.
The next big questionHow much do you know about photography already? If you already know quite a bit about it, or if you think it might be a hobby you want to develop, then you will need a quite different camera from one that is designed to work as automatically as possible. In your price range some cameras are designed to do it all for you and others give the photographer much more control. What way do you want to go? If you go all auto, then find you really want to get into photography, you will be looking for a new camera quite quickly. Onthe other hand, if you don't want all the over ride options you will find they just seem to complicate things unnecessarily.
All the sites with camera reviews listed above are good, but thereareso many reviews to wade through, it is still highly confusing unless you already know the jargon.
If you are going on an extended trip, leave yourself enough $ to buy memory cards, or a portable drive to transfer your photos to, or, best of all, have a notebook computer and transfer them to that. The memory card that comes with the camera you buy will be too small to keep you happy.Memory cards can be bought on ebay much cheaper once you have your camera and know the type it takes.

Hi there Barnesy,

It all gets back to what sort of photography you plan to do ...

Here is a digital camera buyers guide I have on my website: http://www.vividadventures.com.au/VAchecklist.pdf

If you want to take Steve Parish -like wildlife images, $5,000 will not be enough.

It all depends, but for many people $500 is more than adequate.

My kids seem to be taking better and better photos with their $150 Olympus - some that are really very good.

Give us a yell if you want some personal training.

Ciao for now
Andrew.

http://www.couriermail.news.com.au/#
On the grey title bar click on classifieds then general classifieds then type in digital camera or canon etc

Thanks to all for responding. I will look at all of the sites mentioned. I had started researching but couldn't understand the jargon. Every camera has claims of being the best. I do have a laptop that photos can be downloaded onto.

I would like to be able to take photography up as a part time hobby but expense would be an issue there. Maybe if there was a way to change lenses and other functions on it from auto to manual as my competency grew?

Would be happy though with an easy to use, good qualtiy all round camera. Scenery photos, wildlife (maybe movement and having to focus in on small animals), and close-ups (flowers etc). those stitching and altering the shutter speed options seem good.

Thanks

Barnesy

Barnesy,

Its all in the lense mate.. Good quality lense equals good quality shots..

Megapixels ideally dont mean much.. Its the quality of the lense and CCD's which capture the light etc etc..

I have a Nikon Z6, 6 mp 10x optical zoom, in my opinion VERY good cam for the price, sits at about 500 i think...

IMHO dont move from Canon and Nikon...(Good lenses used)

Justin

I would definately go the fuji. We bought an Olympus that has 10x optical zoom. Great camera but think the fuji is better, easier to use and cheaper.
Daryl

For most people who take snapshots the display is the most used part of the camera. Buy the one with the best ( usalally the biggest) display you can afford. After that lenses as already stated are the key to getting good technical shots. So buy a know brand from an optical manufacturer, Cannon, Nikon are the best in these for the hapopoy snapper user.

Best accessopry I ever bought was a monopod. Try one and you will want one as well....

If you intend on taking good night time or sunsets than you would be best with a camera that has the manual option. You can get these now without having to go to an SLR.
Likewise a good tripod is a must for this sort of work, allowing the long shutter speeds without the problem of shake.

If you do intend to get into it you may be better to stretch to an SLR, I have a nikon D50 and it has been a joy to use and easy to learn too.

Have a look on ebay you may surprose yourself at what you can afford.

Cackles