Is the canon sd500 the best choice for me?

[ZCarroll]

The important things to me are decent unlimited movie avi (NOT quicktime!), fast cycle time between pictures, long flash range, excellent photo quality in indoor low light situations (and able to focus lock quickly in those situations), and pocketable. I tried the sony dsc-w1 and absolutely loved it except for very disappointing photo quality, the movies went in and out of focus (I don't know why it did that, they were awesome other than that?), and skin tones got bleached out and no way to manually adjust white balance. I've tried a pentax optio s40 and loved it, except incredibly, painfully slow cycle times between pictures and again not so great photo quality (better than the sony, however and also I could always see everything in the lcd whereas the sony's lcd was barely visible most of the time for me). I also tried a samsung digimax v70, beautiful pictures and seemed to do everything I want, although not quite as fast cycle time as I'd like (I had a defective one though so not sure if it would be faster if it worked properly, also the lcd had a delay not sure if that was normal for this model or part of the defect) and it has the quicktime format (boohoo!).

Is the sd500 the answer to my prayers? I mostly take pictures of my kiddums, in the house, on the stage, at the park, in the woods, with other people, etc. I had an olympus d400z for years that never gave me a bad picture so I'm mystified as to why I've had so much trouble with blur, noise, red eye, over/under exposure, loss of detail, etc. with all the higher pixel cameras I've tried. I don't really feel I need or want a 7mp camera (given I was able to print gorgeous 8x10s from cropped pics from my 1.3 mp oly so it seems photo quality beats more pixels hands down) but I figure if it's got all the features I want more pixels can't hurt?

[el_riddle]

i love mine. the pics are first rate. after two weeks and about a thousand shots i'm more convinced then ever that i love this little guy as a take everywhere camera.

it is what it is though. it is a compact/ultra compact camera. every camera in this class has a red eye problem with the exception of the sony p150/200 due to flash local. however, its very simple to edit out red eye. so i wouldn't let that be the prime concideration.

the size, color quality, speed, ease of use, and flash range make the canon an excellent choice. however, if you don't feel like you need the 7 mp...then perhaps scale down to the s500 which is reputed to be a fantastic little camera.

just remember if you buy a point and shoot camera, you must have realistic expectations. it is not a slr, so you will have limitations. i must say though, you will be shocked by how well these cameras will preform for you.

hope this helps. happy shooting.

luke

[ZCarroll]

so I guess maybe the canon sd500 isn't the answer for me... I haven't had any problem with red eye with my oly d400z, and very, very rarely did it show up with the pentax optio... the test pictures I took with the sony and the samsung didn't show that problem either. I take way too many people pictures to have to go through and edit red eye all the time. According to what I've read about the s500 I ruled it out because of the time limited lower fps movies as well as longer shutter lag. I know it's possible to have all I want in a compact camera since I had it in the oly d400z (although it's a snug fit in my pocket), I just want to add resolution, increased speed and movies. I just have a hard time understanding why I'm having such a hard time finding that, ahhhh! Even with very poorly lit indoor situations all the detail is there and no red eye and perfect photo quality with the oly and it only takes a second or two (with flash) before I can take the next shot and I've never noticed a shutter lag (although I've noticed it in newer digicams I've tried)... why can't a newer higher pixel camera do the same?

Thank you so much for the input, the hunt for a replacement for my old oly has been very a long and frustrating one!

[JTL]

Realistically, for point-and-shoot 7MP, it always comes to only two cameras (alright, three if you include the Nikon 7900)...the Canon SD500 or the Sony P200. Try them both and decide. I went with the Canon SD500. The image quality/color simply can't be beat and it is one of the the fastest point-and-shoot cameras you can buy.