Help! Our daughter is headed off to college in the fall. We'd like to buy her a decent digi cam. She has taken several classes at school, spent a winter taking pics professionally, and has used our Sony and Casio. She doesn't need a top of the line camera but something that is durable and takes decent pics- and doesn't cost an arm and a leg! She won't be printing anything above at the most an 8x10 but more likely 3x5s and the occasionaly 5x7. She would like something smaller and has an aversion to plastic bodied cams. (she can be a klutz) We've done our research but there are just too darn many to choose from! Can anyone here recommend something?
Thanks! We were hoping to spend between $200-300 on the camera. The bag and extra memory will be up to her to purchase! Does that sound like a reasonable price range for what we are looking for?
Thank you for the reply... Otherwise I know not what to look for...
You mentioned she used a camera professionally, that would mean she's familiar with full manual, etc. For the 300 dollar price range, nothing, and I mean nothing will outclass the Powershot A80. It's a four megapixel, F2.8 - F4.9, 38-114mm ' almost ' compact camera. As requested, the body is all metal, swivel LCD ( although a bit small ) and it has full manual controls, about impossible to find for this price. Pop em in batteries, focus...all is quite fine, I used one of these for a day and instantly liked it, and I own a dSLR so my bar is sort of raised high. If I had to pick something to drag around everywhere, this would be it. I think she'd like it
Another camera perhaps to look into is the Sony W-1, which is priced at $400 retail.
Looking for at least a 5X zoom, auto focus assist lamp, at least a 2" LCD, and very fast shutter speed. Would have bought the Sony w-1 except for the lack of zoom and would prefer a bit larger camera.
Any ideas out there?
It might be a strange offer, and the camera isn't new, but I swear by it being the best 5 megapixel. It also has 5x zoom, f/2.0-2.4, and an almost 2.0, a 1.8in LCD, and hologram AF focus, which is excellent. It's also not expensive anymore
I have over 25,000 shots on mine, it's still going very strong.
Have thought of the Sony 717--actually made sure to hold it and use it but wasn't 100% sold on the somewhat cumbersome design., Would probably get accustomed to it if I owned one.
Then again--Jeff knows what's coming up and whether or not we will see our mythically perfect camera in the next month or so...
Thanks Nick! I checked out the A80 and was really enthused until I got to the part that it only takes pics in jpeg- not RAW or TIFF. Our daughter is proficient in PhotoShop and loves to play with her pics there. Jpeg would limit there suitability for that purpose.
However- its' still in the running. Any comparable cam's that take in RAW or TIFF? What do you think about the Elph series?
I may be wrong - but I think anything that is capable of shooting in RAW/TIFF and NOT locking up the camera while it writes to the card, a larger buffer, whatever else required for that, etc, is going to cost you more.
Elph series are small and cute - in fact, they kind of look like the expensive designer camears, with a very fine build and small, all metal body. However, they lack the manual controls the the A80 provides, and they cost more, for the 4MP S410, $400, and for the 5MP S500, $500, a little more or a little less for both, depending where you look. Despite being point and shoot, they do take great photographs, though. No RAW or TIFF, however.
I have a suggestion for you; 35-280mm lense, F2.8-F4, 5MP, RAW/TIFF;and every other possible manual option you could will for; Nikon Coolpix 5700
Sold for about 700, but don't let that frighten you away. Nikon is currently offering a $150 dollar mail in rebate, which brings it down to about 550. I know that's kicking your budget in the shin a bit, it seems to be a very fine deal for an excellent camera. You can download the rebate from either of the two places, PDF file. B&H offers it on their site, the rebate, but it took forever to download so I'll host it for you. Here or here:
Thanks Nick. I hadn't realized that RAW or TIFF would be a problem. I have an older Casio QV-7000sx that has never had a problem with it. Danged pain in the arse to download pics to the computer but not a problem recording at any resolution or file type.
I'll speak with daughter tonight and see what she thinks. However I know that too much over $300 will be out of our range- we still have to pay for college! <G>
Thanks for your help. If you can think of any other cam's that might work -send away!
What to buy? what to buy?
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