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himm67

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OK some days I don't want to carry my D80 with me but a small portable camera. I had the Nikon P1 it was OK, but then it was stolen. Anyone have any good recommendations? I'd say 6MP minimum and small footprint.

Thanks in advance.
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Himm
 
I picked up an A530 late last year as my -- toss it in the glove compartment of my car -- beater camera. It was under $140usd and is small enough to stuff into a shirt pocket, yet it does remarkably well at captures that have good lighting. Its flash is no slouch when it comes to power (for its size), but like all P&S-ers the flash is too close to the lens axis.

I used to use a Sony U20 as my beater, but its technology has now been eclipsed by almost any cell phone.

- - - - what I mean by 'beater' is that this is a piece of gear that can get beat up/ dropped/ kicked around/ lost or stolen, and it wouldn't break my heart -- or bank account -- it is a basic throw-away.
-*-*-*-*-

--
Never put off until tomorrow. . .
that which you can avoid doing altogether.
 
I second that choice or for go for the Canon A640 a 10 mp camera that has excellent quality & very good noise wise.

However these newer Canon only allow you to shoot in Jpg basic - super fine which is good but unfortnuately not Raw, where a couple of years ago the powershot range S60/S70 allowed you to shoot in Canon Raw format, a very handy feature.
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I use a Fuji F30 and an old Canon S50 for such duty. The Fuji is much better at higher ISO than any other P&S I've seen. The Canon is great outside in good light. The Fuji is fine outside, but not as pleasing as the Canon image quality for well lit scenes and unfortunately, it does not have nearly the flexibility in adjustments as the Canon. But the Fuji is a great little camera for good shots inside or low light outside. It won't equal a DSLR, but it is very handy. The Fuji F20 is an even smaller and cheaper version using the same sensor, but with even less control over the settings and less battery life. The F30 has great battery life, much better than my S50. Pretty easy to get 500 shots or more on a charge. If low light is a consideration, then you should take a look at the Fuji. If it isn't, then I'd go with a small Canon.

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Good shooting,

Gene
North Carolina
 
Than the Fuji F30. It has the best high ISO performance without buying a DSLR. Excellent images at ISO 800, very usable at ISO 1600 and ok at ISO 3200. Every other P&S I can think of gets noisy at ISO 200, and is eager to turn up the ISO. Also the Fuji has manual controls, and an amazing flash system. It is very compact as well. If for some reason you don't like this camera, pick up a Canon SD 700IS. Image stabilization is not as good as faster shutter speeds, but the next best thing in my opinion. Both cameras are "highly reccomended" on this website. The Fuji F20/F30 can be had for very cheap too.

Hope that helps,

Mark
 
I love my A610. It's my daily carry camera and on my recent 2-week vacation in Maui, it provided over 50% of my shots (the rest were made with my D200). Specs: 5mp, 4 x AA batts, SD memory, full auto and manual controls, lots of custom settings, 1 memory bank for saving settings, (poor) optical viewfinder, flip/twist LCD, very inexpensive. Must be under USD$300 now, if you can find a new one.

The 640x480 video mode has proven to be surprisingly useful to me. In fact, on this trip, we didn't bring the video camera, which was a great relief. In the past, before heading out each day, we always had to ask ourselves if we should bring the videocam with us. On this trip, my A610 ALWAYS came with us, and the only question was whether to leave the D200 in the safe or not. Having digital still and video in one small, inexpensive package was fantastic. In fact, I shot more video on this trip that I ever had in the past, simply because I always had a video capture device with me.

If you do any snorkelling or water sports, I'd strongly recommend getting a camera for which you can buy a waterproof housing. I bought one for our Maui trip (about USD$120), and after years of messing with inexpensive underwater film cameras (used Action Touch, Canon A1 Sureshot, Minolta, disposables), I finally got good underwater shots which I could easily colour correct. Plus I got great underwater video as well.

For prints, ISO200 is as high as I'd go. This is a bit of a limitation for me, although I've found that I can handhold at fairly slow speeds with this camera since there is very little mechanical movement when it fires. I considered, at the time, a Fuji F10, but I found the ability to use AA batteries, SD cards, and the flip/twist LCD to be more valuable, even though I also enjoy low light photography. The memory bank was very useful, too. I usually have it set to manually focus at 6 ft, f/4, Aperture priority, ISO200, for street shooting.

Here are a couple of small samples:







larsbc
 
Plus - rather small, 6mp, big lcd, good qual, great family cam - take it anywhere.

Minus - stupid autofocus default (I've no idea why it focuses where it does, but I don't like it), thankfully the manual setting works as expected, battery life pathetic, only seem to get about 90 shots to a charged battery.

I just saw a leaflet about the nikon equivalent, the L11. What struck me as rather good is that it says it will handle up to 600 shots with the lithium battery, and if you get caught out you can use AA batteries as well. Other than that, it looks identical to my canon (I see it also has some clever face recognition system... no doubt need to turn it off on the nikon too) I'd certainly consider one.
 
I am new at photofile.ru, but I never experienced such a phenomena.
I assume, there are many scripts on the site, but never new they are harmfull.

sergei
 
I have a Ricoh Caplio R4 that works really well... VERY small, but has a 7x zoom and very usable wide angle (28mm equiv) with image stabilization. In terms of features/size (most cams with this profile are only going to give you a 3x zoom) it is a monster.

The IS is not as good as some Panasonics, but this is really a camera that can fit into your pocket without any problems. Light, big screen... if you are mostly looking at walking around vacation kinds of pictures, it's great. Not as good indoors, but then I guess very few of the truly small cameras are. I don't think they sell them in the US, but I got mine off eBay - there are plenty of people selling them from Asia.
 
Thanks all I ended up with the Canon 800IS. So far (day 2) it seems to be great.
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Himm
 
My recommendation would be that your D80, minus the battery grip, if you use one, and slap on a quality small prime lens, such as the Nikkor 35mm f/2.0d lens, already gives a good, small, portable camera, if you are at all really serious about photography. But, if you must have a 6MP camera, obtaining a D50 Nikon Body, will still provide you with, a small, portable camera, using a lens, such as I stated. The Nikon D40 series will also, provide for this, just that I personally will not purchase a Nikon Body or any Body that doesn't allow use of all the lenses, I'll want to use with it, when the need to go light changes with different shooting situations, and quality or being able to get the shoot, in the first place, becomes a higher priority... (just my opinion)..
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BRJR....(My cameras & lenses are listed in my profile)
 
Wow - we must have pretty different definitions of small (and, perhaps, of camera... lol). I can fit my Ricoh in the pocket of my jeans without any problem. A D80 and a prime lens is smaller than a D200 and long telephoto, but I would still not qualify it as small. Not at all saying your advice isn't good, it's just interesting to me how a general question can lead to such varying advice.
 
I use a 4mp Canon 520 for my grab camera. The 500 series powershots all use the 4x zoom (35-135 equiv, if I remember correctly) and feature program, shutter, and aperature priority so you don't have to give up control.

I got mine for $149 on a closeout 1-1/2 years ago, but just was with a friend where we stumbled across a real bargin (which she bought at my suggestion since she was in the market). That was a 7.1mp version of the camera...being closed out at RatShack for only $129. Hard to go wrong with these little things...fit in pocket or in glove compartment of car easily, and have the usual high Canon quality in their shots. Slow, of course..but you can't have everything.
--
Harry Lavo
'once again exploring the photography passion of my 20's.'
 
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