best brand

[loony.bird]

Which would you say is the best brand with respect to the point and shoot cameras? I'd been using my parents' Kodak earlier, but I'm thinking of buying one for myself. I'm just amateur, though I like taking pictures and editing, and might go into photography seriously. What do you guys recommend?

[ap4a]

There isn't a best brand, and only partisan fan boys will ever tell you that there is. You need to decide what features you want/need and then review what the various manufacturers offer that will best meet those needs (this applies whether you want a compact camera, bridge camera, film SLR, dSLR or a medium or large format camera).

If you intend to take up photography seriously you need to be looking at a camera that gives you creative control, and so has manual and semi-automatic exposure settings (manual, aperture priority and shutter priority), along with manual settings for metering and white balance. If you can afford it a system that has interchangeable lenses (eg. an SLR) rather than a single fixed lens would also be better for you as a serious photographer.

[ianpinion]

Hi and welcome to the forums, loony.bird,

I agree that there is no best brand. What's important is buyiing a camera that best suits your needs, that you're comfortable using and you can achieve the results you're looking for with it.

Can we ask what you are wanting to photograph, because ultimately that will help you decide what camera you need. As in, if you need a certain feature to be able photograph a particular scene well, it's no good choosing a camera that lacks that feature.

Another consideration is how light do you want to travel, as some cameras are very portable, whilst a DSLR system tends to get very bulky over time as you accumulate more gear to go with it. Lastly, what budget have you allowed yourself to spend on this camera?

[loony.bird]

Thanks for replying guys. To answer your questions, I don't intend to buy a DSLR or SLR as I don't have that kind of budget (upto $150 is my estimate) , and I'm not sure how seriously I'm gonna take up photography.

As to what I'd be shooting, I'm not really sure, but I like doing landscapes, though fashion photography is also something I'm interested in and would like to try my hand at. I think I'd like to experiment a bit at first. Also, I'd need the camera for the occasional party or functions, like awards ceremonies, music concerts etc. I guess a camera with a good night vision is desirable, as I like shooting at night and twilight zones.

Well, and I don't want my camera to be very bulky, and easy to handle. I was taking a look at the Canon models, but my one concern is that they don't look very easy to handle, I didn't think I could get a good grip on the camera.
Another thing I'm doubtful about is to how many megapixels should I choose without getting too much noise on my photos.

Anyways, you guys got any particular recommendations?

[ianpinion]

Well I think you're are going to limit yourself to a compact, but you will need to find one with some manual controls, like shutter priority, aperture priority and ISO adjustment, to give yourself some creative control. It would be useful if it's lens started at a nice wide angle focal length like 25mm and be capable of zooming up to a focal length of 250-300mm (10x or 12x zoom).

I wouldn't get too hung up on how many megapixels the camera has, as it's the size of the sensor those pixels are crammed on to that's more important. The bigger the sensor, the better it will perform in lowlight conditions. This is where a DSLR will always out perform a compact because DSLRs have much bigger sensors. It might state that both have the same number of pixels, but on a DSLR each pixel is larger and therefore can capture more of the light passing through the lens in shorter length of time. A compact has only a tiny sensor in comparison and the more pixels they cram on to the sensor the smaller each pixel becomes and hence the time the shutter has to remain open to capture enough light can be as much as ten times longer. It also means it will suffer with noise a lot more as a result.

For the best picture quality, pay more attention to the quality of the lens the camera has. Even with a DSLR, the better the quality of the lens the less distortions you will get from it and your images will appear much sharper. An image stabilizer is also useful to help you combat the effect of shaky hands.

Now if you're looking at Canon's range, take a look at the S90 and SX10iS. Both should perform reasonably well for you, but why not also look at the Panasonic Lumix DMC- ZR1, ZS1 and FX65 too. Lumix cameras use a Leica lens, which is about as good as you can get and score highly in reviews as you can see here

Anyway, I hope this has given you some useful insight, but if there's anything you're not sure of, just ask.

[loony.bird]

Thanks for all the help.