My wish list:

1. Do everything automatically for me. I don't want to mess with it, BUT, be capable of making some adjustments if I need to, especially for low-light/indoor pics.
2. Take passable quality video
3. Fast focus/shutter speed - I'd rather have a camera that takes longer to start up and shut down than one that takes forever to focus and take a pic
4. Easily fit in a backpack with a laptop and ipad and a few other gizmos and papers.
5. Reasonably study, because SWMBO has a penchant for breaking expensive electronic gear.

I realize that my wish list may as well involve unicorns and rainbows, but I want to do as well as I can to find something I'm happy with in these areas. I think I've pretty much decided that I'll be shopping in the $250 to $350 range, but I have absolutely no problem buying a used camera from a reputable source, so that opens a lot more possibilities in that price range.

I've been looking around and I think the Canon PowerShot G15 fits my needs pretty well, but is a bit out of my price range. Any suggestions of a camera that is similar but easier on the pocket book?

I am selling my G11 with all sort of accessories, but I am afraid shipping costs to you (I am in Italy) and exchange rate will be killer.

Shipping alone would kill that deal, sorry

I found the Canon Ixus series works pretty well. I've had one for several years now and it has never failed me. It was one of the more expensive ones though (at that time about $300 IIRC). I believe it meets all of your criteria, with the exception of sturdiness maybe, that's rather personal. But I've never found it to be flimsy anyway.

In that case, there are undoubtedly a ton of earlier, used Canon Gxx cameras (xx=1..15) on eBay for less money!

Yes, but after looking at the differences between the G12 and G15, it's difficult to persuade myself that I don't NEED the upgraded features . That may very well be what I do. Either that, or the little demon on the other shoulder will convince me to pony up the extra $100 for the G15.

I haven't shopped cameras in years...any stout competition from Nikon or Fuji or anyone else with comparable features that anyone loves?

http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/canon-powershot-g15/10

They seem to be comparing it with the Nikon P7700 and Sony (ugh!) DSC-RX100.

John,

I don't know if a point and shoot interests you, but I've always had found the Canon Powershot S___ line to be fantastic. Currently the S110 is $379 and the S100 is $279. The price on the S100 is fantastic because there's little difference between the cameras, so the S100 is a good buy. The S110 is slightly lighter and has built in WiFi, but an Eye-Fi card costs less than $100.

My wife has the S100 and she loves it. I love it too and find myself grabbing it from her on vacations It takes pictures quickly, and has great low-light performance *for a point and shoot*. I really like it.

If you prioritize smallness, the Canon S110 or S100 is the answer.

If you prioritize features, while still wanting small, check out a Panasonic LX7 or LX5.

If you want interchangeable lenses but still small, look at the various Panasonic Micro 4/3 models like the GX1.

The S110 really does seem like it might be the ticket. Shares many features with the G15.

http://snapsort.com/compare/Canon-PowerShot-G15-vs-Canon-Powershot-S110

For the photography gurus: how much difference will the larger aperture make (f/1.8 vs. f/2.0)? Is it worth the extra money?

I am not a guru, but IMHO, in this particular case, no.

Also, the S110 is significantly smaller in everyday use. If you're going for a compact camera, that probably matters. An S110 will easily fit in your pocket. A G15 won't, or, at least, not that easily, and not always.

One real practical advantage of the G15 is the swivel screen. That I loved, and I still miss even today when I use my dslr.

It's a bit more complicated than that. The Canon S110 says that it's "F2.0 - 5.9". It's only super bright when you've got it at its wide angle setting. If you zoom all the way in, you've got 3.5 stops less light. (An exposure that might take 1/10 sec at the wide angle would take a full second at the full telephoto setting.) For contrast, the Panasonic LX7 is "F1.4 - F2.3". It's twice as bright at the wide-angle setting, and it's a factor of eight brighter at the telephoto setting.

On the flip side, the Panasonic is a bigger camera. It's jacket pocketable but not really pants pocketable.

The other camera worth considering, if you don't mind spending more money, is the Sony RX100, which has the biggest sensor in its class. That means better low light performance. Here's a quick comparison I threw together from DPReview:



What you'll see is that the Sony has the highest resolution, but the lens isn't really keeping up with it. The lower resolution GX1 (which has interchangeable lenses) is getting just as sharp a picture. You'll also see that the Panasonic LX7 seems to be outclassing the Canon S110, although the colors might need some tweaking in post, if you really care.

Some prices, from B&H:

Panasonic LX7: $448
Panasonic LX5: $398 (on Amazon: discontinued at B&H)
Canon S110: $449
Canon S100: $280 (on Amazon: discontinued at B&H)

Panasonic GX1 (kit including basic zoom lens): $449/$559 (more if you want the lens that collapses into itself when you turn it off)

Sony RX100: $648

Basically, you pay a huge premium for the Sony, but it's a remarkable achievement of packaging so much into so small a case. Conversely, the older Canon S100, still new-in-box, seems to be quite the bargain.

You said you're willing to go used. B&H is offering a GX1 body plus the 14-42 lens (rated 8/10 on their quality scale) used for $319. That might be attractive to your budget.

If you do get the GX1, you have the ability to buy other lenses, which opens up opportunities you won't have with the pocket-sized cameras. Just make sure you budget for clear filters to put in front of your lens, such that the filter takes the hit rather than your lens. A Tiffen 52mm "UV" clear filter is $5. The über multicoated version of the same filter from B+W is $31. In either case, the purpose of the filter is to "take one for the team". You'd rather have to replace a damaged cheap filter than a damaged expensive lens.

While B&H is great, you can get the S110 at Amazon for$379, as posted above. But yeah, the S100 is the real bargain here.

Canon S100: $280 $249 at Amazon.

I pulled the trigger on the S100. Thanks for all your help guys, you really influenced my decision greatly.

I'm not an avid photographer, but need to be able to take decent but not necessarily stunning photos for fundraising and reporting purposes. Other than that, it will mostly be used to take pics of the kids and travels. For what we'll use it for, this seems like the best compromise of price and features.

Although it doesn't meet my sturdy requirement above as well as some of the other options, I saved enough to buy the spill/drop/defect warranty. SWMBO has used both methods to destroy our electronics in the past, so it seemed wise.

Oh yeah, it should be great for that stuff and that level of expectation.


It's not ruggedized, but I think you'll be pleased with the build quality.


The major difference between the S100 and the S110 is the WiFi, and that can be accomplished with an Eye-Fi card.

Also, both cameras have GPS, so Picasa/iPhoto should know exactly where a photo was taken.

The number one complaint on Amazon for this camera was the dreaded "lens stuck" error. Evidently, the build quality is pretty good except for that one thing that seems to happen to some of them with little provocation. That was the real deciding factor with the warranty. If I get the error, no problem, I get a new or repaired camera in 2 or 3 days.



Actually, the S110 doesn't have built-in GPS, but can use its built-in wireless to use the GPS on a smartphone (either Android or iPhone.) I liked the idea of a built-in one better (although I warrant I'll find out that the built-in one is probably not as good a quality as the one on a recent smartphone.) I did purchase an Eye-Fi card as well, so I should be covered with wireless. My wife particularly wants to be able to wirelessly upload to Facebook.

Is there an agreed standard for accessing the GPS over wireless, or do you need to run some special sharing app?

One of the benefits of having gotten a smaller camera, like the S100, is that there are a variety of underwater housings available at relatively reasonable prices. So far as I can tell, these housings' prices seem to grow quadratically in the size of the camera they're covering. If you're tromping through the jungle, you might appreciate a housing around your camera.

In Belize? Maybe your delivery service is better than I have here in Mexico.

From my experience here, I would expect the following:
a) Contact the warranty provider by telephone or email.
b) Package and mail the camera to them at a cost of about $12 to get it out of Mexico, then another $5 for the USPS.
c) Wait 1--2 weeks for the camera to actually reach the warranty provider after being delayed by customs at the border.
d) Wait 1--2 weeks for the warranty provider to examine the camera and determine that it is indeed broken.
e) Wait 1--2 weeks for the warranty provider to find a suitable replacement camera and mail it.
.f) Wait 2--3 weeks for the camera to make it back through customs and arrive in Mexico.

Maybe Belize is different, but in my case I would budget a minimum of six weeks for the turnaround.

tanstaafl.

Ah yes, I forgot about that. My apologies. That actually happened to ours, but it has been such a minor bump in the otherwise happy ownership of the device that I'd honestly completely forgotten about it!


Well that is certainly possible! However, I have to ask: where do you see the S110 not having GPS? It does according to Amazon...


I don't think that's how it works. With the S100 (and I'm pretty sure the S110), the cameras actually have legit GPS in them, and record that information into the EXIF data.

The Eye-Fi, however, handles location tagging differently, and unless you get their top of the line card you have to pay for the service. What it does is when you take a photo, it looks at all the surrounding WiFi access points (which it's doing anyway, since it's looking to see if you're home and want to transfer your photos). When you do get home, when the Eye-Fi service transfers your photos for you, it matches the access points available when the photo was taken to their own database*, then they record the closest location they can come up with as the GPS data in the EXIF tag.

At least, this is how I understand it to work.

*might not be their own database, could be something like Skyhook, which might partly explain the subscription fee they charge...

The Amazon description claims the camera relies on a smartphone app to record GPS data. If that's the case, you could just use gps4cam with any camera. I can vouch for gps4cam, it works amazingly well.

I had a Canon superzoom with built-in GPS for a short while over the summer. It worked OK, automatically writing GPS coordinates to EXIF data, but it wasn't a great experience. You would often have to wait a few seconds for the GPS icon to stay on or risk recording no location data at all. You would either miss a potential shot, or waste battery power letting the camera get its bearings.

The gps4cam app is much better, especially if you have an Android phone with swappable batteries. Most of the time, however, I carry a GPS logger in my camera bag. Batteries last all day and records my location every second. Then I sync it up with HoudahGeo. I've been using that for years without issues as long as your camera is in sync with GPS time.

I think John mentioned that they'd be moving back to the US late this year, which would keep things short.

Good memory, David

We'll be returning to the US for a year in June for a year.

But also quite astute Doug. I would never trust the Belize postal system for mailing electronics. I would likely wait until someone is visiting, send it home with them and then have them mail it to the next person I know is coming down. I did that with my laptop earlier this year because I knew two people that were coming down within 3 weeks of each other.

The other option is to pony up about $50USD (each way) to send it FedEx.

Pretty much every review out there says that they scrapped the GPS in favor of the wifi.

I downloaded the manual to figure it out. You must install an app called CameraWindow on your smartphone. Then you go to the wifi settings on the camera and choose to either use the camera as an access point or using an existing access point. Then you go through a pairing process and after it's paired, geotagging should just work. Not sure if you have to start the app on your phone every time or if you can set it up to start automatically.

Ah, I see. That's kind of lame. I suppose the GPS can take a little while to start up sometimes, but it's not bad, and I don't really like having to rely on another device for this purpose. I guess I could live with a geologger, but it seems like a hassle to me and I'd rather have the camera do it automatically...

I just bought an Olympus Tough TG-1 with a built-in GPS. It seems to work well, only taking a few seconds to aquire a fix after turning on. It may take longer if the camera has not been used for a few days, or transported some distance turned off, I don't know.

Apparently it can use A-GPS to speed up aquisition but that is not available to me where I am, anyway it works fine without it. Location data and the direction the camera was pointing when the shot was taken is all in the EXIF.

Oh yeah, images are passable although background detail (foliage etc.) shows heavy smearing. Colours are accurate, exposure is reasonable too. I have yet to test the waterproofing etc.