DAKFL - zoom me in

[purplerabbits]

I wish to buy a digital camera with a lot of optical zoom for photies of birds and other things. I do not want to spend more than £150. I was thinking of this one Fuji FinePix S5700 Digital Camera (7.0MP, 10x Optical) 2.5" LCD purely cos I saw in reduced in Jessops and Amazon have it even cheaper (which is not to say cheap). Does anyone have any others to recommend/warn against or notes of things I should think about?

Comments

High magnification

[nojay.livejournal.com]

If you're using high zoom settings you really could use image stabilisation, where the camera reduces image blur by moving the lens system to compensate for for hand shake. Look for the letters "IS" in the name or description of the camera. Sadly there are few cameras with IS under 150 quid and most of them have lower pixel counts than the newer better cameras.

I've just bought a Canon A640 which only has a 4x zoom lens but it does have a 10Mpixel sensor. This allows me a false "digital" zoom option where I can crop out the middle of a larger image and still view it in some detail. PCworld are selling these cameras online for just under 160 quid at the moment.

[memevector.livejournal.com]

I have a digital camera I bought some years ago now, nothing special.

If I were buying a new one, the thing I would most want to change is to have a shorter delay between pressing the button and it taking the picture. It's not instantaneous like on a film camera, so it's a bit limiting for photographs of things that move, because the pic will be different by the time the camera takes it. I'm not sure what counts as "short" these days, but it definitely will be something that varies from camera to camera.

[mistdog.livejournal.com]

I had a Fuji Finepix for 6-7 years and it was certainly robust and reliable.

Jessops are never the cheapest IME. Last year I was looking for a USB cable and Jessops charged £15 for a cable that you can get for £3 online!

[adjectivegail]

Nice camera.

I don't really know much about cameras, except that my dad gave me one of these for Christmas about 3 or 4 years ago and I managed to take photos like this and this with it, and I don't consider myself to be any kind of photographer.

One of the things I love most about my camera is that it's small and light-weight and the battery lasts forever (can forget to charge it for 3+ months and then still use it all day at Longleat without it running out of juice). 4xAAs seems like quite a lot of weight to me, just want to check it wouldn't become an issue for you.

The camera you've linked to is cheaper than the 6.3MP one of the same type. Boggle.

[cyberinsekt.livejournal.com]

Browsing Amazon, this looks like it's probably a bargain:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Minolta-Dimage-Z3-Digital-Optical/dp/B0002T2HFU

I use a compact Dimage, and while the lens isn't the best it's still a reliable little camera. I was out today looking to take a picture of the great crested grebes I saw on Monday. They weren't there, but I was able to confirm that baby coots = love.

(http://www.flickr.com/photos/cyberinsekt/715622249/)