"Jay Honeck" writes:

Well, I shouldn't say "never" -- but it was so big and unwieldy that I never
caught that candid shot at the birthday party, or that image of the fall
colors on my way to work. It was just too danged big to be considered
"portable", and it was a major production to get it set up.

That's why we went with the Canon Elph a couple of years ago, even though
photographically there were superior choices. The danged little thing
actually, REALLY fits in your shirt pocket, has a useful little zoom lens,
easy to use controls, and takes pretty darned good pictures. (All the
pictures on our website were taken with it.)

Exactly so. I got a Canon Powershot S10 3 years ago for that very
reason: the camera that you don't carry around won't take any pictures
at all. I've taken over 1000 pictures with the S10, so have easily
paid for it with savings on film. OK, maybe not, 'cause I wouldn't
have taken so many pix with film.

Some observations:

- I rarely print photos, viewing them on the computer instead. So
more pixels simply means you get to crop more of the original
picture. I'm still happy with 2.1 MP.

- More important to me now are faster startup time, faster time
between shots, more powerful optical zoom, better battery life.

- I usually don't use the LCD display 'cause it runs down the
battery. Get one with a good optical viewfinder too. I only
occasionally use the manual adjust for light quality or exposure. But
control over the flash is critical (force on/force off).

- I really like the panorama feature...this is where you take multiple
overlapping shots, aided by the camera, and software later stitches
them all together. Good fun.