Canon Recommendations for Point and Shoot

[fitislandgirl]

Hi everyone!

I have been browsing the forms and doing a lot of research. My family and I are going to Disney World for the first time August 31st, 2011. I have signed us up in advance for the Disney PhotoPass program but now I'm looking to purchase a nice Canon Point and Shoot camera to take our own pictures.

I want to keep it below $300 Canadian. I'm a fan of Canon. I own an older Canon S3 but it's too bulky and I don't want to drag it with me. I'm not one for manual controls on camera so something simple and automatic would be nice. My husband likes to play with controls so if the camera had the option that would be a bonus. I want something slim that I can fit into a purse or pocket.

I toyed with the idea of an Olympus Tough since we will be going to the waterparks but the reviews are somewhat mixed. At this point I'm feeling overwhelmed. I know I like Canon so I'm looking for suggestions on what you would pick, given what's available right now? I don't remember it being this overwhelming in the past. I don't want to spend a lot of money right now because the plan is to upgrade our S3 with a SLR at Christmas and learn more about photography. I'm looking for a cost effective solution for the trip that will meet our needs.

Thanks everyone!

Kimmy

 

[PirateFrank]

The Canon Elph 500 HS looks very cool. 12mp, f2.0, apparently a good CMOS sensor. I'm not sure if it's a significant upgrade over my SD1200IS (But I'm definitely comparing the two). The other cool thing with the 500HS is its ability to take 1080p video. It's reportedly a good low-light camera (more on this below)

My last trip in aug2010, I took my iphone4 and that's it...and for 80% of the shots, I was happy. It's when I got into dusk and evening shots that the iPhone camera takes pitiful, grained out shots....I had so many cool evening shots that were wasted when I got back to our room and downloaded them to my laptop.

The point behind saying the above, is that if you are intending on shooting mostly daytime shots, your smartphone (if you have one) may be enough....or any cheap $50-$100 3-4 year old elph off ebay.

However, it's the Dusk and Night shots that separate the men from the mice in Point and Shoot cameras. Look for cameras that have good reputations for quality low-light snots.

 

[luvthemouse71]

The s95 first and then the sx230hs. The s95 has a lot of manual control in a small package and takes great pics in low light. The optical zoom is 3.8x. The sx230 isn't too shabby in low light( although not as capable as the s95) but it has a 14x optical zoom. I own both cameras and use them both.

 

[fitislandgirl]

Thank you very much for the feedback and suggestions. I didn't hear back right away on here so I took the plunge and decided to buy the Canon Elph 300 from Future Shop. It's good in low right and so far I really like it. I can try it out for a week and upgrade it to the Elph 500 if I don't like it. From what I was told both cameras are similar except hte Elph 500 has the touch screen and does better video.