Best digital camera for a thru?

[Rufous Sided Towhee]

I'm looking for suggestions on choosing a new digital camera. My old Canon Powershot Elph is getting older, the battery is fatigued and it's just too heavy (7 ounces w/battery) to take on a long-distance hike. I'm not really a photography buff as far as being picky about lenses and resolutions and all that, just like taking a lot of snapshots.

Here are my criteria: It must be:

extremely lightweight (less than 4 oz)
rugged
have a self-timer
under $400

Any suggestions?

[hammock engineer]

This will take you over 4oz, but consider ones that take standard AA or AAA. That way you will not have to worry about charging the batteries or weight/care of the charger.

I carry a heavy 10+ oz cannon A610. Yes it's heavy but it takes 4AA batteries. I have taken over 600 pics on the same set of Lituims.

[maxNcathy]

I just ordered a Canon A430. great review.

[otterman]

You'll find other threads on this, but this is my two cents. I just got a Fuji F30. It is just over your weight limit. Weighs 5 oz. It takes great picture and I've been able to print great 8x10's. It has a lot of simple features that will help you take great pictures. The ISO goes up to 3200 which means you can take great low light pictures. The only thing I don't like about it is that it doesn't have a viewfinder. Just the LCD display. I bought it at Adorama for $209 after a $50 rebate. The rebate is good until Jauary 31. Oh yeah, it has a solid metal body. Check out dpreview.com to compare the features of a lot of cameras.

[otterman]

I forgot to mention in my previous post. The battery life is impressive. Among the best in that class of camera. I'm at somewhere aroung 300 pictures on the first charge and there is not sign of needing a charge.

[Footslogger]

If I was buying one tomorrow I'd probably get the Olympus Stylus Waterproof model 720SW.

http://www.olympusamerica.com/cpg_se...duct=1225&fl=4

Was in Staples the other night handling the latest models and really think that is the way to go. Shockproof, waterproof, small ...

Only thing I don't particularly care for is the proprietary Lithium Ion battery. If that sucker used AA's it would be my hands down favorite.

'Slogger

[EarlyBird2007]

I'm looking for suggestions on choosing a new digital camera. My old Canon Powershot Elph is getting older, the battery is fatigued and it's just too heavy (7 ounces w/battery) to take on a long-distance hike. I'm not really a photography buff as far as being picky about lenses and resolutions and all that, just like taking a lot of snapshots.

Any suggestions?

I just bought an Olympus Stylus 710 for my 2007 thru. 7.1 mp, weather resistant, very light (not sure of exact weight), self timer. Amazon currently has it on sale for $202.94. So far I love it. If by any chance you are coming to the PA Ruck, I will bring it and let you play with it.

[Bryan Mc]

nikon coolpix L4. its the AA batteries that last nice and long with lithium batteries. i had the same debate over charger or AAs but decided to go with the AAs because you can get batteries anywhere. camera ended up being cheaper too. but its a good 4.0 megapixel camera which is all you need really unless youre going to blow your pictures up to side your house with the picture. only weighs 4.1 ounces they say, which i assume is without batteries, but still not bad. good luck.

bryan

[mnof1000v]

There are countless opinions on this subject, as I'm sure you'll discover. I used a very simple Fuji Finepix A350. It's about 4.5 oz, and it uses AA batteries. For the money, it's a pretty tough little camera. And Fuji now has camera's that exceed its abilities within the same family - the Fujifilm A-series - of cameras.

Check them out online:
http://www.fujifilm.com/products/dig...p/index_a.html

[rswanson]

Man did I sweat over this decision myself, recently! My criteria was intially very similar to yours and after a ton of research, I settled on the Pentax Optio W20. It's very light and waterproof to 1 meter. But then I changed my mind. I came to the conclusion that better quality pictures are of greater importance than weight or durability so I chose to go another direction.

I ended up buying the Canon Powershot A710. It's fairly light and compact and uses only 2 AA cell batts. This means a longer flash recycle time but thats not so much of a downside for hiking. The camera has an image stabilization feature that allows you to snap pics at lower ISO settings and slower shutter speeds when handheld, which is a huge bonus in lower lighting situations I find common on the trail. And, the camera has a ton of manual controls, almost as many as some DSLR's. I can say that it takes some really phenomenal pics. I know I'll have to take care of it in the rain but that's what Ziplocs are for.

You can find it on sale for close to $300 from some online retailers. B&H Photo is a great site to deal with.

[Froggy]

Pentax makes waterproof cameras, such as my OptioWP. It's only waterproof to about five feet but that's plenty for hiking in the rain. Easy to clean, just wash it and wipe off.

And the menu system is very straightforward, especially considering the Canon I used to own.

There are now other waterproof cameras, too.

[doodah man]

I'm looking for suggestions on choosing a new digital camera. My old Canon Powershot Elph is getting older, the battery is fatigued and it's just too heavy (7 ounces w/battery) to take on a long-distance hike. I'm not really a photography buff as far as being picky about lenses and resolutions and all that, just like taking a lot of snapshots.

Here are my criteria: It must be:

extremely lightweight (less than 4 oz)
rugged
have a self-timer
under $400

Any suggestions?

As others have mentioned, cameras are very subjective. I am more of a point-and-shoot type and my digital upgrade was from a extremely basic film camera. I went with the new HP Photosmart E427 that I got myself for the holidays for $90. It is essentially a 6 megapixel digital version of my old Olympus Stylus film camera, even including the sliding lens cover. Literature lists it as 'weather resistant' and it weighs in at 4.9 ounces with 2 AA lithium batteries. No optical zoom with only 5x digital zoom capability. (No moving lens, which contributes to the small size and weather resistance which I actually wanted so there would be fewer things to go wrong.) So far, about 500 pics on a fresh set of lithium AA batteries. And... it must be pretty idiot proof, because even I have not been able to mess anything up... so far... doodah-man

[Footslogger]

This thread got me thinking ...that it had been quite a while since I had reviewed the available cameras. So, I did a little surfing after work tonight and I need to change the position I took in my earlier post.

If I was going to buy a new camera tomorrow to take on a distance it would be the following:

Nikon Coolpix L6 6MP Digital Camera with 3x Optical Zoom

http://www.dpreview.com/news/0608/06082407nikonl6.asp

Reason being is that it meets all the needs of a hiker PLUS it uses AA batteries and provides 1000 shots on a single set of batteries.

At first I thought about the whole "weather resistant" thing but then I remembered that in 2003 I drug a little Panasonic camera all the way to Katahdin and all I used to keep the camera dry was a pint sized freezer strength ziplock ...and I never had a problem, even with all the rain we had that year.

I'm actually thinking about going out and getting one of these cameras (or ordering one on-line) over the weekend.

'Slogger

[fonsie]

I got the Olypmpus 710 and its 4.3 ounces.....7.1 megapixal, imagestable, self timer....and much more.....click my gallery and I got a pic of what my camera looks like and how small it is.

[the goat]

I got the Olypmpus 710 and its 4.3 ounces.....7.1 megapixal, imagestable, self timer....and much more.....click my gallery and I got a pic of what my camera looks like and how small it is.

fonsie- how does the lcd screen look when you're standing in bright sunlight? i'm trying to find one w/o a major glare. thanks.

[strnorm]

check out the kodak c743 7.1 mega pixels with a 512 sd card and with lithium batteries,3x zoom, plus a timer

[hopefulhiker]

I used a $90 dollar camera that took AAA batteries from Radio Shack, it used the SD card and took reasonable pictures weight with batteries was six ounces..

If I was going to do it again. I would take a camera that allowed panoramic shots. It would have an auto stitching feature that would let you take multiple shots and put them together for a large panoramic view.. I think Kodak makes a camera like this.. but it is not super small and I think it takes a charger.. Look into the panoramic idea.. Some of the vistas I saw were not done justice by the little snap shots I took.

[DavidNH]

on my 06 thru hike I used a Canon A620. It his a tad on the heavy side and takes 4 AA batteries. It does take very good pictures though.

My main recommendation, had I to do this over again, would be to find a camera that does NOT have a whole bunch of settings that I would never use. I mean why have all that when 99% of the time the camera gets left on the automatic setting?

On thru hikes, one spends most of his time making miles in which case the camera should be as simple as possible. Those who like lots of options, features and gizmos, probably should go for an SLR camera (the larger type that takes different lenses). I did see some long distance AT hikers using very nice SLR cameras.

David

[highway]

This thread got me thinking ...that it had been quite a while since I had reviewed the available cameras. So, I did a little surfing after work tonight and I need to change the position I took in my earlier post.

If I was going to buy a new camera tomorrow to take on a distance it would be the following:

Nikon Coolpix L6 6MP Digital Camera with 3x Optical Zoom

http://www.dpreview.com/news/0608/06082407nikonl6.asp

Reason being is that it meets all the needs of a hiker PLUS it uses AA batteries and provides 1000 shots on a single set of batteries.

At first I thought about the whole "weather resistant" thing but then I remembered that in 2003 I drug a little Panasonic camera all the way to Katahdin and all I used to keep the camera dry was a pint sized freezer strength ziplock ...and I never had a problem, even with all the rain we had that year.

I'm actually thinking about going out and getting one of these cameras (or ordering one on-line) over the weekend.

'Slogger

It has no optical viewfinder so you are forced to rely on the LCD screen in bright sunlight and its harder for fast shots at times

[Sly]

It has no optical viewfinder so you are forced to rely on the LCD screen in bright sunlight and its harder for fast shots at times

Yup, that's one of the reasons I picked the Canon A710 IS. Only 300 something pics using 2 AA batteries, but I don't I'll be taking any more between resupply and will carry a spare set anyway.

Plus, I like the 6x zoom....