Video/Digital camera

[Gambit]

What would you recommend to look for in a digital camera or digital video camera. We will hopefully be buying these around xmas this year. Any brand recommended or to stay away from? Around $700-800 for the digital & a bit more for the video camera

[Laminge]

Casio Exilim Card EX-S500 Digital or even the 7.2mp one

I want one of those., sick of lugging the SLR around and find the power consumption on the big buggers a drain

This little fella and a 1gig memory card would be the perfect in pocket camera for shots where you can get close in

Dont bother if you want to zoom though

[FRDXR6]

*Kodak are supposebly crap (or so i have heard).
*Cannon are generally a good all-rounder.
*Nikon are good but sometimes a bit pricey for what you get.
*Olympus are pretty good too - only bad thing i heard about them is that they chew through batteries a bit quicker than others. (I just bought one with a lithium battery so will be able to test this out )
*Fuji - i only saw a few but they didnt really seem like they were made of quality products (the ones i looked at anyway)

$700-800 should get you a very nice camera. By christmas you would be looking at one with probably 6-8 megapixel and at least 12x optical zoom.

You must also factor in the costs of extra batteries/charger $30-100 (if applicable), camera bag $20-50 and memory cards $50 for a small one to $200+ for the big ones.

But i dont really know too much about this stuff, this is just what i learnt as i recently got a new digi camera i'll wait for the experts to reply.

Are you buying both a digital still camera & a digital video camera?

[Perana]

I can't recommend Olympus highly enough... ours is great !

[csv8]

From a friend in the camera game, SONY are the best. Check out SONY DSCS 90. 4.1 mpixel. 32mpeg, Carl Zeiss lense, 5 min movie time. rechargable batteries, come s with charger. 128 memory stick will give you 96 fotos, per battery charge, www.camerastore.com.au

[sutty]

We've got a Canon S1 IS. It's got 10x optical zoom, 3.1mp (great for up to A4 size photo's), does 30fps 640x480 video and we also got an underwater housing so can do all of the above whilst snorkling or diving (good for up to 40m).

We also looked at the Olympus, but the underwater housing swayed us the down the Canon path.

[FRDXR6]

Most brands including olympus have underwater housing cases available too....

To break it down i got the following which came to $640 after some bargaining.

*Olypmpus C-765 Ultra Zoom (4.2megapixel, 10x optical zoom, lithium battery & charger included) $460
*Olypmpus 1GB xD memory card $160
*Camera Bag $20