I have a Nikon D90 but I’m keen to get a really good compact for out on the trail. So many great shot opportunities and my Blackberry is just hopeless. My wife has a Canon 1000HS and whilst it’s an acceptable camera it lacks the manual control I need. So….

Canon S95? Going at acceptable prices just now, or do I look at a 4/3 style solution. Gut feeling is it needs to be pocketable for fast access, so a compact. But would be interested to hear what others are employing. Anything over £300 is too much so maybe that makes my decision for me… ❓

don’t know if you’ve looked at one. The only down side is they are fragile, i’ve already bust my s90.

I’ve got an Olympus XZ-1 which is fantastic.

Superb low light performance, great colours and loads of manual settings.

But – sometimes I wish I’d gone for the S95 to just drop in my pocket like you say.

Answer = BOTH!

wanted the S100 but the S95 was such a good price I couldn’t resist. Very impressed with the quality of the shots.

XZ-1 is pretty small no?

I use an Olympus Tough for this purpose. It’s not that great of a camera but you can get it with an external holster that straps to your camelbak strap. The camera’s bungeed to it too so you can’t drop it. This means that you can grab the camera and snap without even having to stop the bike. Doesn’t matter if the camera gets wet or muddy.

This simple factor makes taking pictures on a ride so much easier. Because it only takes a few seconds I find myself snapping all over the place and it doesn’t slow my ride down much at all.

Now I wouldn’t necessarily recommend the Oly Tough (except on cost grounds) but any other toughened camera would work the same way if you can find a holster to fit.

When I dont pack my D90, I use a Ricoh GR-D, 10mp, solid little camera with raw file option, an amazing good 28mm wide angle lens and manual control.

Not really a point and shoot camera, but the results I get from it are very good for such a small camera.

No zoom and might be a tad over £300 new, but loads second hand & there is a small zoom version that does not detract much quality wise either(Ricoh Caplio GX100).

S95 is great for carrying round as it is so small. Seems very robust to me.
quick selection of a few shots
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I bought a Canon Powershot SX220 for less than £200 & it’s the dogs dangly bits IMO 🙂

It can be full manual or full auto.
It’s got burst function for action shots plus super slow mo vid too. It’s small & compact and easily fits into my shorts pocket.

I’ve only had it since January so I’m still learning what it can do but I’m pretty pleased by the results so far.

Crispy Bacon those are some great shots, I’ll take a look at the SX220. When I refer to full manual I’m looking for P,S,A,M or (P,Av,Tv,M as Canon do it), does the SX220 have this facility?

Benslow, the XZ-1 came to my attention this morning, gets great reviews but users reviews knock it for poor dust protection and a slow user interface, other than that it looks like I need to take a look.

I would really like an optical viewfinder, but I guess that means a bigger heavier camera? hmmmm… The S95 looks pretty good. Any other suggestions / recommendations?

Nikon P300 is worth a fiddle with. I bought one a few months ago. It’s about to be replaced by the 310, so you might be able to get some good deals on it?

It’s got a decent zoom, works pretty well in low light and has a fast lens when shooting wide angle.
It has enough controls/buttons on it to be pretty quick to use without being cluttered and the casing is a pretty robust metal skin.

Negatives so far are that it sometimes misses focus even in good light, which is odd. It also sometimes focuses on the background, not the subject when left to it’s own devices.
And – I was hoping it would be closer in image quality to my SLR than it is. Don’t get me wrong – it does take great pictures and the quality is easily comparable to similar cameras, but I think my expectation was perhaps a bit high.

ask1974 – yes it has the usual Canon manual features you mentioned above.

The other thing i’m totally blown away with is the zoom on this camera. I’ve had it go up to 56 x zoom, here are a few examples I’m very impressed with 🙂

The widescreen on the back of the camera shows you what you are going to get – maybe the viewfinder you are looking for?

I have to admit that I’m very happy with this compact camera. It does instant vid & even slow-mo vid too, I’ve yet to have a play with the slow-mo function tho.

Canon G12?

I think they can be bought for just under £300. Or get one of the previous iterations 2nd hand. I’ve got a G9 and its bombproof – Berghaus do a very good camera case which it fits inside exactly.