My parents want a compact digital camera. I have had a look through t’interweb and found a few good ones but was just wandering if anyone has any opinions of the better cameras out there for their budget.

Criteria:
Must be a standard size camera (not SLR style – its got to fit in mums handbag)
Decent zoom (dad like taking pics of wildlife)
Will be taking a mixture of indoor and outdoor shots (family gatherings/scenery etc)
Price up to £160ish

I hope i have covered all the bases and help would be muchly appreciated from the STW masses.

Experience with helping buy camera’s and tech for ‘mature folk’ is get them in a shop to actually play with the things. Simple for the win – oab_inlaw hated two compac P&S camera’s she bought until she tried my Ricoh with a ‘turn the dial with simple pictures on’ and minimal faffing. She also immediately noticed how quick to start and how quick to take snaps…not something I thought she would notice.

Check out the Panasonic TZ range

High street price for the TZ8 seems to be around £150, lot cheaper online mind 😉

Great camera for the price.

http://www.jessops.com/online.store/products/77414/show.html

Or have a look at the Canon Ixus range too..

When I helped my Mother in Law look for a camera, I found a nice Nikon with a touch screen. I don’t recall the name, but I thought it good because it was really easy to access the scene modes (they were one press away and came with icons for easy identification) which would help her get better pictures as per the brief.

Not sure how old your parents are gnusmas, my Mum manages with one I bought her, but some of the buttons and menu options are a bit on the small/geeky side with the Panasonic, worth trying out before you buy.

Thanks for all the replies so far.

The are both in their 60’s, mum has severe MS and has lost the majority of use in her fingers so probably won’t be using it herself – but would like to carry it in her handbag.

Dad is stuck in the stone age – he is still amazed you can start a car with a key!!!! He is not very technically minded so would need to be pretty simple to use but take nice pics (which is the main thing they care about), on family gatherings etc i will be there and i usually have the camera thrown at me whether i like it or not.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B004M8S152/ref=noref?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&psc=1

The price on this keeps fluctuating. Got it for £161 after keeping my eye on it. great reviews on amazon and other review sites. Lots of camera for the size and price (if you can check daily and hold out for a deal)

edit: has full access to all menus for manually selecting photo options, but also an easy mode which locks the menus and the camera selects the best options

I bought an SX220 for my mum before they went on a safari holiday – she loves it. Very easy to use in auto or the predefined scene modes but lots of control there if you did want it. Nice big screen for reviewing pics too.

TZ18 will be just fine. Really, they don’t need the GPS stuff which comes a couple of models up. This has some nice manual functions, if they ever want to have a play beyond P&P, but is also good straight out of the box camera

Bought a Panasonic TZ19 for £150 last week. Very pleased with it so far.

http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/compact-camera-1

Another benefit with the Ixus mentioned by S is that it has a viewfinder.

Anyone stuck in the stone age will expect one – and a screen is difficult to use in bright light for anyone with poor eyesight and/or uses prescription sunglasses or reactolite lenses.

Dead simple to use and good program mode means you can forget about faffing around with scene settings (which the older user will forget to reset anyway 😳 )