Ugh. Do Not Buy A Kodak. AFAIK, all of their cameras are designed and manufactured by Chinese OEM's and the Kodak name is slapped on them. Here is a quote from a review of the Z990:
One of the biggest issues with the Z990 is the buttons and switches being so unresponsive. If you want to shoot in a hurry, forget it. Choose a different camera.
At times it took us up to a minute to turn the Z990 on, we had trouble zooming in and out as the camera seemed to ignore the commands entirely and entering the menu at the top of the screen could be a nightmare. The weird thing was that sometimes the Z990 would execute commands straight away and other times it seemed to take an age.
That is simply... stay far, far away. The photos may come out ok, but why waste your time with a camera whose firmware was obviously glitchy as hell? Digicams are a mature market now, and nobody should have to deal with crap like that any more. The photos may be fantastic, but if your camera falls down on basic functionality like the buttons not responding to your inputs, you're going to miss shots, and eventually you're going to get frustrated enough not to even try. A taken shot with a crappy camera is always better than a missed shot with a great camera. That being said, I would expect this basic competence from most digicam makers nowadays, especially the bigger brands. (NOT Kodak.)
The Olympus, mehhhh. I have one of their underwater P&S's, and the image quality definitely takes a backseat to the Canons that I've owned.
Both of those cameras are considered Ultrazooms, i.e. they have a zoom of 30x or more. So they will zoom WAAAAY in on far-off objects. Cool if you're shooting animals or birds or something, but I would not recommend one for a first/everyday camera, and these cameras will definitely not fit in your jeans pocket.
I've had (actually still have all of these; some of them have been damaged by dropping, but they all still work) a Canon SD600 (wife's), SD780IS (wife's), ELPH 500HS (mine), and (new for the wife after the 780IS was beaten to its deathbed) an ELPH 110HS. All of these are in the same market segment, i.e. Value Compact Point & Shoots -- which I define as being small (generally about the same size as a standard 3.5" screen smartphone, but probably thicker; but generally 1" or less in thickness); having a moderate zoom (usually 4x or 5x nowadays) from a reasonably wide angle (28mm or, better, 24mm) to short telephoto (100mm or 120mm range); and coming in at the $120-$200 price range ($120 or less starts to hit the "budget" range, where useful features are taken out to meet the price point).
Image quality for these Canons has always been fantastic versus the competition, while still getting better with each generation.... skipping 2-3 generations like I did, I always saw a huge improvement with each move to the next camera. The newest one (110HS) is capable of taking stunning photos in a wide variety of situations. It doesn't have the reach of some of the bigger/more expensive cameras, but for an everyday, "carry it around in your pocket and almost forget it's there" camera, this line has been a consistent winner for Canon for the past 5+ years. Panasonic has come closest IMO to competing with Panasonic in the Value Compact P&S range, and several manufacturers (Sony, Fuji, Nikon, Pentax, etc.) have had strong competitors in other areas of the market (usually 2-3x your budget), but the Canon ELPH (formerly SD) lineup has been untouchable in this market segment. Superzoom, several other brands are competitive. Underwater, absolutely would choose a brand other than Canon. Enthusiast P&S, Canon has some good choices but so do several other brands. But I honestly don't even consider other brands anymore when looking for this kind of camera (which, BTW, is the kind of camera that I usually recommend for most people who don't have a digital camera already; exceptions being that they need a camera for special purposes, such as underwater or wildlife; or that they have a large budget ($400+)).
All other brands in the Compact P&S arena compromise in one area or another (image quality, usability, versatility, size) relative to the Canon. These cameras practically define the market segment. All others are forced to be cheaper to make up for their shortcomings. I would not pay the full retail price ($230) but it is commonly found on sale for under $150, and at that price it is a great deal. You may be able to find older models (100HS, 300HS) for a good price as well. Sometimes they dip below $100 on clearance.
I would not go for Canon's cheaper lineup, the A models (e.g. A4000). These usually lack the true optical Image Stabilization which Canon has developed over the years nearly to the point of perfection. I don't think that any other camera company does IS as well as Canon, and it makes a huge difference when shooting in low light situations without a tripod.
Sorry for the wall of text, I really should start a blog or something.
I haven't tried out with video yet. The picture quality is OK but I love long zoom range of this camera.
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