Point and Shoot with decent Video

[MGully8]

I'm in the market for a new point and shoot compact digital camera. My last camera was a Canon S330 which was awesome the day I got it five years ago but I think it has grown old and fat needing to be replaced. Canon treated me well so I'm leaning towards another one but am open to suggestions.

I'm really interested in a camera that can do decent video for things like a vacation highlight video with both stills and video. There is a temptation to get a camcorder of some kind but I'd rather wait till I've completed a few videos and learned a software package before taking that dive.

So lets here what suggestions everyone has.

 

[mooncancook]

I bought a Canon S5 couple months ago after reading reviews of its excellent video capability, and I wasn't disappointed. Very sharp video, and allows full 12x zoom in video mode, also supports HCSD which is important for video as vedio files are huge. Also love the flip-out LCD display.

 

[soydios]

It's SDHC (Secure Digital High Capacity).

Saving up for a D300 sadly does not leave room for a P&S.

 

[bvalpati]

I just picked up a Canon A560 specifically to do video and so far it's pretty good.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16830120193

It does 640X480@30/15fps, 320X240@30/15fps and has a 60fps 320X240 mode which is limited to 1 minute. It can take up to a 32GB SDHC(when they come out) and you can use an AC power adapter with it.

The camera was only $130ish from Newegg and the AC adapter is about $33 at Amazon
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0000...e-ce-feed-20&creative=
380333&creativeASIN=B00006CFDO&linkCode=asn

I'm using a 4GB card right now which gives me about 35 minutes of 640X480@30fps video but I'm shooting relatively fast action stuff, for typical family/kid stuff you could use the 15fps mode to double the amount of video you can record however the camera limits video to one hour per file so you would have to stop shooting and create a new file every hour.

All in all not bad for the price, I haven't used it for stills yet but I know Canon is easily the best still quality in the cheap P&S market.

Oh yeah, one other drawback, you can't zoom while shooting video in 640X480@30fps, you might be able to in the lower resolution mode I'm not sure. For me it's not important since I just set the camera up and let it shoot, the stuff I'm shooting is always the same distance from the camera and in the same general area.

 

[eelw]

If you want high quality video with a point and shoot, look no further than the Kodak Z1275. 12MP, 5X optical zoom. The kicker, it has 720p video support. Just have a tripod handy or a very, very steady hand when recording. The only downside, it eats batteries like crazy.

 

[bvalpati]

The only bad thing about that Kodak that I can see is it appears to have a 2GB file size limitation which when shooting 720p would only be about 5 to maybe 6 minutes of uncompressed data. I think if you really want HD your best bet is to go with an HD camcorder that does on the fly compression.

 

[eelw]

Nope. You actually get a little over 28 minutes of 720p video for each 2GB segment.

 

[bvalpati]

Originally posted by: eelw
Nope. You actually get a little over 28 minutes of 720p video for each 2GB segment.

Wow really? It must use some sort of compression then. I wasn't aware it had built in compression on the fly.

 

[Steven T]

The video is excellent on my tz3 but you dont get to use the 10x zoom pretty solid on my f31fd too for a compact but the tz3 is a bit better.