Sony DSC-HX50V/B 20.4MP Digital Camera with 3-Inch LCD Screen (Black)

Truth in advertising, I am not a professional photographer not even close. I like to take pictures but rarely get very artsy with it. My problem was that I was quickly getting tired of the inadequacies of my previous camera. It was a good small multipurpose camera but too often I missed getting the picture I wanted because it was either too slow or just didn't have the capability to do what I wanted it to do. When I shopped for a new camera I looked extensively at larger cameras in the 18 to 24 ounce range. After reading a review on Amazon about one of those cameras I decided I wanted something smaller. As the person said, it was a great camera but whenever they went out to take pictures they would look at it, decide it was too large and then grab a smaller camera. I knew it would be that way with me also. I wanted a camera with at least a 20X zoom that would be easy to use and would fit in my pocket. I narrowed it down to this one and two others. Based on overall reviews on Amazon and reviews I read on photography sites I opted for this one even though it was more expensive than the others. I have not been disappointed. I used this at my daughters wedding and then again on a trip we took to New Orleans afterwards. It has done everything extremely well. It is very easy to use and easy to navigate to all of the functionality it has and there is a lot. All I know is that people were impressed with the pictures I was able to get given lighting conditions at the wedding. Of course this has a 30X zoom, which is greater than I probably needed but the zoom is fantastic and there were very few instances where shaking was a problem. In fact I can only think of one. Shaking had been a problem with my previous camera which had a markedly smaller zoom capacity. There is still a lot for me to learn about the camera but the beauty of it is the camera when left to it's own devices takes exceptionally good pictures so I can take my time playing with the functionality. Just a couple of words about some of the other functionality of the camera. I asked a friend of mine who knew nothing about the camera to take a movie of the wedding ceremony. It came out extremely well even down to being able to hear everything that was said. I tried the panorama functionality in New Orleans and nothing could have been easier. I was used to having to stitch things together with my old camera. With this one you simply sweep the camera across the area. Nothing could be easier and it worked very well. I wasn't very interested in WIFI. It isn't difficult at all to hook this to your computer or pull the memory card and put it in the computer but I tried it out anyway. It was easy to set up and surprisingly worked very well. I had set up a WIFI connection for a friend of mine's camera and found it cumbersome and very slow. This was easy and relatively fast. BTW my friend sent back their camera. I'll probably still mostly transfer pictures by cable because it is easy and faster but it's nice to know that you can use the WIFI if you want to. For me and my purposes this may well be the last camera I purchase. I can't imagine needing more. I'm very happy with the purchase and would recommend it to anyone.

Every superzoom I read about has its tradeoffs. For this the trade offs were not where I was most concerned. Everyone thought the pictures I took were right out of National Geographic (I was on safari for two weeks). I thought the size was good. Very solid feel. it fit into my front pants pockets fine, but I don't wear tight jeans and generally wore cargo pants or something similar. I was taking picture like crazy and there is no way the battery lasted for 400 pictures. That is because if you take videos or view you picture, or edit or delete them, it is easy to use up power. Having a spare battery is smart idea. I go it the night before I left. Bad idea. So it was on the job training. Not recommended. Picture quality is great, You can reduce pixels to 10 MP and get great picture (no noticeable difference to the human eye in pics 8.5 x 11 or less)and faster time between shots. 20 MB seemed to take a while, which is a problem if you are shooting special moments (Like cheetahs taking down a Wildebeest or you kid being so cute). The intelligent auto mode was really effective in taking almost any type of picture. There are also other modes to cover special circumstances (Low light mode without tripod was great) including food and soft skin (why?). Taking movies was also a plus. HD mode is awesome. It also does MP4 which is important if you are going to post or otherwise share videosI was a professional photographer in my day and a avid travel photographer today. I would sum it like this. Great superzoom, easy to get started, if you just keep it in intelligent auto mode or you can do whole bunch of other very cool stuff if you have the inclination, time, and patience to search for "how to instructions". Reliable, dropped it twice, 2,000 shots with no problems. Finding how to do many advanced things are this camera is not easy. Sony did a bad job on reference materials and help.