Panasonic Lumix DMC-FX07T (brown)

Summary: I love this camera. Not being very knowledgeable about photography, I find this camera very easy to operate. The camera feels good in my hand. Pictures are crisp and clear. the menu is very user friendly, which means you can be taking great pictures almost immediately. I'm amazed at the battery life.... I can go for months without a charge. The camera fits easily into my purse or pocket. I would suggest getting a little padded leather case (they sell them in the drug store) to keep the camera in so as not to scratch the lenses (the camera doesn't come with a case). I've captured all of 2008 on my little camera, which I keep with me all the time. Won't go anywhere without it! You can't go wrong with this little jewel!

Summary: This camera is the bees knees!

The combination of buttons and menus is just right for me. For example, there is a dedicated button for the anti-shake gadgetry. This is something that deserves a button--digging through the menu for it all the time is a pain on other cameras. Another example is that another dedicated button displays the LCD options, which include brightening it, turning it off, or making it visible at a high angle, so you can still see what the camera is looking at when you hold the camera high above your head, say to take a picture over a crowd or over a huge piece of coarse woody debris in an old growth forest. The balance between having a button for each feature or a menu to provide more options was well chosen on this feature rich camera.

I'm particularly impressed with the high ISO. I don't recall at the moment how high it goes, but that's what your read the specs for, not the reviews. The ISO goes high and that's good for taking shots of your baby's face lit by the birthday candles, or even better, the fresh spring blossoms in the spotty diffuse light deep in the understory of a pacific northwest rain forest.

That raises another point. I wander all around the woods, often slipping, sliding, and falling on wood, rocks, and all sorts of fun stuff. I keep this camera in my pocket completely unprotected. Between the rain and the beating this camera takes, I am always pleased that it keeps on working. It has solid construction, but feels like it is not specifically made to be durable. So far, so good.

The startup time (from turning on the switch to the time to the first picture) is very quick...a second, give or take. Much quicker than I would have expected.

Anyway, it's a good camera.