I haven't been to a "proper" community aquarium in years and am not familiar with the one mentioned, but unfortunately the Belle Isle Aquarium was set for closure by Detroits most recent budget cuts after being open for many decades, and thats' so sad. I visited that one several times when I lived in Detroit and much enjoyed it, though it had nothing in those days to compare with walking through a viewing tube to watch fish swim around you!! I'd love that, though all those sharks might make me a bit jittery! I guess I've watched too many shark horror movies , where the big moster sharks crash into the viewing tube and attack the public. I hope I haven't made you a bit jittery with the thought!! I've also been to the one at Golden Gate Park in San Francisco, and loved seeing the dolpins etc. They have a great one there , but nothing to compare with those new modern ones!!

I read this thread with great interest. In the beginning of 2005 I decided that my 35mm camera was just not cutting it anymore and that I needed a digital camera. After much phoning and talking to people at different camera shops in our city with my long list of requirements that I needed in a camera to... -point and shoot...easy to use. -ability to take action pictures for insects moving (since our kids were basically gone from home already, so no sports to photograph). -clear closeups without having to bend down to take the picture...so I wanted the best zoom that they could offer for the best price. -great quality because I would be taking lots and lots of pictures of the flowers in my yard. -rechargeable batteries The winner... Canon Powershot S2 1S. Just new on the market in June 2005. It has 5mp and a 12 zoom. I use the foliage setting to take pictures of flowers...since it gives a richer truer picture. I got the first one that came into Brandon into Future Shop. BTW, Staples didn't carry high end cameras, just cheaper models. Individual camera stores were just getting one or two of these new Canon cameras in at a time on preorders. I have put 25,000 pictures through the camera since June 2005. (Not all saved, thank goodness). I love the camera. If I was to ever get another camera (and retire this one to my DH's business for him to use on construction sites or whereever) I would get the newest Canon, a 5S 1S or if a 6 is available that would be it. Met someone at some event somewhere and they had the same camera I had. Their son ran the Don's Photo in Saskatoon. When they wanted their first digital camera he recommended this one also for all the same reasons. They loved theirs and used it all the time. All the pictures in my photobucket album have been taken with my Canon S2 1S. Pictures I took this summer will not be inputted into each individual sub-album until this winter when it is less busy around here. http://www.valleyrimgirl.thenewtonfamily.ca/ By the way if anyone is browsing the albums and find something mislabelled, please let me know...which means it was sold to me incorrectly labelled. I hate that when that happens...another NOID in the yard. Brenda

"User-friendly" is kind of hard to judge. There are features that make a camera easier to use -- like a tilt-out LCD on the back. There are other elements to consider: do you have any other electronic devices that use Sony's Memory Stick storage technology? If you do, you may find it more "user-friendly" to find a camera that uses the same technology (Compact Flash, Secure Digital, etc.) so you're not investing in technology you won't use elsewhere. What kind of battery does the camera take? IMHO, it's more user-friendly to use AA or AAA cells which you can find anywhere instead of buying a proprietary battery that only the manufacturer will sell you. I know that kind of confuses things, but if you think about the features on the cameras you've handled that you really liked, some user-friendly features will become more obvious to you. All that said, though I now own a digital SLR (Olympus), I had a Canon PowerShot that I rather liked. It took surprisingly good pictures for a P&S and I tended to leave it on Auto, which was good enough even for some shots of fireworks (!). It was relatively easy to use, and had plenty of features I did not use -- nor did they get in the way. Canon sells several models for the price you're willing to pay; I'd look at a couple more.

You need the "fastest" lens you can get for telephoto and low light (indoor) photography. Why? To get a fast shutter speed. You can hand hold successfully up to 3X zoom and then you need a tripod or rock solid camera support to reduce shake. As you approach 8x zoom, a fast shutter speed is mandatory in most cases. What may have happened to your high zoom shots is automation to gets at least some level of exposure. As you zoom out, the speed of the lens falls. By speed, I refer to effective lens opening stated as f/number such as f/8. This means that the effecive lens opening is its focal length divided by 8. Most of the time, the maximun f-stop is mentioned in the sales literature. What you should watch for is the maximum f-stop over the entire zoom range. You will find that many high zon lenses fall to small openings at large zoom. When met with a small f-stop, an automatic algorithims has three choices: It can increase the shutter open time (slow the shutter), increase the ASA rating, or a combination of both. On many point-snd-shoot cameras, noise appears at ASA greater than 200, and noticable shake effects at shutter speed slower than 1/100 sec at 35mm equivalent of 100mm focal length. Getting a more expensive cameras with a nominal lense will not cure these problems. I have a Canon Power Shot S series IS camera with 12X zoom. Here's what makes this camera work: The lens is rated at f/2.7 to f/3.5 over the zoom range. An opening of f/3.5 at 12X zoom is almost unheard of in point and shoot cameras. It was this feature that lead me to buy this camera while accepting other dislikes. There were enough likes to make the purchase worthwile. For one, it has one of fastest boot-up times in the industry. It is ready to shoot 1 to 2 seconds after turning it on. I perfer ths color renidition and sensors used by Nikon. it took me a while to sort out the burnouts in my pictures with my Canon. My gut feel is that the Nikon system as a better dynamic range. But, when you can get only one camera that has to doa lot of things, this Canon was one fo the best at that time (3 years ago). Over that period, improvementsa nd other offerings have appeared. My advice: For your want, get the fastest lens you can get, but it should have minimal distortion, chromatic abberation, etc. A note about zoom: Not all zooms are alike. One maker's 10X zoom may not be equivalent to another 10X zoom. The starting point set the lense apart. (I'm going to use the more familar 35mm film equivalents for sake of discussion.) A normal lens lies in the range of 50 to 55 mm for 35 mm film photogaphy. Suppose the bottom of the range is 35mm (somewhat wide angle), then 10X zoom becomes 350 mm. If the starting number is 28mm, then 10X zoom would be 280 mm. As you can see the second lense has considerably less zoom than the first even though both are 10X zoom. In my case, I would sacrifice a little at the high end to gain a little more wide angle. Several times during the past year, I have needed a bit more wide angle. There are two schools of though about image stabalization. Its a boom for the non-techinal ocaasional shooter who has trouble holding a steady camera. There are those who claim superior results by turning off the image stabalizer and use a very steady camera mount with remote shutter release. In bright light, the image stablization can be turned off with no ill effects provided the shutter speed is fast enough.