The camera I mentioned takes video as well. A lot of video too. I take videos of my daughter all the time, and upload them onto private youtube for her great grandma to see. It has a ton of settings on this dial you turn. http://www.imaging-resource.com/PRODS/W170/W170A.HTM# That link should show the photo of the back view of the camera where the dial is. My camera is red. They have an option for automatic shooting where you dont play with any settings besides zoom/flash. Then they have a setting one one up where you can change a few more settings. Then a more advanced setting where a lot of settings can be changed. The link says its $300, but it isnt. I bought mine through Wal Mart on sale in Feb. I dont see them there anymore though. You can buy them online though. The camera has a child or adult face detection mode, smile shutter (neat where it will automatically take photos everytime someone smiles). The smile shutter can also be adjusted for the level of smile needed to snap the shot. It also has Backlight, Backlight Portrait, Twilight, Twilight Portrait, and Twilight using a Tripod. Those are more of the settings on the camera. Either the twilight or the backlight option can make a photo taken in pure darkness, light like taken in the day. Standard Scene modes include Beach, High Sensitivity, Landscape, Snow, Soft Snap, Twilight, Twilight Portrait, Fireworks, Smile Shutter, and Underwater. The Sony W170 Menu system gives you access to Twilight, Beach, Snow, Fireworks, and Underwater. The others are on the Mode dial. I laughed so hard using the creative effects to photos after you shoot using any of 10 editing functions, including: Trimming, Red-Eye adjustment, Soft Focus filter, Unsharp Mask, Cross filter, Partial Color filter, Fish-eye filter, Retro, Radial Blur and Happy Face (really funny). The Happy Face effect uses photo retouching to put a smile on faces, with smile levels adjustable from 1 to 5. Danielle

Nerd alert. Each pixel in your camera receives light and "fires" as a certain amount of a color (red, green, blue are standard). Sometimes, pixels get confused for one reason or another and fire the wrong amount. That's noise. It shows up in your picture as a pixel that's obviously the wrong color; but since the pixels are small, it just looks "grainy." Think of it as the visual version of the "hiss" that we all loved about cassette tapes. Noise-filtering software, either in-camera or in Photoshop, smooths over the noise by identifying pixels that are obviously not the same color as their neighbors and replacing them with the "right" color. The plus side is that the noise goes away; the minus side is that detail goes away, too. DSLR's have larger sensor sizes (15x22mm up to 24x36mm for the whole sensor), and non-DSLR's have smaller sensor sizes. DSLR pixels are therefore larger and thus less likely to be confused. My Lumix has a pretty small sensor (5x7mm for the whole sensor, 1/9 of the area of the smallest DSLR). The up side of that is that it's easy to give a small sensor a large zoom with a small lens. Hence, 12x zoom is quite doable. The down side is that the small sensor is relatively noisy, and in low-light settings, the noise gets pretty bad. I figured that I could live with noise in low light, since most of my subjects only pose in sunshine. And mostly, I was right. Occasionally, though, I wish I could get a good, detailed shot of a Satyr in the woods without having to resort to a flash. Jeff

It looks like amazon.com has the same package for $479.00. Buying piece by piece at the best prices wouldn't get you better savings. Two things I would clarify with the ebay seller. The shipping costs are not clear to me. Also, will they take the package back if you aren't satisfied with the quality of the add on lenses? The 2-lenses and 3-filters are items that may not give you satisfaction depending on their quality. I have a Panasonic DMC FZ20 which takes pretty good photos. Some of my complaints have been addressed with the newer Lumix series cameras--according to one of the camera review sites. My camera doesn't do well in low light, the FZ8 is reported to have fixed that noise problem. Also the 8 has a popular lens size so you shouldn't have trouble or high costs finding filters, etc. All Panasonics have good stabilization. Their Leica lens are top quality. The new ones shoot in RAW which is good. All the accessories that come with this package appear to be off brand and inexpensive. That isn't always a real bad thing. It lets you experiment with tele-converters, various filters, tripod, etc. If it turns out you develop a burning desire to take really professional quality wildlife photos and need a better lens/camera you can upgrade later. You should be able to get good portraits with this camera. IMHO too many people jump in and pay $1000 for a DSLR and another $1000 for lenses. All of that stuff sits in a drawer and gets used at graduations, birthdays and vacations. My point is, you can learn a lot with this package. Which ever camera you choose, spend another $50-100 and get Photoshop Elements software and a good manual. Also consider the Cannon S3. A lot of people love this camera. Check out the birding forum. Ken has an S3 and just got a fairly good quality 1.7 tele-converter. His bird photos are wonderful. He's a nice guy, and will answer your questions. Here is a link that might be useful: Ken's bird closeups

Quote, "actually only two DSLRs have the ability to use EVF: Olympus E330 and the Panasonic Lumix DMC-L1" Actually that is not true..The Pentax K-7, K200d and K-x all feature live view. I have been shooting a Pentax *ist DL (6.1mp) and have just ordered a Pentax K200d to get the "shake reduction", "Live View" and 14.6mp resolution while still allowing me to use all the Pentax lenses that I currently own, going back to the old Pentax screw mount lenses from the late 60's. Now for the original question regarding battery life: Now in regards to the original question regarding battery life: First off, you cannot judge battery life by how many SD cards you have recorded because the number of images you can put on an SD card is dependent upon both the size of the card and what format you are shooting. My Pentax *ist DL will allow me to use a maximum 2gb SD card. With a 2gb card I can record 165 images in RAW format (6mp), 760 in JPEG "Best" mode (4mp), and nearly 2400 images in JPEG "good" mode (1.5mp). Now in regards to the original question about battery life. There are a number of factors that effect battery life. First off, per the table in my Pentax 8ist user manual battery life varies greatly depending upon what type of batteries you are using. Obviously the best battery life is with the special batteries that are made specific to this camera, but the Pentax 8ist will also allow me to use 4 AA batteries so I will only show the comparison of AA batteries. Approximate image storage and playback capacity: AA LITHIUM ION- batteries: (Note that operating temp has a big effect) 23 DegC normal mode 750 images, 50% flash 650, 100% flash 550-Playback 700minutes 0 degC normal mode 670, 50% flash 570, 100% flash 470-playback 470min. AA Rechargeable NiMH 2500mAh @ 23degC 560, with 50% flash 500, 100% flash 440, Playback 470 0 degC 500, with 50% flash 440 and 100% flash 380, playback 400 AA Alkaline batteries: 23 degC 90, with 50% flash 70, with 100% flash 50, playback 140 Not recommended at 0DegC. ................................................. I primarily shoot nature and wildlife photography and I am looking forward to the live view feature because I often shoot macro and very low angles, often requiring the camera to sit right on the ground. Currently I am using a right angle view finder but the live view will make it much easier. On average I shoot about 500 pictures a day and have shot as many as 1500 in one day. When I go in the field I carry 10 2gb SD cards and 5 sets of AA NiMh (2900mAh) rechargeable batteries. While the above table for NiMh rechargeables was for 2500mAh batteries from my experience I find that the 2900mAh batteries perform as well as the Lithium Ion batteries. You can expect to pay about $20 for a set of four AA Energyzer or Duracell 2900mAh batteries and another $20 for wall charger but after having recharged them perhaps as many as a hundred times I find they are a bargain at twice that price. I also bought some generic rechargeable NiMh batteries on Ebay. The ones listed as 2900mAh work fine, but the ones listed as 2500mAh do not perform nearly as well, although they do work well in my external flash equipment and flashlights. When buying rechargeable NiMh batteries be very careful to check the amp/hour rating. They make some AA NiMh batteries that are listed as rechargeable garden light batteries. They are only 1800mAh and while they work fine in those little solar powered garden & walkway lights, they are useless for photo applications.