6. Digital Cameras and Camcorders

By Ed Tittel

Samsung S1050 Digital Camera

$100 at Sears

With high resolution (10.1 Mpixels), 5X optical zoom and a large 3” LCD viewer, the Samsung S1050 offers a nice combination of features and functions for an inexpensive point-and-shoot digital camera. Manual controls extend shutter speeds across a range from 2 seconds to 1/2000 second, and ISO sensitivity between 80 and 1600. You’ll also find automatic face and automatic exposure controls that should make manual controls largely unnecessary, along with white balance and lighting selections, exposure compensation and image stabilizers to help more experienced shutterbugs shoot good pictures. At its normal price of $150, this camera is a pretty good deal; at the Sears Black Friday price of $100 it’s a steal, especially when you factor in the Sears price protection plan.

Olympus FE-350 Wide

$100 at Staples

The FE-350 Wide from Olympus is a compact, feature-rich digital camera with 4X wide-angle lens (offers 28-112 mm equivalent at f2.7-5.4), plus 5X optical zoom and a 3” LCD image viewer. Thus, the FE-350 is especially good at capturing panoramic scenes and large group portraits. Resolution is lower than the Saumsung S1050 at 8 Mpixels, but the FE-350 also includes face detection, auto-focus and auto exposure controls, along with 17 different shooting modes. The FE-350 also offers in-camera editing tools to remove red-eye and adjust lighting (brightness and contrast) after the shot has been taken. Olympus also bundles its Master 2 Software with this camera, which provides download and photo edit tools for computer use (USB and audio/video cables are also included). The wide-angle lens and intuitive user interface make this a user-friendly point-and-shoot; at the Black Friday price, adjusted from $250, it’s hard to resist!

Canon HF10 High-Def Camcorder

$560 at 1wayphoto.com

We recommended this camcorder in our 2008 Dad’s and Grads Buyer’s Guide at MSRP ($999), so we’re ecstatic at Black Friday prices under $600 (right now, 1 Way Photo’s is the price to beat at $560, which is about 33% lower). The HF10 product page is flash-RAM based and includes 16 GB onboard to capture a little over two hours of video at its highest-quality 17 Mbps setting (at 5 Mbps that increases to over 6 hours). There’s also an SDHC slot, so for $100 more, you can add another 16 GB and double your capacity! With a 12x optical zoom and its ability to serve as a 3.3 Mpixel still camera, the HF10 is a much better play at $560 (or less, if you can beat that price — this is no “Black Friday” deal per se, though it beats all Black Friday deals we’ve found so far) for nascent videographers on your Christmas list.