[NewBeetle]

Sorry for yet another 'which camera' thread but my heads battered with the sheer amount of choice out there and just end up going round in circles.

I take a lot of shots like these (feel free to mock my trainer fetish) and the camera I get must be good at close textures and colours etc.

http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e3...s/DSC00040.jpg

http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e3...DSC00039-2.jpg

Obviously I will be using the camera for regular holiday/family shots too, and I am really liking the idea of a powerful decent zoom lens. Like the idea of 30fps video with sound and ideally in widescreen aspect. SD is a must for media as its just getting so cheap now.

I had convinced myself to get a Panasonic FZ7/FZ8 at £140/£190 but keep talking myself out of them after reading too much blurb about noise problems. Not sure why I am so attracted to the pannys but I keep thinking the panasonic LX2 may be a contender too, obviously not as much zoom but much smaller etc.

As you can see I am proper confused and need to make up my mind soonish as I am gonna get one for my birthday next month.

Any suggestions welcome

Depends on the amount of zoom you want. For an excellent and reliable all rounder with a great 10x zoom (28-280) try the Panny tz3. Very similar to the LX1/LX2 in terms of image quality but without the manual controls or Raw capability.

I'm very seriously considering these two cameras myself and having a hard time deciding. I think I'll go for the LX for its manual and Raw options but from everything I've read about the 'Tizzy' from actual users it gets rave reviews. You can do a search on Flickr to check out images for yourself.