Compact Camera Reviews

Street photography—walking around with a camera, poised to capture life on the fly—has never been more popular than it is now. Back in the day, masters like Alfred Eisenstaedt and Henri Cartier-Bresson prowled the streets with classic film-based Leica rangefinders, but today most street shooters opt for modern digital cameras.

Superzoom cameras, like Nikon’s Coolpix P1000 ($999.99) are popular because, let’s face it, people who buy entry level DSLR’s rarely, if ever, take the kit lenses off their cameras. I looked for statistics on this and didn’t find any empirical data but friendly retailers in the industry told me this assumption is true.

Shutterbug, a member of the Technical Image Press Association (TIPA), once again teamed up with over two dozen other member magazines from around the world to select the winners in the annual TIPA World Awards for the best photo products of 2018 in 40 different categories.

Superzoom point-and-shoot cameras are an attractive option for everyone from casual shooters to serious enthusiasts because they provide unmatched versatility and value, typically in compact, portable packages. Here are our 7 favorites.

Here’s a blast from the past: A new video from the LGR YouTube channel with the unboxing and “testing” of a 1995 Epson PhotoPC 0.3-megapixel dinosaur recently found at a thrift shop. The PhotoPC was not only Epson’s first foray into the digital camera business, but it was also the first-ever color digital camera on the consumer market for less than $500.

“It is not the mountain we conquer but ourselves.”—Sir Edmund Hillary

The Sony Cyber-shot RX100 V is a very compact and stylish camera with loads of power “under the hood.” It features a 13.2x8.8mm (aka 1-inch type) sensor with an image resolution of 20 megapixels. The camera’s high-speed lens system (f/1.8-f/2.8) has a zoom factor of nearly 3x (24-70mm, 35mm film equivalent). The sensor system and lens have not changed from the forerunner RX100 IV, but the new RX100 V has a remarkably faster and new AF system with 315 AF areas that cover 65 percent of the image.