advice? I finally broke my Nikon Coolpix 9700

[Urbanflyer]

I need to replace my compact camera--I have always had a Nikon Coolpix of some sort since 1998 or so. Although my "good" camera is a Nikon, I am thinking of getting a Panasonic Lumix ZS70K for my pocket. Any thoughts or advice. I need something to carry on an everyday basis since I never know when something will catch my eye. Thanks for advice!

[tclune]

My buddy has a Fuji with the X-Tran sensor as his pocket camera and loves it. He's a Nikon shooter in large format cameras, but really enjoys the change of pace with the different sensor. It also has a fixed focal length lens, which adds to the change-up for him. You might consider going in that direction, just to shake things up with your shooting.

[Manfred M]

Unless you are a printer, what's wrong with your phone?

It's my "B" camera and the newest iPhones, Google Pixel phones and Samsung Galaxy phones are all producing outstanding images. It's with me any time I walk out the door. I recently picked up a Samsung Galaxy S10+ and I'm willing to bet that no one notices when I post an image from it on this site.

Serious shooting, the big Nikon still comes out. My little Panasonic GX-7 (which was my walk-around camera) hardly ever comes out.

[Urbanflyer]

Unless you are a printer, what's wrong with your phone?

It's my "B" camera and the newest iPhones, Google Pixel phones and Samsung Galaxy phones are all producing outstanding images. It's with me any time I walk out the door. I recently picked up a Samsung Galaxy S10+ and I'm willing to bet that no one notices when I post an image from it on this site.

Serious shooting, the big Nikon still comes out. My little Panasonic GX-7 (which was my walk-around camera) hardly ever comes out.

I have a Google Pixel 2 and I am not happy with the image quality for anything but record shots though I have posted some on this site. Not ready to spring for a new phone at this time.

[pnodrog]

We (I really mean my wife) has a Panasonic Lumix DMC-TZ70 which works well. In bright light she sometimes has difficulty in zooming in on the subject partly due to the range but mostly because she never uses the viewsfinder only the display.

On our recent trip to Australia I was editing my picks for the day and was about to save one I had played with for about 5 minutes only to realise it was a jpeg from her camera and not one of mine. I was silly enough to tell her and when I said it was a pretty good little camera she reminded me that I always claim it is the photographer not the camera that counts.

It is certainly a brand of camera I would consider again.

[DanK]

It's all a matter of tradeoffs. There are lots of options. I'll describe what I ended up with when I went through this. My information is probably dated because I went through this a few years ago. However, for what it is worth:

1. I didn't consider a phone adequate. Admittedly, newer phones have better cameras than my iPhone 7, but I want more control than a phone provides, and I also have no interest in investing in a newer phone.

2. The big issue for me was size: whether the camera can fit in a pocket. For my purposes, the best camera that would fit in a pocket was IMHO the Sony RC-100 series. This is now in its seventh (!) iteration, and the newest models are very expensive, but the older models are still available and are much cheaper.

3. One step up in size is the Lumix LX-100, which is what I bought. It has a lens that doesn't retract, so it fits in a jacket pocket but not in a shirt pocket. When traveling, I often carry it in a fanny pack. While I would have preferred the smaller size, this one has excellent ergonomics and controls for a small camera, and at low ISOs, it produces very good images. A newer version, the LX-100 II, has been released since I bought mine. It's not cheap, and it has at least one big disadvantage (at least the first version): because the lens is not removable, cleaning dust on the sensor means a trip to the repair shop, which in my neighborhood is about $60. I have only had that problem once, but I am very careful in handling the camera to minimize the risk.

The original model also doesn't handle low light very well.

Here are two shots I took with it on different trips. One can't tell much about lens quality from images of this resolution, but if you are interested, I can upload a full-size JPEG somewhere.

[inkista]

I need to replace my compact camera--I have always had a Nikon Coolpix of some sort since 1998 or so. Although my "good" camera is a Nikon, I am thinking of getting a Panasonic Lumix ZS70K for my pocket. Any thoughts or advice. I need something to carry on an everyday basis since I never know when something will catch my eye. Thanks for advice!

I think more advanced shooters with dSLRs/mirrorless setups are more drawn to the 1"-format enthusiast compacts than to the 1/2.3"-format superzoom bridge cameras. A shorter, faster lens with a bigger (2.7x crop) sensor tends to feel like a better tradeoff for the slower/longer lens with the smaller (5x crop) sensor.

But the 1" enthusiast cameras are a lot more expensive. They do come in superzoom varieties (Panasonic ZS100/TZ100 and FZ1000, Canon powershot G3 X, Sony RX10, etc.), but it's the Sony RX100, Canon G7X or G9X, or LX100 series with the f/2 or f/1.8 max. apertures that tend to make the recommendation lists. And they all have older generation models that are cheaper on the used market.

[robincooper]

I will suggested an action camera. You can read a review bestadvisers.co.uk/action-camera-go-pro/. I'm using GoPro about 2 years for photo and video and satisfied with it.