Canon Ixus 80 IS

I originally bought this camera for someone else, but after seeing it, feeling how well it was made and looking at it longingly, I realised I had to buy one for myself. It is beautiful. The IXUS 80IS is compact lifestyle camera. It's able to take photographs at 8 mega pixels, although you'd probably not use this facility, it's there. It has an autofocus lens with a 3x optical zoom, the LCD display is bright and clear to use. By depressing down slightly on the shutter the lens goes into auto focus mode, with the onboard software it can actually get even closer than the 3x magnification. But of course there can sometimes be a loss in picture quality when using such things. There are various shooting modes to use, night time, macro, portrait, landscape, pets and children, tungsten and florescent balancing etc. Each of these modes will taylor the settings to get the best shot it can. A face recognition program is present and obligatory in any compact camera. The small lens is very responsive, it takes no time at all to focus and there is very little delay between fully depressing the shutter and the picture being taken. In earlier compact cameras this used to be a problem. By moving the shutter button about a quarter of a turn the lens will zoom in or out on a subject. This same function can be used when previewing pictures, this way it either gets in close or allows you to view several thumbnail pictures at the same time. You have freedom of choice to decide how much detail will be in your pictures by choosing the appropriate megapixel size. My only gripe is the manual mode, this tries desperately to allow the camera to be manual, but it is not fully there in my opinion. There is seemingly no control over the shutter settings. Flash, and ISO yes but then it choses the shutter speed. However, when previewing pictures it is possible to view the technical details of the settings of each one taken. What it does have and is certainly a plus is an exposure override mode. I used this especially during the snow we had and it worked great.Using automode means not having to think about the pictures taken, just point and shoot. It does this just as well and if someone had no idea of taking a picture it works without any fuss perfectly.The build quality of this camera is excellent, it is enjoyable to use, although I'd recommend one of the first things you do is to attach the strap. Always have this on your wrist and there will be nothing to worry about.I've also taken video with this camera and it's great to feel like a director. The video files do however tend to be quite large so this would suggest purchasing a decent sized memory card for it.Overall I would say you can't go wrong and I'd recommend this camera to anyone.