Be Excellent To Each Other

Can anyone recommend me a decent camera for £200 or less that I can use to take pictures at a staff conference.

It's got to be easy to use as I'm not a photographer by any stretch of the imagination.. but I would like something with a view finder for my eye! Does that mean it's got to be SLR? Something beefy to make me look like a pro where all I'm doing is pressing one button!

It's got to be mail order too by the way!

Thanks everyone!! I would offer to share the pictures with you all but I guarantee you'll be less than interested!

I wouldn't bother with an SLR for that. Spend 100-120 on a Canon Ixus from Amazon or somewhere, it has a viewfinder and is a very good camera. Spend another 20 or so on a big SD card and reader.

That said, it is very small and dinky. Their Powershot model is bigger and chunkier and I think much the same price, so you might be better with that for this job. It'll look less silly on a tripod.

That.

I've got this one and it's superb.

Panasonic FZ28 - loads of options, viewfinder for your eyeball and takes SD cards. Also does decent video.

May be just over your £200 limit though - well gross of VAT anyway.

maybe not
Never heard of the company though

Do you think I'd look more professional with an SLR? I think I might.. I like the canon Ixus too... but it's not an SLR? Oh decisions decisions...

You'll have a job getting a DSLR for under £200, unless you want to go second hand or film.

For that budget I'd probably just go for an Ixus or equivalent. £200 isn't a lot for a decent camera at all, unfortunately. It's an expensive hobby.

Have a look at that Panasonic in the link DavPaz posted - looks very uncompact-like.

You can twiddle the switches and wheels between shots to look extra pretend/professional.

It may be cheaper to hire a photographer for a few hours.

If having official photos taken at a conference is requested, it's probably a sales conference, and therefore purely to massage their egos and the resulting photos are of negligible importance Might as well get a new gadget out of the deal.

Just get a normal compact camera and hide it inside a professional camera setup you can make from some broomsticks, a cardboard box and an old curtain. To be even more convincing get some fireworks taped to the end of a ruler for the flash. Also have the entire room stand entirely motionless for ten minutes while you capture their image.

Exactly ... Plus if I'm taking pictures, it gets me out of doing anything else for the conference! This is a good thing.

or hire the camera gear.

I'd avoid compacts like the plague if the pictures are going to be used for anything other than the internet, but also because they take "too" long to take the picture due to shutter lag between pressing the button, it focusing, and capturing the shot.

For £200 you could probably hire a Nikon D700, a speedlight and a Quantum turbo battery - bung it in program mode and take fab pictures all day long.

Check out Calumet photo for hiring gear - they're all over the UK

Failing that, there are numerous bits of gear you could pick up 2nd hand - hell a Nikon or Canon dSLR from a few years ago is ALWAYS going to be better than even the latest point and shoot compacts.