Can I get pros/cons of Nikon Coolpix cameras?

[babylonsister]

It looks like I might get a new one after all for the big 5-0. My DH buys and sells coins and heard this was pretty decent for macro shots. Any thoughts w/o betting the bank on it? About $300?
Or any other suggestions in that price range?
Thanks.

[Ms. Toad]

1. Don't know anything about it personally,

But here is where I send everyone for digital camera information: http://www.steves-digicams.com/

I used the site as my primary source of information to decide what I wanted to buy.

WHat I bought was a Camedia 4000Z (~ $250 on line, good with Macros), and I love it. Have purchased two clones of it for my mother and daughter (their request after they saw the pictures it produced). I don't know if you can get it anymore, and it uses memory cards that were easy to find when I bought it but are hard to find now.

You can see some of my macro pictures here: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=280x12247 (The poinsettia was taken at a distance of an inch or less), and other shots I took with it here: http://photogroup.smugmug.com/gallery/681553

Good Luck.

(Edited to add information about macro distance)

[babylonsister]

2. Thank you so much for all the great information! nt

[Fovea]

3. I had the CP5400, and it was a pretty great camera

This was shot with it, IIRC.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/cameraobscura/11001692/in/set-276537/


And I went with the D70 when I finally decided to go DSLR. The 5400 is a wide angle zoom, you probably want something like the CP8700.

[alkaline9]

4. I don't know a lot about Nikons, but...

...I find it hard to believe you could go wrong getting just about any name brand camera with a macro function for photographing coins. As a poster said above, http://www.steves-digicams.com/ is a wonderful site for reviewing cameras. You may be able to find a camera cheaper that does about as well photographing coins.

I think what you should do is figure out what OTHER options you really want in a camera. For example a big zoom was more important to me than high mega pixels, so I got the 4mp Kodak dx6490 with 10x optical zoom... and what do you know it manages to do macro shots pretty nicely too :D There's lots of cameras out there, and I would think that most of the newer ones do just fine with macro shots.

Here is a macro shot of a few coins using my camera (now almost 3 years old) ... and imagine if my coins were actually nice and shiny!