Hi,

My wife loves taking photos of insects at close range but as she only has a fairly basic compact camera she is a bit disappointed with the results, especially once printed.

She isn't at all technical and actually not particularly interested in cameras but just wants to be able to point and shoot whilst getting better results than the compact camera is capable of.

I was thinking about buying a cheap used bridge camera off e-bay as there seem to be some in apparently good condition (although no doubt quite old) for as little as £40 just to see if she really is interested enough to eventually justify something better.

I have seen a Nikon L120, a Panasonic FZ 150 and umpteen variations of Fuji FinePix for around the £40 mark but I really don't know much about them of if they would take acceptable Macro pictures.

Am I simply wasting £40 or is it possible to get a camera which would do the job for this sort of money.

Any advice or suggestions of what to look out for would be appreciated,

John.

Can't comment on the cameras you've listed, & you might need to go up a bit from the £40 mark, but I've had a Canon Powershot SX50 for around 5 years or so & it's an absolutely incredible bit of kit, tho' obviously dated now - I use it mainly for it's landscape & telephoto capabilities (I have hand held close ups of the moon!! the image is so stable!) than macro, but it will take very sharp close up images, will even allow you a little bit of zoom to get away slightly from the subject, stops shadowing from the camera etc.

Took a look on Ebay cos no idea what they make & immediately saw this

ebay link

which is the 12.1Mp version identical to mine, tho' looks a LOT less abused - Lol. Obviously it's an auction & may get bid up, but certainly worth a punt - there's hundreds of £££'s worth of gear there, tho' why on earth he's got 4 batteries I have no idea as one lasts ages & recharges in around 2 hours from empty!

You could always buy, try & resell if interest proves limited?

if it was me i would look at a used DSLR with a macro capable prime lens.

Evening John,

I've had a Fuji Finepix SL245 for a few years now and had mixed results re. photo quality. However, where it does score is on close-up work. Although my usual camera is a Nikon D3200 DSLR I tend to favour the Fuji's macro capability over the Nikon. In the following pics the first was the Nikon and the second the Fuji.


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These images have been resized for the forum so don't necessarily reflect true quality.

Michael.

I have had several of the Fuji bridge cameras, the current one being an HS10 and without exception they have all performed very well indeed, the HS10 especially so having a lens that in normal use is equivalent to 28mm - 720mm in one smooth zoom. I have tended to use this one for longer range shots (got a nice one of the moon full frame a little while ago) but it has done well on macro as well

I've got an HS10 as well - great camera but battery life is rubbish with Alkaline or even good quality nimh rechargeable (it takes 4xAA).

Basically every time I wanted to use the camera [admittedly infrequently given my phone does most things well] the camera would die because the batteries were flat.

I bought some Li-on AAs instead which were expensive but last for literally ages and ages - I've had them about 2 years and charged them once. Made a massive difference.

I agree about alkaline batteries not lasting well, NiMah 2800ah batts last well in use, I guess the issue may be storage as the batteries have to keep the camera clock running so will be slowly discharging. Hadn't heard of lithium AA 1.5v cells so I've bought a few to try out.