Riverdog,

The responses here so far are so right on. Everyone will have a different opinion because there are a lot og quality products out there. As mentioned, Cannon is good as is Nikon, Olympus, Sony Etc. As Parker stated, PLAY with the cameras. You want one that feels good to you. One that fits nicely in your hand....feels solid and secure. One that the selections and options are easy for you to use.

As far as features, you are looking at resolution which is measured in the Megapixel. 1 Megapixel is one million pixels or dots per image. The higher the pixel rating the clearer the image. Especially if you want to blow up your image. With a 3 megapixel camera you can blow an image up to 8 X 10 without getting that grainy effect.

Next is the zoom feature. Obviously the more zoom, the closer you can bring an object. However there are two types, digital and optical. Optical uses the lense to zoom in just like in a 35mm camera. Digital uses software to expand or contract the image. Digital zoom does the same thing as blowing up your image. It moves the pixels apart. The more digital zoom used the lower the resolution of the image. Most cameras come with both digital and optical zoom and they work together. You want to pay attention to how much of each and go with one that has more optical than digital.

Last, check out the battery feature. Digital cameras will chew through AA batteries really quick. Some use the AA batteries and some use rechargable Lithium Ion. There are pros and cons to both. The AA bateries are easy to get and cheap but you will want to bring plenty with you for a full day of picture taking which will get expensive in the long run. You can get rechargable AA's which will help with the cost. Just get plenty of them. The Lithium Ion are more expensive but you can get a full day and many shots out of them. However on an extended outing with no charger can be a problem.

I hope this helps!!

Mike