Canon PowerShot ELPH 500 HS 12.1 MP CMOS Digital Camera with Full HD Video and Ultra Wide Angle Lens (Silver)

I love this camera! I wanted a higher end point and shoot camera that could keep up with my kids and do well in low light. I read a lot of reviews and settled on this one. I thought about the ELPH 300hs but decided I was too used to using the touch screen on my Sony Cybershot to go back to buttons. I love the touch screen! The menus are well laid out and it is easy to find things. I was a little worried it would take me awhile to figure out the Canon menus since I have been a Sony user for so long, but I am not having any trouble at all! I am having fun trying out all of the programs/effects on the camera. The Kids and Pets setting is just what I was looking for. My kids don't sit still for me to take pictures and now I can just snap pictures of them on the go without the picture being too blurry. After reading reviews I was worried about battery life. I decided to buy and extra battery since we had a big wedding we were going to and I didn't want my camera to die before the day was done. Turns out I wouldn't have needed the extra battery. I still have the first battery in after taking 150 pictures and a few short videos. Another thing I love is that there isn't much delay between pressing the button and the actual capturing of the picture (this was a big frustration with my previous camera). The only thing I noticed is that with moving subjects and in low light you really have to make sure to give the camera time to focus by holding the button halfway down for a second or two before snapping the picture. I had great luck with this camera in low light. I snapped some really awesome pictures on the dance floor at the wedding. I was even able to shoot a little video on the dance floor. When I tried that with my old camera it turned out almost black, but with this camera I got a great video of my 3 year old dancing. I have only had this camera for a week, but I haven't found any area where this camera has let me down yet. I am excited to keep experimenting with some of the programs and effects I haven't gotten to use yet. Bottom line....Great camera!UPDATE: I lost my ELPH 500 HS while we were on vacation (a long sad story). I needed a new camera fast so I went to Best Buy and they only had the ELPH 300 HS and nothing else was really close to the quality I wanted at the price I wanted so I bought it. The 300 has pretty much the same functions as the 500 and still takes great pictures. But I would take my 500 back any day! The touch screen makes it so much simpler to navigate through the menus and change settings quickly. I don't think the microphone is as good on the 300 because a couple of my videos are hard to hear. It seems a little slower to focus and snap a picture, but maybe it is all in my head. One problem I noticed is that my photo editing software (I use Picasa) would automatically pick up the red eye on photos with my 500 but on the 300 I have to manually select the area to change it. The 300 looks cooler than the 500 and is a little smaller, but I loved the large screen on the 500 and you don't get that with the 300 since they had to make room for all the buttons. Bottom line in my opinion: Spend the extra $70 and go for the 500 - it is worth it.

I almost didn't buy this camera because of all the negative comments about the touch screen. After using it for a few weeks I have come to love it. I actually look forward to manually configuring white balance, exposure and ISO because the touch screen interface is fun to use. I'm 6'3'' and have big hands but the screen works fine. My favorite feature is that you can configure the screen to show icons for your favorite tasks, such as white balance, which I use all the time. I'm happy that so many people hated the touch screen because it seems like the negative publicly drove the price of this camera down prematurely, which netted me a hefty savings.The difference switching from my old digital elph's physical buttons compared to this camera is similar to when I traded in my old blackberry for an iphone. Night and day.My only complaint:I love the 24mm wide angle zoom but I wish the default zoom level could be adjusted. The problem is that when the camera is first turned on, the lens defaults to 24mm. Most of the pictures I take tend to be the typical closeups of people. Wide angle is not a good option for these types of pictures because it creates distortion and other problems. I wish I could set it to default to 35mm instead. For now I have to zoom in a little every time I turn the camera on for a photo. I also wish it would display the zoom level in terms of mm.I would definitely buy this camera again.

I had very high expectations for this camera, and while it has performed beautifully in the video realm (better than expected), the still photo capabilities are not as good as I had hoped. I'm still fiddling with settings, hoping there is something I can do there to improve the quality. I had expected the still photos to approach or equal (possibly even surpass) those taken on my brother's Canon S95, but so far the S95 unquestionably outperforms the 500HS. I normally use an SLR (Canon 7D). I purchased this one as a small camera to take on outings. I end up taking a lot of video and very few still shots because the still photos just are not coming out. If I were to make the choice all over again, I would pay the extra money for the Canon S95.Edited to add:I played with this camera a little more over the weekend to see if I could improve its performance. I got some nice, clear portraits up close in natural light, and some decent ones up close in artificial light. As soon as I use the zoom, however, the pictures get very noisy.