Jon, I think that just about any name brand P&S would work for getting decent shots. Technology has come a long way, and the $100-$200 range in cameras are used by many many people to get usable shots. You get what you pay for, of course, and that includes the photog shooting the images. But I can see where having a P&S sitting around would work well for a non-profit. Candids, used to document the work done by the NP can be very effective in defending budgets. A picture IS worth a thousand words, even a poor pic. Especially in a NP situation, people want to know their money is really helping those poor kids (or whatever work the NP does is getting done).

I think if you go down to your local camera shop, and ask them for what is available in that price range from Nikon, Canon, Fuji, Pentax, or another well known brand, you'll get a decent camera that does good usable images. They won't have the best contrast range, you won't have delicate manual control, but the person who gets handed the cam and told to "go take some shots of them" will be able to document what is going on. Optimum would be to get Sebastiao Salgado over there to shoot the shots, but NP's have to work with what they have. And that means they can't always afford to have the pro hang around for hours and days to get complete coverage or snag that *perfect* shot.

And if you go with the girlfriend to help, you can judge the ease of use and be the "expert", insuring that things such as pic quality do work, and that the camera will get what you want. I think all too often we forget that there are millions of people taking millions of images with cheap junky camera, and that the person behind the camera matters more than the camera. Some of those millions turn out stunning and moving shots. As long as the average person can operate the camera, I think you'll be on solid ground for what the NP wants.

Good luck.

Generally, steer clear of the latest, most-exciting cameras released; they carry top-dollar premiums. One or two models back will be VERY fine performers, no longer in the top-dollar spot and often discounted even more-deeply because of their younger, sexier sisters.

OK, so let's get specific... noble "non-profit" or not, I'm STILL not clear what sorts of shots they'll be wanting.

Are they likely to be shooting indoors, or outdoors, or some of each?

If indoors (with limited light), the ability to interface with an off-camera flash is probably one of the biggest things to look for. The other indoor biggie is good wide-angle capacity, as the often-cramped spaces indoors can mean it's challenging to get all aspects of a shot into a single frame. Pano/stitching can SOMETIMES help, but usually not where the subjects are people (who move between pano panels...) .

The difference between 28mm-equiv and 24mm-equiv is quite notable at the wide end!


For other kinds of shots, other features might be more relevant...

A good site for feature-comparisons is on dpreview...
www.dpreview.com/reviews/compare.asp
will let them search for models fitting a given spec.

Then look at the side-by-side comparison:
www.dpreview.com/reviews/sidebyside.asp
And of course reviews of each camera... tho always take dpreview reviews with a grain of salt... even a whole saltcellar of it...


- Steve