Olympus Camedia C-720 3MP Digital Camera w/ 8x Optical Zoom

Rating:
Summary: No optical viewfinder
Review: Upgraded from a D-460 3x zoom for the 8x zoom. So far I don't care for the digital view finder. Red eye flash doesn't work in full auto mode; haven't reached the learning curve yet (100 shots) of focusing at maximum zoom. Photo quality, when focus is achieved is execellent, colors are true to life. Recommend? Maybe yes, maybe no; the jury is still out.

Rating:
Summary: Slow focus, motion blur, yellow photos
Review: Very disappointed in this camera. Fine for still and outdoor photos, but between the slow focus and the motion blur, most pictures of our kids are a blur. We've missed many great shots. The lighting in the photos also comes out odd....often looks yellowish and the flash often makes this even worse. Most of the time, its hard to even tell the difference between a flash photo and one without flash. Forget this camera if you want to avoid frustration! And shame on Olympus for charging an extra $20 bucks to get a fully functional photo software program.....after spending [a lot] on the camera...of course, you don't know this when you buy the camera!

Rating:
Summary: Zoom, greatest advantage but Olympus is unpredictable...
Review: When pictures turn out good, they turn out really good (great, excellent, so much better than with other digital cameras) with vivid colors and great sharpness. However, in low light conditions they don't turn out that good.
I bought this camera only for it's great optical zoom which is the greatest advantage of this camera so you can compose what you really want. 8x optical is more than twice as much as what most digital cameras offer and I don't know how those other cameras sell with such a useless zoom (3x optical is nothing!) 3x optical is just ridiculous when 8x is already available.
The autofocus is sometimes very disappointing. It might let you down when you need it the most. For example, African Safari, great opportunities missed because the autofocus just took too long or just didn't focus at all! Very frustrating. Like if you went to Africa every day!
I had the c700 model before this one and I'm not sure if selling it to my brother was a nice thing to do with a brother. Had the same problems. Big surprise when I found that the C-720 doesn't have sound capability in the video mode. C700 had. Why would Olympus come up with a newer model with more resolution but decrease the zoom to 8x and take out the sound capability? Go figure!! Bottom line: if you don't care about having sound on your video clips, don't care missing some once in a lifetime photo opportunities because the autozoom didn't work, then go for it! But, if you don't mind spending [a more money], maybe the c730 will not have all the flaws of it's predecessors. However, that's what I thought when I upgraded from the c700 to the c720 so we are back to the beginning and Olympus is unpredictable. Lets be positive and think that maybe they get it right this time.