On P&S the lens is listed as field of view equivalent to on 35mm film. The lens on the Nikon S570 for example is really 5mm on the wide end but they call it "28mm equivalent." That *IS* a wide angle. 24-25mm equivalent will give you a good deal more flexibility for interiors though. 16mm would be nuts and doesn't exist on a P&S camera.

These all have 24-25mm equivalent wide ends of their zooms, real image stabilization, and don't go too overboard on the megapixels (which kills the image quality). In ascending price order.

Under $200:

Panasonic FX48 - basic point & shoot
Panasonic FX580 - bit more zoom on long end, touchscreen
Panasonic ZS1 - bit bigger, way more zoom on long end
Panasonic ZR1 - almost as much zoom on long end as ZS1 but much smaller (I own one of these, fits in pocket)
Casio EX-H10 - similar to ZR1

A bit more:

Samsung TL320 - has manual controls
Canon SD980 - it's a Canon
Sony WX1 - spiffy low-light shooting modes

 

ill say it again, Canon SD1100IS o:

 

SD1100IS has a 38mm equiv wide end of its zoom. Not wide at all.

 

yet probably perfectly acceptable for what i/he use it for o:

 

He's trying to get wider than the wide end of his SD750 in the original post. The wide endn of the SD750 is 35mm equivalent. That's already wider than the SD1100. So no.

 

Ok so if you can swing about $250 then the Panasonic ZS5 is about the widest you can get.

It has a 25mm wide end of its zoom and it has a little trick on its sensor to give you real variable aspect ratios. Usually on a p&s it's a 4:3 aspect ratio (like old SD TV), and to get to other aspect ratios it just crops the top & bottom off the image. Basically worthless since if you have any kind of image editing program you could do the same thing.

With the real variable aspect ratio, it works like such:



The whole sensor is 14.5-megapixels, BUT rather than using the whole width the whole time, the 4:3 ratio frame gives a 12-megapixel image that's 4,000 pixels wide, 3:2 gets a little shorter vertically but is 4,176 pixels wide, and 16:9 is shorter still vertically and 4,320 pixels wide. So if you want to shoot in 16:9 you can go wiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiide.

It also has manual controls. Since you're using this for non-moving house interiors, if you get a cheap tripod you can do long exposures with the self timer and stick with a lower ISO setting for less noise.

Enjoy!!

 

Thanks for all your help Mike. Unfortunately, a 16:9 aspect ratio wont be of much use since our MLS system and most of my marketing software uses regular 4:3, and if you upload a 16:9 image, it will just stretch it out to fit into a 4:3 frame.

That said, is the ZS5 pretty much on par with the rest that you pointed out earlier? If so I might just go for the SD980 because I'm already familiar with the controls (assuming they're similar to my SD750) and my current camera has held up well over time.

 

Ah, yeah in that case the aspect ratio doesn't help ya. Main benefit to the ZS5 then is the manual controls.

To narrow it down a bit...I'd probably decide among FX48, ZR1, SD980 or WX1. Depending on your priorities.

The SD980 is certainly nice but it's $250. It has a 24-120mm lens and 3.0" screen. For only $150 the FX48 has a 25-125mm lens, 2.5" screen and a bit better noise performance.

The ZR1 has noise similar to the SD980 (i.e. not quite as good as FX48), 2.7" screen and 25-250mm lens. That won't help you for your work stuff but comes in handy for things other than inside of houses.

If you do want to spend the whole $250 of the SD980 then the Sony WX1 has really cool low-light tricks. It's a faster lens and some sensor gimmicks. Downside is it's stuck with Memory Stick instead of SD card. You can read more about the WX1 here: http://www.photographyblog.com/revie...sc_wx1_review/

I have a ZR1. I got it to complement my SLR and be useful in as many situations as possible when I wouldn't otherwise be lugging my full gear bag. So the extra zoom range stood out to me. I was very tempted by the WX1 but it was a bunch pricier when I bought the ZR1 and I didn't feel like dealing with Memory Sticks.