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The best digital camera for capturing unforgettable moments is definitely the Canon Elph series. The most important thing about these cameras is that they are extremely small and light, which means they slip easily into a purse or coat pocket. Unforgettable moments invariably happen at completely unexpected times; with an Elph PowerShot, it's easy to stay prepared and capture the sweetest and most hilarious moments in life.

One important feature in these cameras is that they have optical zoom. Optical zoom means that you can focus in on far away subjects using the lens. This is opposed to digital zoom, which is essentially equivalent to cropping your picture later on your computer, i.e. the resolution stays the same. The Elph cameras come in a range of prices (from around $160 to $600 on amazon.com), with a wide selection in resolutions (mega-pixels). As long as you are not planning to order prints the size of your refrigerator, you don't need to worry _too_ much about the resolution. My camera is 6 mega-pixels and my 8x10 inch prints come out just fine. 7.1 mega-pixels will give you film quality resolution fro prints up to 15x20 inches.

Another terrific feature available in some versions of this camera is the home-video option. This option can be found in some of the pricier versions of the camera, but is definitely worth the splurge. There is nothing that can compare to a home-video of your daughter's gymnastics performance, or your son's expression after slipping off a log and getting soaked in a stream. The sound quality is very good, not quite as nice as a camcorder but excellent nonetheless. You can even turn up the sound when you play the movies back on the camera! We use the video feature to "interview" people at family events, and we also use it to document our vacations. The kids watch these videos over and over, they cannot get enough of themselves. There are other features that are also handy, the night-snapshot is fantastic for low light shots of people, and there's a separate night setting with a long exposure. There's a macro setting for shooting things close up, and a foliage setting for enhancing the colors outdoors. Red-eye reduction and delay timer are also very handy.

Last (but not least) these cameras are extremely robust. They can be routinely handed over to the kids. The results are interesting when children are allowed to do their own documenting. This camera can take whatever the kids dish out. We have two in our family, and they've been dropped, scratched, contaminated with sand, and so far they are still taking great pictures. Digital cameras are also extremely convenient because you don't need to worry about wasting film, you can just delete your son's 47 pictures of a grasshopper at a convenient moment. In fact, you can do this on the fly from the camera, if you happen to be running out of memory.

All in all the Canon Elph digital camera is the perfect camera for capturing those unforgettable moments, year after year.

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