Best digital camera under $50?

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Steve M.

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We all know that you can buy a really good film camera for under $50, but how about digital? Are there any digital cameras that fall in that price range that are capable of making a decent 8x10 print? I suppose that a DSLR is out of the question, so this might have to be a P&S thing.

For what it's worth, I used to have a very old Fuji E 550 that could make great photos, but it was a really small, silver, plastic camera that looked ridiculous on a strap. So extra points if the camera could be something that you wouldn't get laughed at if you brought it into the coffee house :]
 
"Best digital camera under $50?"

Probably the hot one bought in an alley, as sold by a desperate soul looking to buy some self medication in a bad way.

But realistically, there are plenty of 15 to 10 year old low mega pixel sensor cameras with decent lenses that are sold in pawn shops for 50 dollars or less.
 
Steve M. said:
We all know that you can buy a really good film camera for under $50, but how about digital? Are there any digital cameras that fall in that price range that are capable of making a decent 8x10 print? I suppose that a DSLR is out of the question, so this might have to be a P&S thing.

For what it's worth, I used to have a very old Fuji E 550 that could make great photos, but it was a really small, silver, plastic camera that looked ridiculous on a strap. So extra points if the camera could be something that you wouldn't get laughed at if you brought it into the coffee house :]
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Used DSLR cameras are now approaching that price range, albeit often sans lens. I have several Pentax *ist DL cameras which I dedicate to manual focus lenses and exposure methods. All purchased in the $30 range. 6mp, aps-c, reasonable image quality.
 
xayraa33 said:
"Best digital camera under $50?"

Probably the hot one bought in an alley, as sold by a desperate soul looking to buy some self medication in a bad way.

But realistically, there are plenty of 15 to 10 year old low mega pixel sensor cameras with decent lenses that are sold in pawn shops for 50 dollars or less.
Click to expand...

Not often in pawn shops I'm aware of. They typically want high end of used prices.

KEH is a good resource as is ebay and shopgoodwill.com.
 
As modern as you can P&S. They are still sold new for under 200$. So, it should be no problem to get one at 50$ mark.
My 16 (fake) MP Canon was 20 CAD on street sale day. It gives 8x10.
Any 8MP camera will do 8x10.
 
There are a lot of older DSLRs you can get around $50 or between $50 and $100 here in
germanys local boards. The E550 still is a good camera but there are plenty panasonic, sony, canon
and olympus from the years 2011+ you can buy for some small bucks.
And they will serve well also.
Fuji F10/F11, Oly 5050, KonicaMinolta ...
 
bmattock said:
Not often in pawn shops I'm aware of. They typically want high end of used prices.

KEH is a good resource as is ebay and shopgoodwill.com.
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You are right that pawn shops usually want too much money for everything they have to sell.

But in the Church and Queen streets section of Toronto where pawn shops are to be found I did run into an Olympus C-740UZ for 55 CDN dollars which converts to less than 50 USD in cost price and plenty of outdated compact and grubby looking P&S Sony and Canon and lesser brand cameras for 50 CDN dollars or less.

Most of these cheapo cameras produce very good photo results, much better than most film Instamatic cameras of the 1970s.
 
xayraa33 said:
You are right that pawn shops usually want too much money for everything they have to sell.

But in the Church and Queen streets section of Toronto where pawn shops are to be found I did run into an Olympus C-740UZ for 55 CDN dollars which converts to less than 50 USD in cost price and plenty of outdated compact and grubby looking P&S Sony and Canon and lesser brand cameras for 50 CDN dollars or less.

Most of these cheapo cameras produce very good photo results, much better than most film Instamatic cameras of the 1970s.
Click to expand...

Very nice!

A couple years ago, I started buying simple 8-12 mp Canon, Nikon, and Sony cameras from online thrift stores and refurbishing them for my grandnieces. So low cost that if they got lost or damaged, no big deal. I noticed the Sony DSC-H300 is a really nice one. Nearly kept that one for myself! Might still buy one just for me.
 
Panasonic GF-1 can be had for about that money. Would still need a lens of course. 8x10 would be easy for it and it is a great little camera at that price.

Shawn
 
Steve M. said:
For what it's worth, I used to have a very old Fuji E 550 that could make great photos, but it was a really small, silver, plastic camera that looked ridiculous on a strap. So extra points if the camera could be something that you wouldn't get laughed at if you brought it into the coffee house :]
Click to expand...

I know you're joking around, so consider this my humorous response...

As an aside, I'd shoot with a pink Hello Kitty camera and dare anyone to say a derogatory word. And coffee shops? Like I seek approval from those effete snobs.

:) :) :) :) :p :p :p
 
I'd recommend a good working version of a Canon Power Shot SD1000. It not only will give good photo's, it'll also take pretty nice video's too. Plus, it's small as a deck of playing cards so fits into your pocket nicely.
 
Axel100 said:
Fuji F10/F11 ...
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Second the F10, prints in 8x10 look great on my Epson P600, especially in color, was really surprised when the first print came out of the Epson. Worth to mention, the camera still works flawlessly after all this years, I use it again now from time to time instead of my smartphone, the results are somehow more pleasing to my eyes.

Jürgen
 
On a whim, I recently bought a refurbished Kodak Pixpro FZ43 for something like $40 off Amazon. It arrived in a plain white box but was in brand-new condition and I thought it was really surprisingly good, even offering some unexpected-for-the-price features like histogram.
 
What about a Bridge Camera?

Going by what I sold my old Coolpix L810 for you could easily get one in that range and I got some really nice results from it and acctually miss it, even with a far superior DSLR having long taken its place.
Some even will let you get manual on the level of a DSLR, sure quite a few have smaller than APS-C sensors and of course the lens is a fixed Zoom unit but they can be still brilliant learning tools and at the right price you may even have some spare cash for some accessories to go with it.
 
Canon PowerShot ELPH 100HS


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Thanks for the recommendations. But is there anything out there with an optical viewfinder? I didn't see any viewfinders at all on any of the cameras mentioned here. Probably should have mentioned that in the original post.

I may start looking at Nikon DSLRs from the early days, since I have a couple of manual focus Nikon SLR lenses, assuming they're backward compatible.
 
Oh my! It looks like I can get a Nikon D50, D70, or a D100 for that price. Who knew? Of course, the devil will be in the details concerning a battery, memory card and charger, but it might be possible to get it all for somewhat more than the $50 price point. A SLR would be perfect. Now to see if my old lenses will meter or communicate w/ the electronics on any of these. If not, I'll start cruising auctions for other brands w/ a kit lens.
 
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