>>3117610I purchased one when I went to Tanzania. It was the first "real" camera I every purchased. I was going to be living in a tent in the middle of a game reserve doing animal research. So I chose this camera for a couple of reasons:
>BatteriesI made sure it took AA batteries. This way I was able to take a slew of them and never run out of juice.
>ZoomI think it had the equivalent of a 600mm lens or something ridiculous.
I wanted to get as close as I could to lions and giraffes and hippos as I could. And although my abilities as a tracker are pretty good, impalas and wildebeest still run away once they can smell/see you -- so having a superzoom was useful.
Thaaaaaaaaaat being said, now having a proper camera and looking back on my photos from that excursion -- I laugh at how horrible they were. I took thousands of photos, and I'm only proud of 2 of them. At the time, it was useful and it served its purpose. But if I went back I would obviously take a proper camera with a tele lens -- it's just that a proper setup is significantly more expensive.
