point 'n' click v. slr

About a year ago, we bought a Panasonic Lumix digital camera. I had done some research into what kind of camera to buy, and we've been very happy with the camera. The quality of images, variety of settings, and ease of use have been fabulous. I've really been enjoying taking photos in the last year and have recently begun thinking about whether an SLR might be a good investment. Having never used one before, I didn't want to drop a huge amount of money on one without taking one for a test drive. I wasn't sure if all the bells and whistles would be interesting or boring to me. So, I borrowed a colleague's Canon EOS-20D for the weekend.

Yesterday, I took a walk with it and my Panasonic. I took a bunch of the same shots with both cameras, so that I could compare and contrast them. Here are some such shots:


Point 'n' Click


SLR

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Point 'n' Click


SLR

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After dinner, I set the SLR on a long exposure and took these shots of the Long Beach beach.




My initial thoughts are that the images are fairly similar. I like the colors in my point-n-click better, but that could be adjustable using the SLR software. There's a whole lots more power in the SLR, as evidenced by the visible sand in the photos at the bottom, and even with the lens that came with the SLR camera, the zoom is better than on my point-n-click. All told, I like the SLR a lot. Not sure if it's the time to go shopping for one, though... What do you think?