Well I have to say that I was amazed at the size of this camera when it arrived, it's tiny ! You know what they say about things in little packages, it certainly holds true in the case of this camera. Not only is it great to look at, but the quality of pictures is outstanding. The controls are very simple to use, my wife was snapping away happily in no time. The back is uncluttered leaving menu controls via a virtual wheel displayed in the lcd monitor.The menu sytem is easy to pick up with a bit of "playing" This is a perfect camera for persons who want the point and shoot simplicity of a compact, but produce the picture quality of a very decent SLR. It may not have enough manual overides and bells and whistles for the semi- professional photographer, but it certainly delivers in terms of results. It will slip into a small shirt pocket and ready to snap in a couple of seconds from sliding the lens cover over. If you buy one make sure you get yourself an extra xd memory card, the 16 mbyte supplied will only hold sixteen at high quality, and 5 at Super high quality! I purchased a 128 mbyte card. That will give you a whopping 133 snaps at HQ, and around 45 SHQ. The battery lasted a good 15 hrs + with the monitor off. It can also be topped up at any time, so don't worry about any battery memory problems. A spare battery will set you back about £30. When on holiday I charged it in the evening and it was ready for a full days shooting. For portraits, macro and landscape I'd recommend you use Super high quality. Dont forget it's All Weather, I used it during rain etc without a problem (a common british problem). The software provided is very user friendly too, connecting to a usb on the computer was simple to do. A word of warning, if you intend to use the panorama facility make sure you purchase an Olympus xd card, the Fuji don't allow this feature! If you want a simple to use beautiful looking camera with great results!