When I went to Japan last year I carried two cameras with me. One was the robust, high performance Canon 5D Mark III, a 22MP full frame DSLR that costs about $4000. The other was a small superzoom camera with a 24x zoom range, the Panasonic FZ150. That little camera weighs about 1.5 lbs, has a much smaller 12MP sensor as compared to the Canon, and it was priced at $450.

Technically, the Canon 5D is by far the better camera of the two. It's got a much larger sensor, higher resolution, and less digital noise in low light scenes. Its lens is optically superior. And it has a wider range of ontrols that the FZ150 does not have. But the funny thing is, all of my best photographs from Japan were taken with the Panny FZ150.more