If you've been watching DPReview.com or the other sites, you probably know that a whole bunch of shiny new cameras have been announced recently. Probably the most exciting action is happening in the $3000 full-frame D-SLR market. The entrants are the Canon 5D-Mark II, the Nikon D700, and the Sony A900. Sony has the highest resolution (24mp), followed by Canon (21mp) and Nikon (12mp). Nikon has arguably the most sophisticated autofocus, the highest frame rate, and appears to be built to survive a small atomic blast. Canon has respun the same sensor that was already in their top-of-the-line 1Ds-Mark III, meaning they were able to keep costs down and produce what's likely to be a very big seller. Canon even tosses in a 1080p video mode. (Nikon has a 720p video mode in its much cheaper D90 camera.) Clever. Sony is trying to jump out in front of everybody with its high resolution, but is it actually a good camera? Would anybody seriously want to buy into the Sony (nee Konica-Minolta) camera system?

Personally, I bought the Nikon D700 before these announcements, and I'm not feeling the slightest regret. 12mp is plenty of resolution, and I love the amazing autofocus and the see-in-the-dark aspect of the sensor.

The other clever thing brewing is in what we might call the "advanced point-and-shoot" market. In addition to the usual crop of "super zoom" cameras, there are a few cameras angling to be the camera that a pro might stuff in the bag as a spare, or that an "advanced amateur" might pick up who cares more about image quality than size. Canon just announced the G10, which is competing with Panasonic's new LX-3 (also sold as the Leica D-Lux 4, but appears to be exactly the same camera). The Panasonic/Leica is lower resolution (a feature, not a bug), and has a wider-angle lens with a wider aperture. The Canon has an optical rangefinder (which nobody will ever use) and has big, chunky knobs, versus the fiddly-looking buttons on the Panasonic. Nikon has the new P6000 which is closer to the Canon than the Panasonic in its general specs, but has a vaguely proprietary raw file format versus the theoretically more accessible raw formats of Canon and Panasonic/Leica.

(Tom Knoll, one of the chief Adobe wizards on this, wrote of the P6000 raw files: "Adobe will attempt to support its raw format just like it attempts to support other camera's raw formats--by reading the data directly" versus using the Vista-specific WIC libraries which Nikon is supporting.)

Anyway, I've already got the D700, but my wife is hating our cheap point-and-shoot and I'm thinking of getting one of the Canon G10, Nikon P6000, or Panasonic LX3. Any thoughts on this (or on other camera topics)?