I tried to step into the digital world a few years ago with a Panasonic DMC FZ-10. It has a fast 2.8 aperture lens with a range of 38-420mm (35mm equivalent). I figured it'd be just fine for shooting sports and wildlife. But, it turned out to have a very noisy sensor, auto-focus is inaccurate and with the tiny viewfinder manually focusing is extremely difficult. Exposures were all over the place and I found it's small size difficult to hold even in my little hands. So, whatever you decide on don't go by specs and raving reviews of others. Try to test it out in the environment you need to use. I've since gone to a DSLR and am very much the "happy camper".