excellent optics, 10x zoom (if you're an idiot like I am you won't understand that a 10x zoom is hard to use without wiggling it); it has an idiot setting, which I use, but if you're used to a fancy camera, it has a huge range of settings for different light, etc. conditions. Has video mode (which I have only ever used to record the song of a tui in the NZ rainforest - not for video). Small, compact, big screen. You have to take the picture using the screen - no way to look through the camera.

when I asked the same question before a trip several years ago, Jim P. suggested the Panasonic Lumix. I am happy with it.

Dana, We have some falcons that bathe regularly at the beach of Lake Michigan, but I've never seen anything like this. those are some of the funniest and most refreshing photos I've seen! I just love the ones where she is entirely disassembled and when drops are flying all over! what a scream! thanks so much.

where we are these days:
looking at the same thing;
pretending not to look at each other; and
"how did I get myself into this...I thought it would be fun to have eggs!"

thanks, Lou. reminds me that the OWL 3D MOVIE is due to come out this summer sometime. Bound to be kitsch but you KNOW I'll be there, in my 3D glasses. And speaking of animation, I did like the How to Train Your Dragon movie.

Yeah, I just saw them uncovered for a minute, and I am almost 100% sure I see two BEAKS in that mess, a phenomenon most commonly seen on TWO BIRDS.
Cool.
May Day double-header!

sure does! I think you're right, Ei!

That's 1 of 4.

Zoom and g/g. Still there, still going strong.
Those are the Uptown Theater falcons; I live pretty close to that one too.

Wait - we have something like 17 peregrine nests in the area, and I suddenly remembered that a few weeks ago when I was at the Field Museum, Mary Hennen showed slides of some of the others - one downtown nest was actually IN a flowerpot, as opposed to ours, which is in a sunken column cap - the birds ledge down into a planter area.

it's already too dark here to see into the scrape; we were expecting a hatch all day...
http://www.epl.org/falconcam/

Jeanne, that's the same 3rd floor scrape I've been watching for a few years.
These albums (and others I posted) are all of that nest; the female is Nonna and the tiercel is Squawker.

http://www.kodakgallery.com/gallery/creativeapps/slideShow/Main.jsp?token=669801453506%3A802591933&sourceId=533754321803&cm_mmc=eMail-_-Share-_-Photos-_-Sharee

http://www.kodakgallery.com/gallery/creativeapps/slideShow/Main.jsp?token=869801453506%3A296449811&sourceId=533754321803&cm_mmc=eMail-_-Share-_-Photos-_-Sharee

hahahaha. she looks like she got WAY more than she bargained for!

ahhhh...nice and chaotic...that's how I like owl boxes.

Before she slipped to outside she obtained from to the running stud, whereupon they both in obscurity disappeared...

I bet that's not a bad translation -- probably that's exactly what happened.