Decision time with a little help, since T. decided to pitch in as a birthday present for me. Here and here I've outlined some of the stops in my search for a new camera. For a few weeks now, I've scanned various stores online, second hand venues both online and offline, compared different cameras, models and prices, read reviews, and thought about what is important to me as a photographer and what is less so. Throughout my search, I've looked for a small, light camera that is versatile enough to allow me to take extreme close-ups while offering a decent zoom — at a reasonable price. In addition, I reckoned it wouldn't hurt if the camera was available in white. ;)

This is what I eventually ended up buying: an Olympus PEN mini E-PM1 with interchangeable 14-42 mm and 40-150mm lenses. The camera is reasonably small (109,5 × 63,7 × 34 mm) and light (217 g), which is slightly less than half of the weight of my current Olympus SP 550-uz. Nevertheless, I've been very happy with that and with the performance of the Olympus cameras in general, and I've heard that the lenses are good as well. I was slightly apprehensive when thinking about carrying different lenses with me, but I finally decided on this option since the total weight of the E-PM1 package is not that bad. The newer version, E-PM2, has a few more features, but it is also slightly bigger and heavier and much more expensive, so I hope the E-PM1 will be a good match for me and I think the price was more than fair. I consider it to be the icing on the cake that it indeed is white.