Perfect real estate camera?

I remembered when I got my Kodak V570 I was impressed with the 23mm fixed wide lens and also with the in-camera panorama stitching. This camera, after it was discontinued continued to go up in price, much like the newer Panasonic LX3 that also has a wide lens. Why? Well one reason is that they both made great cameras for the many Realtors out there. When you need to present a house on a web-site, you want to capture the full feeling of being right there, in the room or house. The problem with that is that it is hard to capture it all in one shot.

Well, I think the Sony DSC-HX5V is going to give them a run for the money. Sure going full on DSLR with bounced flash and so, will still be the best, but that is a $1500+ investment that you need to do. Take the Sony, it has many things going for it. The "iSweep" panorama function is really good. You hold the camera, either normal or upright/portrait, and the press the shutter and sweep the camera. A few seconds later and you have a finished panorama. Even though the lens is quite wide at 25mm, this is neat to have. Take this photo (mind you, this is at night, low light) of my living room:

That's 25mm and not too bad (for night time shot). But if you really want to be there, this is a quick iSweep panorama from the same place.

Now, the LGB train track would probably not really be there if the house was staged for a sale :) But you get the point, right? The 25mm lens with the panorama makes for a really wide capture without need for Photo Shop or some other expensive post processing program. And no need to lug around an expensive SLR.

And the 10x zoom and full 1920x1080 HD video is not that bad to have at your kids soccer game...

Check out the specs of the camera here: