I shot professionally for years - and my 35mm was a SLR. Recently I tried to move images from my Olympus to any machine and discovered poor support for smartmedia as well as the driver for my smartmedia device. So I have been looking to replace the camera.

I wonder if the SLR cameras are the right choice. There are some cameras with 18X (and more) zoom and they support excellent macro photography. What kind of work would you be doing that requires you to have lenses that fall outside of these zoom ranges? If you can do the macro work as well, I come to the conclusion to save the complexity and cash.

FWIW my search led me to the Panasonic line - because of the Leica lenses. There are a copule capable models that will fit in an underwater case, and one model that claims to be waterproof to 40 meters (if memory serves me right). I haven't made a decision yet, but I am doubting that it will be a SLR. I was at one of the big box stores yesterday and noticed one of the Nikon Coolpix models that is extraordinarily thin. It is not exactly what I want, but a very good choice for those that are looking for a capable camera in a thin package...

There is a great comparison site on the internet if you search for digital camera comparison.