I have 2 different Canon digital cameras and I love them both. One of them is more of a professional camera - it can be fully automatic, or fully manual, or anywhere in between. It can also use accessory lenses. The pictures are amazing. But, it's a few years old and Canon no longer manufactures that particular model. The equivalent model today would be the PowerShot G6. My other Canon is a pocket-size point-and-shoot camera. It's great for traveling because it's so small and lightweight, and it takes very good pictures. It's a Canon Digital Elph - there are several different models of the Digital Elph and they vary in image resolution. Both of my digital cameras can take short movies - up to 3 minutes in length.
If you want to be able to take movies longer than 3 minutes, you'll want a digital camcorder. I don't have one of these, so can't give a specific recommendation there. Most digital camcorders have the ability to take decent-resolution photographs, but I know nothing about the image quality.
Webcams are usually cheap, low-resolution cameras that connect to your PC and allow you to transmit live images of yourself over the internet. I would not consider any webcam good enough for any kind of photography. The resolution of these cameras has to be relatively low in order to be able to stream over the internet, so picture quality tends to be very poor. Since they are so cheap, you could get one in addition to a regular digital camera and it wouldn't cost you that much more.
I know you said you don't like looking at websites, but I would highly recommend visiting
www.cnet.com to read reviews and ratings of different digital cameras. This website will help you decide what you need in a camera, and tell you which ones are the best. Good luck!
