Versatile, good auto presets and plenty of manual settings, image stabilisation, face tracking available
Disadvantages:
Image stabilisation less effective under low light, flash quickly saps battery strength
Recommend to potential buyers:
yes
Full review
Ah...first camera I bought myself. Had it for a few months, and all's well so far. Almost. On the bright side, this camera offers lots of features for occasional snapshots which I use it primarily for. I especially like the landscape/scenery mode, managed to get almost perfect color reproduction and detail in outdoor shots on bright, sunny days. For serious tweaking, it offers manual controls like aperture, speed and exposure settings but I've rarely tried those. The preset settings work just fine. And you have presets that cover most situations too.
The optical image stabilization is a big plus, and I found it to be very effective provided you have good enough lighting. One thing I experienced is that if you press the button halfway too long when focusing, the image stabilisation won't work as effectively, even in adequate lighting and fairly slow-moving / static objects.
Face tracking is fast and accurate most of the time. However, if you prefer very fast focus times I suggest switching to AiAf mode, which is basically center autofocus but with exposure balancing
In darker environments, the flash worked very well to about eight feet ahead. Better get the extra power flash attachment if you plan to take pictures from distances far away under low light. Changing the ISO setting helps a little, but still no substitute for a more powerful flash. Of course, since this camera is AA powered the battery life takes a hit with the flash on. Using alkaline batteries I got about 70-120 shots depending on the shot environment and if the flash is on or off. Using high capacity (2500mAh) rechargeable batteries I got more consistently 80-150 shots before 'battery low' signal started flashing. With lithium AAs, easily 100-250 shots.
Startup and shutdown times are very quick too, and using my SanDisk Extreme III 8GB SD (Class 6) card I could get continous shots back-to-back almost instantly. Fantastic. A slower card reduces this time slightly (my 2GB Class 4 SD), though I haven't tested what happens if you shoot continuosly till the card is full.
Zoom quality is good, and at 4X optical it's above most compacts. With digital zoom turned on quality dropped a little (loss of detail on the resulting image), so I would suggest turning it off unless needed. Zoom transition isn't that sensitive too, in that you can't move the zoom in lots of small increments (only 4 steps if I remember).
I'd say this camera is kind of like the Swiss Army knife equivalent of a compact. Easy to use, and lots of potential for real serious photography. It has features just waiting to be unlocked by the enthusiast. Real bargain at its price, too. Highly recommended for both casual photographers and the budding photojournalist.
Evaluate this review
How helpful would this review be to someone making a buying decision? Rating guidelines
Add to list 
Recommend it 
Receive review alert 
Write a review 
Publish video review 
Make a comment 
Print it 
