AliventiAsylum's Full Review: Fisher-Price L8341 Digital Camera
This was the Christmas of digital cameras. The older kids all received one as their main present. Not wanting my eight year old son to feel left out, and thinking that a “real” digital camera would be too delicate to be subjected to the rather rough treatment of an eight year old boy, I looked for something else. The solution was the Fisher Price Digital Camera. Although the recommended age for these cameras is up to six years, I think it’s a reasonable camera for children older than that who are likely to punish a camera a bit more than they are designed for.
The camera is very sturdy, which is the first huge plus that I was looking for. It feels like a solid block of heavy plastic, with softer plastic on either side of the main camera part that makes for easy gripping with both hands. There’s a two-eye viewfinder which makes it easier for younger kids to use as they don’t always understand how to use a single-eye viewfinder. There’s also a preview screen on the back to center the picture that way. The LCD screen is just 1.6 inches and the display isn’t all that great. Although it’s in color, the colors don’t seem to take on the vibrancy of real life on the screen and the resolution isn’t all that great. We’ve mostly used the screen to preview pictures and discard all of the junk ones my son takes.
Operating the camera is easy. There are just a few buttons on the back. One turns the camera on. One turns the built-in flash on or off. The ability to scroll through and delete pictures is back here as well. The button to take the pictures is on the front.
My son caught on to using this very easily. The first day we were treated to 400 pictures at the lower resolution of 640x480 of things like his cartoons on television, upside down shots of everyone in the family, walls, doors, etc. With the camera it was easy to preview and delete the pictures that were pure junk. The rest of the pictures we downloaded to the kids computer via the included USB cord. The resolution isn’t great at 640x480 and the best it gets to is 1.3 mega-pixels. That really isn’t all that great a resolution but this is a kids camera. It also holds many less pictures at the higher resolution - somewhere around 60.
The color on the pictures once I could see them on the computer was actually pretty good; much better than it appeared on the preview screen on the back of the camera. We didn’t need any special software to download the pictures. The software already present on the computer did a fine job with this. It picks up the camera as a USB storage device and just copies the pictures as it would any file. My son was quite pleased with the resolution and being able to print his pictures from the computer once we downloaded them. He’s not taking quite as many junk ones any more, but when he does, it’s very easy to just delete them off the camera.
The Fisher Price Digital Camera works on four AA batteries. These don’t last all that long, especially when using the flash. We bought rechargeable batteries for all of the digital cameras, this one included and just switch out the dead ones with ones that are charged up. If you go with alkaline batteries, you’ll end up spending a fortune on batteries if your child enjoys taking pictures like mine does. The battery compartment is a bit difficult to open, which is good considering I don’t want him getting in there and messing with the batteries himself.
There’s a strap included that makes it easy to hang off the wrist. My son didn’t like it and would rather carry it in his two hands so we ditched the strap. It might be easier for it to get knocked around this way, but he didn’t like carrying it the other way. The camera has been dropped several times - once even in the snow - and it has worked perfectly fine afterward each and every time.
I highly recommend this very simple camera for kids. The durability alone makes it worth buying over cheap cameras that don’t last all that long. It takes a beating from kids of just about any age. As long as they are pleased with the resolution, it’s a great option especially when younger kids want to keep up with older siblings who have a more advanced digital camera. It does burn through batteries rather quickly, so add the cost of a set or two of rechargeable batteries. It isn’t a cheap investment by any means, but it will last much longer than a cheap camera.
The Fisher Price Digital Camera is a great option for younger kids and ones above the recommended age range that you just don’t trust to handle a digital camera with the care they sometimes need, like my son. If your child is looking to craft pictures, this might not be the option for them. If they just want to be able to take pictures like their parents or siblings and aren’t particularly picky about the resolution, this is a great place to start them off learning about the picture taking process. Mom and Dad don’t have to worry when they inevitably drop it as the camera does stand up to being dropped in a variety of conditions.
For my eight year old, this has been the Christmas present he’s gotten the most out of. I’m very pleased I decided to buy it for him when I was buying cameras for the other kids in the house.
This product is a re-stage of the Kid-Tough Digital Camera J8028. 1.6" color LCD preview screen (WAS 1.3") Dual-handle grips Two-eye view finder. Co...More at Amazon Marketplace
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