Small Size Reflects Price, Not Features
Written: Dec 15 '02 (Updated Dec 31 '02)
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Pros: Sliver housing, lens cover, small, only 6.5oz, picture quality, and price.
Cons: Shutter lag, flash recharge time, and proprietary memory.
The Bottom Line: Due to the small camera size, photo quality, and especially price, you should look into this model when considering a digital camera.
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| hoosierdaddy85's Full Review: FUJIFILM FinePix 2650 Digital Camera |
Fuji FinePix 2650 - How'd they pack all those features in such a small camera?
Reviewed by Tyler A. Blythe
This is actually the second digital camera I've been able to have enough experience with to review, so I am not a newcomer to the world of digital cameras. My first digital camera was the 1-megapixel HP C200. I'm also very familiar with photography in general as I've been involved in the SLR side of pictures for many years. So when I found out a friend of mine bought this tiny camera, I wanted to borrow it for a few days and put it through some tests. With its price and size as the leading Pros, I discovered other positives with this small, silver beauty. Don't expect studio quality 8x10's from a $200 camera, but at this price tag I was very impressed.
Overview
The first thing that will probably catch most peoples' eye about this camera is its size. Although its depth is a little more than most (4 inches) it makes up for this in its height and width, 2.6in and 4in respectively. This camera can fit in a front shirt pocket easily, but it's depth of 4in make it a little too bulky to "stylishly" put it there, but it can easily fit into a pant or jacket pocket, and especially a purse. Another great thing about this camera, which I was shocked to find some cameras in this price range lacked, mainly SONYs, is a sliding lens cover, albeit somewhat flimsy. Some digital cameras don't have any sort of lens cover. I have been in photography for quite a while and it is just common sense to take good care of your lenses, and since I normally use SLRs, it's an obsession of mine. Anyway, while browsing through the stores I never even bothered to look at cameras without lens protection, because you can have the best camera on the market, but it only takes a small scratch to totally ruin your picture quality. I suggest a good lens cover to be high on your list of features as well.
This camera weighs in at 6.5oz (but feels like a feather), and with its compact size, should be easy for an adult of any age to hold and keep steady with one hand. If you can hold a can of coke steady in one hand, you can manage this camera. I also like how the flash is on the right side of the viewfinder (if you are holding the camera like you're shooting it) because if you need to use your left hand, you don't have to worry about blocking the flash which is an issue with some cameras. The LCD seems slightly dark compared to some other models, but no LCD will be good in direct light. The camera comes complete with a 16mb xD storage card, 2 AA alkaline batteries, USB cable, hand strap, and software for uploading your pictures to your computer.
Ease of Use
This camera is about as easy as it can get to use. There isn't much to say in this area. Slide the lens cover, slide the power button, select your shooting mode (auto, movie, or macro) via a rotating selector surrounding the shutter button, and press the shutter button on the top. If you want to zoom (3x Optical; 2.5x Digital), the buttons are located right where your thumb is placed. If you want to change your white balance, this can be done relatively easily as well. If you forget to change the balance mode, you could produce "bleached photos" or ones that are dark, and this could be viewed as a nuisance to some, but keep in mind that most cameras don't allow you to do this. I'll go into some explanation of this feature, and why it's so good to have it, in the Photo Quality section. If you want to view the photos you've taken, just a few button pushes and you can be scanning through all the photos on that card.
Shutter Lag
This camera is between average and good in the area of shutter lag. It will take a second or less before the picture is actually taken, but you will experience this with digital cameras for many more years unless you make the leap into the $800 range. I don't feel the shutter lag on this camera is any worse than the lag on other cameras, if anything, it's a little better. I was pretty impressed with shutter speed as well. There are so many variables when it comes to shutter speed on point and shoot cameras, especially digital ones, but I was able to snap a few shots of my dog catching a Frisbee in mid air with little or no blurring. It takes a little while for the flash to recharge, but the camera writes the picture to the memory card pretty fast, which is supposed to be a big plus of this xD format.
Durability
This camera seems to be built very well with the exception of the lens cover. I know I've mentioned it a few times already, so you're probably thinking this cover is awful...but it's really not. It feels cheap, but that doesn't always mean it is. Any lens cover is better than none, so you have good lens protection. The great thing about digital cameras is their lack of moving parts compared to their film counterparts. I doubt you have to worry about the zoom motor going bad, and the lens cover should last several years unless you are sliding it back and forth 24 hours a day, so this camera should easily "last until new technology develops." Like I said, it only feels cheap, but you don't exactly need a solid steel shield to slide over the lens, just something to keep dust off and any other foreign object away, so this camera should hold up just fine.
Photo Quality
This is the area where this camera really shines...and I'm not just talking about the flash (which actually isn't all that powerful). For a $200 digital camera, and really any 2.0-megapixel camera, this takes some remarkable pictures. I can print 8x10's and I hardly notice "jaggies" except in areas where there is high color contrast, and even then I have to hold the photo close to my eyes. Also think about this. 8x10's are normally put in a frame and placed on a shelf or whatever and viewed from a distance, whereas your smaller formats are put in albums and held by the viewer. With this camera, the images are very smooth at those formats, and they are suitable for 8x10, especially when you consider nobody will be holding an 8x10 3in from their face. If you are just going to be using the images on the internet, this camera will more than suit your needs. As for the size of the images, you can select from: 1600 x 1200, 1280 x 960, 640 x 480 image formats. Keep in mind that the higher the resolution, the better the quality, but you'll get fewer photos on the card. In my experience, if I know I'm only going to be using the photos on the internet, I'll set it to the middle setting. This allows me to get more photos on the card, without losing all quality, and the photos don't hog up so much space on my hard drive either. Not to run this in the ground, but don't expect great prints either if you have a cheap printer. It takes a good printer paired up with a good camera to make nice prints.
--Adjusting White Balance
As I said earlier, you can adjust the white balance, or leave this setting to auto. Some beginners may find it annoying to adjust white balance themselves, but I would just like to put it in this light (no pun intended). You are taking a photo outside then step inside to take a picture in incandescent light, then go to another room and take a picture in fluorescent light. Anyone with photography experience will tell you these conditions are so different from one another it's like apples and oranges. With my expensive SLR, I had to buy a lens filter for daylight, incandescent, and fluorescent lights which came to a total a little over $100. With this camera you can select your lighting type from presets of: Fine, Shade, Daylight Fluorescent, Warm White Fluorescent, Cool White Fluorescent, and Incandescent Light. Now if you forget to change the mode, you can end up with a bleached photo, or one that is too dark. You can also set white balance to Automatic, however, automatic detection of white balance is more difficult for a camera than say auto-focus or auto-flash, so I would recommend setting this to manual. Most photos in Automatic did turn out fine, but I am pretty picky and felt the results were better when I selected the mode myself. Just a scenario, you are in a room with fluorescent lights overhead (which most photographers know is not a good friend of ours) and a few high power incandescent lights. When you take the picture in Auto mode, the camera could set itself to incandescent, when really would probably need a fluorescent setting and this could cause a sub-par picture. Now for most people, the difference isn't all that noticeable, especially if you are used to point-and-shoot cameras. But I think that if you make a habit of setting White Balance yourself, then after a month or two, take some shots in Auto mode, you'll be able to see the difference.
Battery Life
To start this off let me say that ANY digital camera can "eat" batteries; it all depends on how you use it. The BEST way to gauge battery life is merely on number of shots, and this is without using the LCD (this also doesn't include uploading). Any magazine rates battery life by this process and this process alone. You can take any digital camera, and if you use the LCD all the time, and just use the batteries during upload time, you'll go through batteries like crazy. So I feel it is wrong for some people to say this camera isn't conservative enough when it comes to battery life. Digital cameras were designed to be used like normal cameras, then you use the LCD to make a quick view of a photo to decide right then if you like it or not. Some people have the habit of using the LCD as the viewfinder, then showing the photo to everyone within a one mile radius, and THEN use the battery power to upload the images. Anyone that is investing in a digital camera should take the $20-$30 and buy an AC adapter. ALL digital cameras have an adapter port for a reason...to hook up an adapter during uploading. In my opinion, this camera doesn't eat through batteries as bad as most people say. Just remember, if you are going to run an LCD screen all the time, and use battery power to upload your images, it's only logical that they won't last long. Use the camera like it was designed, like all digital cameras were designed, and I'm sure you will feel like you're getting your fair share out of them.
Other Features
I just wanted to touch on a few other features of this camera. One for instance is the method by which you zoom. It is two separate buttons, but I wish it was more of a slider or "see-saw" type button that you could just push or pull instead of using two buttons. Mainly what is most impressive about this camera is that it's not just a camera. You can make movie clips (although not the greatest quality) in the AVI and Motion JPEG formats. Not only that, but this camera triples as a web cam. So in a way you are getting three devices in one. The movie option isn't so great, but it's fun, however, this camera becomes a very good web cam, and with its compact size, it's not too big to be placed on your monitor or wherever you want if you decide to use it for video conferencing. As for the memory module, at first I was let down to discover it used a proprietary format, but after some research I found out this was developed by Olympus and Fuji together. The plans are for both companies to move to this kind of format not only so everyone has to buy new memory cards, but this card is supposed to read and write the images faster, which translates to less wait between pictures, and faster uploading from camera to PC.
Is this the best digital camera on the market? Of course not. Is this the best 2-megapixel camera? Maybe. Is it the best in its price range? Absolutely.
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 199.99
This Camera is a Good Choice if You Want Something... Easy Enough for Anyone to Use
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Epinions.com ID:
hoosierdaddy85
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Reviews written: 2
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