Kodak EasyShare C360 Digital Camera - Decent, But Not As Good As Could Be
Written: Dec 30 '05 (Updated Feb 01 '06)
Product Rating:
Ease of Use:
Durability:
Battery Life:
Photo Quality:
Shutter Lag
Pros: Easy to use, well-built, uses 2 AA batteries and SD memory, fast focusing
Cons: Slow operation, some softness in images, not for large prints
The Bottom Line: The Kodak EasyShare C360 is a 5-Megapixel camera that is easy to use and produces rather good photos for print sizes up to 8x10. It uses 2 AA...
dkozin's Full Review: Kodak EasyShare C360 Digital Camera
I got the 5-Megapixel Kodak EasyShare C360 for $205, which is not exactly cheap. There is a lot of competition in this price range. Do you get what you pay for with this camera?
What is Kodak EasyShare C360
The Kodak EasyShare C360 is a 5-Megapixel compact digital camera with a 2-inch LCD screen, optical zooming viewfinder, Kodak Retinar aspheric all-glass lens with 3x optical zoom (34-102 mm equivalent) powered by 2 AA batteries. The aperture range is f/2.7-5.2 at wide angle, f/4.6-8.7 at telephoto. The camera also has a macro setting.
The C360 has an orientation sensor that rotates images automatically, features shutter speed range of 1/1,400-4 sec, ISO range of 80-400 (or Auto) and records images or movies on its internal 32 MB of memory or on SD (Secure Digital) or MMC (MultiMedia) memory cards. The camera has a USB connector and can record video in VGA resolution with sound.
First Impressions
After I inserted my rechargeable AA NiMH batteries, I was ready to use the camera using its built-in memory. To avoid having to connect the camera to my computer and to be able to store more images at any time, I used my SD memory card.
Feature-wise as well as performance-wise, the C360 is similar to the Kodak C340 (which has a smaller screen and less onboard memory). The C360 is powered on by rotating the mode wheel on the top deck from the OFF position to one of the others, e.g. AUTO or SCN. The camera extends its lens and opens the lens lid.
Controls and Ergonomics
The camera is well-built. The C360 has slightly unconventional shape with a handgrip that looks good but could have been shaped better for ergonomic purposes. The camera has its major controls within easy reach. The buttons on the rear panel are well arranged and marked.
The camera has a mode selection wheel on the top deck that lets you select the shooting mode and to turn the camera on or off as well. The wheel does not require much effort to rotate. The shutter release button is located in the middle of the wheel.
Just as the C340, the C360 has an exposed DC power port on the side, but the memory card, A/V and USB ports are covered by a hinged rigid plastic door on the other side. The battery compartment door is sturdy and the battery polarity is marked well. It is located on the bottom panel, which also has a connector for optional EasyShare docking stations as well as a tripod mount.
Menu System
The camera has a familiar Kodak menu system that is very easy to use. But the menus are not the most efficient and are you can only navigate them slow. The relatively small LCD screen and the large icons do not let you see many menu choices at the same time.
For an inexpensive camera with not much manual control, the menus are well-suited.
Ease of Use
Just as the other inexpensive Kodak cameras, the C360 is easy to use, especially in its Auto mode, where you just point and shoot. It also has clearly labeled scene modes on its mode wheel, including Portrait, Landscape, Macro, Sports and Video as well as SCN. You turn the camera on by rotating the mode wheel from the OFF position to Auto or another mode you which to engage. You rotate it to OFF to turn the camera off.
Build Quality
The C360 is sturdy and well-built with good-quality materials.
LCD
The camera has a 2-inch LCD screen that gains-up (increases brightness in the dark) and is large enough for framing the shot well. There is also an optical viewfinder.
Performance
The camera takes about 4 seconds to power-up after you rotate the mode wheel. The power-off takes about 3 seconds. Zooming from wide angle to telephoto takes less than 2 seconds and feels fast. The focusing is fast too. The camera can focus in under a second, even in dimly-lit conditions. The camera shows you where it focused by displaying green square brackets, which works well.
The shutter lag is very short. The camera can take photos at about 2-3-second intervals (without flash), which is slightly slow. If you are using the built-in flash, the interval grows to 4-5 seconds. There is also a continuous mode, which lets you take 5 photos at 2 frames per second (5 photos in 2.5 seconds).
Image Quality
The camera has a good automatic white balance system for most situation, aside from incandescent lighting, where it produces a slightly warm cast. Incandescent setting is better, but there is still some yellowish cast.
The camera produces rather good 5-Megapixel photos overall. The photos have good colors, are generally sharp and contrasty. But the photos are slightly soft overall at full wide angle and the corners of the frame are slightly soft at other focal lengths.
The lens of the camera shows some chromatic aberration close to the edge of the frame in areas of high contrast, especially at wide angle. There is also some slight fuzziness at the object edges. If you are printing 6x4 or 5x7 photos, all this will be all but invisible. However, if you want to crop extensively or print larger formats, you might be able to see these imperfections.
Overall, the photos are sharp for smaller prints but seem to be a little soft when viewed pixel-per-pixel on the computer screen or printed in large format (11x14 or larger will look soft).
Just as other compact digital cameras, the noise is a function of the ISO and gets bad at ISO 400. Photos at ISO 400 are only usable at print size of 5x7 or 6x4 inches and ISO 800 restricts the resolution to less than 2 MP and cannot be used for decent-looking prints, even at 6x4.
Battery Life
The camera uses 2 AA batteries. I used my rechargeable 1600 mAh NiMH AA batteries and took about 70 pictures without seeing the low battery warning.
Flash
The flash is pretty typical and has about average range (about 10-12 feet), but is slightly less bright than average.
Bottom Line
The Kodak EasyShare C360 is a 5-Megapixel camera that is easy to use and produces rather good photos for print sizes up to 8x10. It uses 2 AA batteries and inexpensive SD memory. I recommend it if you do not need manual control and do not intend on making enlargements exceeding 8x10 in size.
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