Great for the Right Person!
Written: Dec 24 '01 (Updated Apr 25 '02)
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Pros: Perfectly exposed pictures, even under tricky lighting situations. Mid-roll change. Three print formats
Cons: Expensive film processing,
No hot shoe
The Bottom Line: Beautiful pictures! Flexible print formats. SLR features at a point and shoot price enables settings to make creative pictures.
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| kentarquinio's Full Review: Nikon Pronea S Film Camera |
Update 5/25/02
I noticed that the price of the Pronea has gone up dramatically and is difficult (impossible?) to find for the $149 price that was widely available during Christmas 2001.
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The Nikon Pronea S has a number of advantages and disadvantages not seen in other cameras.
First the disadvantages.
The Pronea S is an Advanced Photo System (APS) camera which has some disadvantages. In the film based camera world 35mm is "it". There are many films and accessories and additional services available for 35 mm cameras that may be more difficult to find on even unavailable for APS.
APS appears to be dropping in market share. In an unscientific sampling of stores in my area, camera sales people have reported to me that they are discontinuing many models of APS cameras and that the ones they do still carry seem to be selling less briskly. I am aware of no new APS slrs in the last several years. I believe that the great discounts to be had on APS cameras, to some degree, represent "fire sales" to rid manufacturers of slow moving products.
After the third roll of film, my Pronea S started to be unable to focus. My photo dealer exchanged it for a new one and I am up and running again.
The flash does not pop up automatically when the camera determines flash is needed. It notifies you in the viewfinder and you are supposed to this this manually. Several times I have failed to notice this and the camera took the pictures without flash. The results had the right amount of light exposure but were blurry (camera and subject movement) and were orangish (quality of light). When you consider, it actually exposed the film correctly in very low light without the benefit of flash, it actually did a pretty good job. It would have been nice though, if the flash popped up when it was needed.
Some processors that have one hour 35 mm processing do not provide one-hour APS processing.
The focusing system on the Pronea S is not as sophisticated as many of today's cameras. Witness three, five, or seven point focusing systems now commonly available on 35mm slrs. The Pronua S has only one. These multiple focusing points can aid in both focusing and exposure. Despite this limitation, I have not found the Pronea S to focus inaccurately very often. The vast majority of my pictures are correctly focussed and look great.
The lens on the Pronea S is limited to 30 to 60 mm (comparable to a 38 to 75 mm on a 35 mm camera). For my needs, the 30 mm on the Pronea S is too long for tight spots and the 60 mm is too short for portrait close-ups. A portrait limited to the head, even at 60 mm, can slightly distort the features of the person. This is not just limited to the Pronea S. Any comparable focal length lens will have the same affect. This is not important if you normally take head and shoulder portraits or group shots so this may not pertain to you.
Another disadvantage of not getting a longer lens is that you will need to get quite close if you wish to have your subject fill the screen. This makes it more difficult to get candid shots. In short, if you purchase any camera with a comparably sized lens, you may decide to purchase a lens with a greater focal length to supplement it should your tastes dictate tight closeups or portraits taken at a comfortable distance to enable candid pictures.
In contrast, 35 mm slrs can be purchased without the standard lens and you can include a telephoto lens of your choice. Some buyers are opting for a 28 to 200 mm lens as an alternative to a 28-80 mm lens. The Pronea S, to my knowledge, is not available at a further discount, if purchased without the lens. It will, however, accept lenses that are compatible with other Nikon slr cameras.
The Pronea S does not have a hot-shoe. Perhaps the designers did this to enable them to include a pop-up flash that sits high and to one side of the camera or simply because they thought most users would not require anything beyond the built in flash. The placement of the flash has made it so that red-eye is not a problem. None of my pictures, many done at night, have any evidence of redeye. For many cameras (including the Pronea S) Red-eye reduction mode gives a series of flashes prior to exposing the film. This has the potential of making your subjects uncomfortable. I never need to use the red-eye reduction feature of the Pronea S because red-eye has never been a problem with the feature turned off.
Those who are interested in an off-camera supplemental flash have this option.Nikon's solution is a wireless flash slave controller (SU-4) that can be purchased separately. Apparently, the controller watches for the on-camera flash and fires a slave flash virtually simultaneously as the on-camera flash. It then meters the exposure through the lens and turns off the on-camera flash when a proper exposure is achieved. When the camera flash turns off, the slave flash also turns off. I don't know the details beyond this (or even know if I got this exactly right). You can also purchase a manual flash very inexpensively from a another manufacturer and achieve good results by setting the flash manually or moving the flash closer or further from the subject to achieve the desired results.
Slave external flashes are more limiting than a flash that is directly attached to the camera. Flashes attached to a hot-shoe will communicate to the flash the settings of the camera. Some other manufacturers now have slave flashes that communicate with their current cameras by wireless means. If you are interested in the Pronea S but demand a hotshoe then you should consider a very similar Minolta APS SLR known as the Vectis S1.
Another disadvantage of any APS camera is the cost of the film and processing compared with 35 mm. In my area, 35 mm processing is typically around $6.00 for a 24-exposure and can sometimes be found for even less. This usually includes two prints for each exposure. Often 35 mm prints are even less when processing is on sale. 35 mm enlargements are also very reasonably priced.
In my area, APS processing of $7.99 for 25 exposures is a "good" price and this only includes single prints. Double prints for APS cost around four dollars more. This means, for those who want double prints, APS processing cost nearly twice (sometimes more) as much as 35 mm processing. APS enlargements are also dramatically more expensive than 35 mm. A 5 by 7 enlargement might be two to three times more expensive for an APS reprint as a 35 mm reprint because 35 mm reprints are often "on sale" while APS reprints almost never are.
On a percentage basis, the cost for processing APS is usually staggeringly higher than 35 mm. When you consider that the sharpness of a standard print is comparable to that of the 35 mm and the quality of enlargements may appear less sharp, this may discourage you from purchasing any APS camera. On the other hand, you may view it as money well spent to obtain the many benefits of the APS format.
Now the good side. Advanced Photo System cameras have a number of unique advantages not available with 35 mm cameras. You probably have heard about many of them.
The Pronea S was a very small slr of its day. Even with further reduction in size of newer 35 mm slrs, the Pronea S is still quite small for an SLR.
Some APS cameras can change film midway and enable you to reload the film later at the exact spot where you left off (the Pronea S can). Perhaps you may want to do this to change from color to black and white or to change films to different speeds or change films for different people using the camera.
Advanced Photo System cameras return film to you in the numbered cassette that it was originally purchased with. This number is printed on the contact sheet and the back of each print. This I find to be a great convenience. Film can then conveniently be stored in specially made storage boxes and easily matched with photos or contact sheets for later reprints
APS cameras have Print Quality Improvement. This is information recorded on the film that is supposed to make the film processor print better pictures. The Pronea S does take beautiful pictures so perhaps PQI does make a difference. Assuming I don't screw up, the Pronea S always takes perfectly exposed pictures. I took a picture of a sunset. The resulting picture was beautiful. Using my previous 35 mm point and shoot camera, sunsets appeared washed out because the camera and processor attempted to average the brightness of the scene. The Pronea S knew that this was not an average scene and the resulting print was correctly exposed and processed. I have taken many night pictures using night mode on the camera with people in the foreground and Christmas lights or office buildings in the background. The results were stunning. The people's faces were perfectly exposed and very natural looking (not washed out). The office buildings or Christmas lights were gorgeous.
The Pronea S has a smaller negative. However, I am very plesed with the results of the prints. Some claim this small negative results in grainy enlargements. I make many panorama prints, which in itself are enlargement comparable to an 8x10 in the 35 mm world. To my eyes, the image is beautiful! I have not made anything larger than a standard panorama, so I really couldn't say how larger enlargements would look. Obviously, this is a very subjective evaluation and depends largely on your own perspective.
Advanced Photo System prints will have the date and time the photo was taken printed on the back of the prints. Some APS cameras enable you to optionally print the date on the front of the photo (the Pronea S can). I find, the date feature is great. I often check on the back of prints to see when the picture was made. Some processors include other data regarding the settings of the camera when the picture was made. I find this information very interesting. Some 35 mm cameras also print the date. However, to my knowledge, 35 mm film cameras print the date on the photo itself. To me, this takes away from the beauty of the picture.
Some APS cameras will print additional standard messages such as "Anniversary" or "Birthday" on the back of the picture (the Pronea S can). I find the message feature not worth the trouble of setting the camera to record the message. On the other hand, you might like this feature.
I love the ability to print in three size formats. Print sizes are conventional (4 x 6 inches), HDTV (4X7 inches) and panorama (4x10). There are larger versions of each of these formats that enable you to create reprints in various sizes. I prefer the panorama and HDTV sizes to the conventional 4x6. To me, this is a great convenience; to be able to crop inside the camera rather than taking the trouble to have pictures cropped as reprints. I love the panorama format. Many of my pictures are panoramas. This is a required feature for me on deciding which camera to buy. On the other hand, my wife and many other people feel panoramas are not very appealing.
Of course, there are 35 mm cameras that have panorama settings. However, the only panorama 35 mm slrs in current production that I am aware of are the Minolta STsi and the Minolta XTsi. Those interested in a panorama 35 mm slr would do well to consider these. The downside of the 35 mm panorama pictures is that the cropping is done inside the camera and prevents a portion of the negative from being exposed. This is not true of APS. You can make any size reprints at any time with an APS film negative.
The smaller film size has an advantage when used with a telephoto lens. For those who use a 300 mm lens on an APS slr, the size of the resulting print is comparable to that of a 375 mm lens on a 35 mm camera. This would be great for people who want to maximize their telephoto abilities.
I have spoken with two processors in my area about printing panoramic pictures from a 35 mm roll. One told me that they do not charge extra for printing a few panorama prints when processing a roll of 35 mm film. The other told me that she did not charge extra for any number of panoramas from a 35 mm roll, even if all the pictures were panoramas. On the other hand some processors charge more, sometimes dramatically more than APS processing, for 35 mm panorama shots. Check with processors in your area to see their policy if you considering a purchase of a 35 mm camera with panoramic capabilities.
The Pronea S can be found for as little as $149. This is by far the lowest priced auto focus, auto exposure, sir camera on the market today that I am aware of. Unfortunately, during the life of the camera you are likely to have a higher overall costs than a current model 35mm slr because of higher processing and film costs. So, if you are considering a camera purchase, you should purchase the Pronea S because you value the APS film format.
The Pronea S is an SLR camera for the price of a point and shoot camera. Unlike the vast majority of point and shoot cameras, you can control the aperture and shutter speed. This can give you many creative opportunities not found in point and shoots. You can also see the picture through the lens in which the film is exposed so there is no more "chopping off heads" that I often experienced in my old point and shoot. The only advantage to the point and shoot is they are usually very small.
To summarize, the Pronea S is an inexpensive to purchase, flexible camera that takes beautiful pictures. The APS film format has many benefits and a few disadvantages. For those who want a low priced slr, the $149 Pronea is the only game in town. On the other hand, I believe its low price is a reflection of the current demand for APS cameras and lack of popular features now available on many 35mm slrs.
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 149.00
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Epinions.com ID:
kentarquinio
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Reviews written: 4
Trusted by: 0 members
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