Cons: Camera frustrates and hinders impromptu picture taking. Missing many features.
The Bottom Line: If you are looking for the ability to venture occasionally into advanced features this camera is missing far too many advanced features. For other folks it's the perfect camera.
consumerdude's Full Review: Canon PowerShot A95 Digital Camera
Initial Impressions
Of the eight digital cameras I've had, this was the only one where the Mrs. said "wow!" upon seeing it. It's got a very nice finish and a very cool look to the camera. Externally, the only disappointment is in the very cheap looking and cheap feeling hinged lens cap. If you use the camera on a weekly basis, it's almost a certain to break.
Some Niceties
a. The 10x image stabilized zoom is very nice. As with most point and shoot big zoom most cameras, it does have difficulty focusing near the 10x end of the zoom.
b. Tilting lens mechanism is very useful for low down shots of kids.
c. The flash seems stronger than other reviews have noted. It seemed to light up a room more than I expected.
d. The hinge mechanism seems to be very robust and able to last many years. The camera is balanced sufficiently that it will stand by itself at any angle (unlike the previous Coolpix S4).
e. There are few hard buttons on the camera (good & bad)
f. MOST IMPORTANTLY, the camera does take nice pictures...
Now for some ugly details...
a. Switching between movie and picture modes is tortuous and is certain to cause lost picture/movie taking moments.
a1. To take a movie: a) press mode button, b) toggle joystick right to movie mode, c) center press the 5-way joystick to OK. If you accidentally miss the center press OK on the joystick and select another mode, then repeat steps a, b, c.
b. There is no autobracketing feature. Not really to be expected here in a point & shoot camera, but it would have been very nice to have.
c. In normal single shot mode, there is no way to shut off the "auto-review" feature, i.e. the camera shows you the picture it just took. This is a pain because you have to wait for the camera to display the picture before you can take another one. Yes I know that it's called single shot mode, but in some other digital cameras the camera will continue to take pictures as long as you hold down the shutter button. And the delay is so interminably long on this camera that it is frustrating.
d. The camera cannot optically zoom during movies. It can only do a 2x digital zoom during movies. In my opinion, this is a grave problem with the camera.
e. It's somewhat easy to nudge the hinged lens cap so that it's in your picture. You won't have many finger shots, but you will get the lens cap on the left side of some pictures if you're not careful.
f. There are few hard buttons on the camera. This really slows things down with all the soft menu navigation required to change settings. Examples of some commonly used features which could use a hard button: flash mode, movie/picture mode, on-screen diplay details.
g. There are only two vibration reduction settings, ON or OFF.
h. The "easy" picture mode is strangely placed in Sibera on the lens body.
i. Battery/memory card
j. Here are things that are missing from the S10 that I have seen in other point & shoot cameras in this price range,
Overall, it's just a frustrating camera.
In my epinion, the S10 would be perfect if it had...
...and these are things I've had in my previous 10x digital cameras in this price range, so we're not talking about exotic features here.
1. manual focus (Sony DSC-P100)
2. more "hard" buttons
3. optical zoom during movies (Panasonic DMC-TZ1)
4. auto-exposure bracketing (Panasonic DMC-TZ1)
5. multiple pictures on self timer (Canon S2 IS)
Conclusion
In short, for a point and shoot camera, I score it very poorly on capturing impromptu moments because of the long shot to shot times and difficulty in changing settings. It's a shame this camera doesn't have any where near the number of features that its ancestral Coolpix 900 series had. To simplify things, Nikon left far too many features off this camera and took off too many buttons.
Recommended:
No
Amount Paid (US$): 344 This Camera is a Good Choice if You Want Something... Fool-Proof for Absolute Beginners
Nikon s easy-to-use Coolpix S10 combines 6.0 effective megapixels with an amazing 10x optical Zoom-Nikkor glass lens to get you close to the action.Vi...More at Buy.com Marketplaces
6.0-megapixel CCD captures enough detail for photo-quality 14 x 19-inch prints 10x image-stabilized optical zoom; 2.5-inch LCD with 170-degree viewing...More at Amazon Marketplace
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