I am an owner of 35mm Canon camera with lot of lenses (from 20 f2,8 to 80-200 f2,8). I have purchased this camera before a trip to Greece as I needed a very small and light camera that I could put into a pocket or pouch. Bringing 2 Kg of photo equipment in yours backpack is not always easy and so I wanted to try a different approach and after a long trade-off between the Canon S70 and the Fuji E550 I purchased the latter.

I have found the E550 great for many reasons. First of all the 32-130 (35mm equivalent) optical lens gives you a great flexibility as, differently from most of the other compact cameras except the Canon S70 (28-105), the widest aperture allows you to take pictures even when you are close to the subject. The ISO 800 setting allows you to to take good pictures if light is low.

In this review I always refer to the optical zoom as the digital one is basically a fictitious enlargement (you can do the same thing with Photoshop later on). I found it useful a couple of times when I needed to view on the LDC display some details that were very far but without taking photos (like a binocular). In any case the maximum digital zoom depends on the chosen resolution and varies from x1,4 at 6Mpixels to 6,3x at VGA resolution (640x480).

The macro function is useful as it allows to take pictures at 7cm from the subject. The results are quite good.

Video capture is great: 640x480 at 30 fps with length limited only by storage capacity. Unlikely the Nikon cameras that use quicktime format you can easily edit the avi files generated by the E550 with VirtualDub (freeware) and with XviD you can reduce the size of the files of at least 10 times without loss of video and audio quality.

The LCD has generous dimensions and the camera software is easy to be mastered and used. If needed you can have full control on the camera parameters (aperture, exposure time, focusing) and you have available useful bracketing functions (quite similar to PRO cameras). The handgrip is very good (I quite like the shape on the battery side that helps you to keep firmly the camera with your hand) and the dimensions of the camera are really minimum considering all the characteristics (better than Canon S70 from my standpoint).

The startup time is almost instantaneous and the shutter lag very low. For sure you will not miss photos waiting for the camera start-up or focusing as it shots almost immediately.

Using standard NiMH battery the E550 allows you to get cheap replacement batteries to be brought with you. From my experience I am able to take around 300 shots with one set of battery. This however is never a problem because with a few $/euro you can buy and keep with you a couple of additional AA batteries to be used in case of emergency.

Concerning the memories the xD ones used by the Fuji are not much more expansive than the standard ones.

About the manual: I read it only once just to be sure I was not doing anything wrong or that I was not missing some important features. The E550 is really easy to be used.

The Cons: Viewfinder is hardly usable (very small - and at wider angle you see the lens protruding out) while the LCD in conditions of bright light cannot be always seen clearly. Maximum exposure time is limited to 3s (not good if you want to take pictures of the sky in the night - this is an absurd limitation). Of course at the wider aperture you have to expect some distortion but that is impossible to be avoided with a such compact lens. The picture format like all other compact digital cameras is 4:3 instead of the 3:2 of SLR cameras.

In conclusion I think the E550 is an incredibly capable compact camera and compared with other similar cameras it is really great value for money. It has some aspects that could be improved but all in all I definitely recommend it. The pictures taken are really impressive for a such small camera. If you want to see some of the photos taken with the E550 in Greece please refer to http://it.pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/dsantachiara/my_photos" and then click on Alonissos.



Recommended: Yes

Amount Paid (US$): 390
This Camera is a Good Choice if You Want Something... Flexible Enough for Enthusiasts