Wow… A Practical Digital Camera That Can Go Underwater!
Written: Jan 10 '04 (Updated Jan 12 '04)
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Pros: Excellent underwater and land performance, superb pictures during movement, easy one-handed use, low shutter delay
Cons: No digital zoom, occasional sunburst flaring, only 2-megapixels, right-hand model, limited waterproof depth
The Bottom Line: The DSC-U60 is an instant conversation piece that serves active/shallow water or winter sports lifestyles very well at a fraction of the cost of a digital camera and waterproof enclosure.
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| esasaki's Full Review: Sony Cyber-Shot DSC-U60 Digital Camera |
Being avid snorkelers, my wife and I were looking for a way to replace some of the underwater one-use film cameras that we took on our trips with a waterproof digital camera. After a lot of research into specialized underwater digital cameras and watertight enclosure for non-waterproof cameras, we decided to bring along a Sony Cyber-Shot U (DSC-U60) digital still camera with us on our recent 7-day Caribbean cruise.
The Basics
Note: Sony has an excellent virtual tour of the U60 that shows the case design and opening of the bottom of the watertight case at http://www.sonystyle.com/intershoproot/eCS/Store/en/imagesProducts/ProductTour/di/u60/U60.html -- I recommend looking at that page while reading this review.
The DSC-U60 is a compact digital camera, easily fitting in one hand—in fact, it was designed to be operated with one hand in vertical fashion (similar to how you would grip a cell phone). You grasp the body with your right hand, and your index finger activates the large shutter button. The controls on the back are operated with your thumb: buttons to change the camera’s options and a selector knob that switches from image review, image capture, and movie capture. The back of the camera also includes a small 1” LCD screen (64,000 color reflective display with backlight) that serves as the viewfinder and playback screen and is covered by a protective piece of plastic.
The front of the camera has the lens and a red-eye reduction flash, again sealed behind a protective window. On the bottom is an O-ring sealed compartment that holds the Memory Stick or Memory Stick Pro storage card, batteries, and USB port. In order to access any of these components, you must unlatch the locking release latch and flip open the bottom of the camera. Obviously, this is something that you don’t want to do in a wet environment, and special care must be taken to keep the O-ring in good condition since this is the only area where water can enter and ruin the internal electronics.
The camera also comes with a rubberized loop style strap that keeps the camera tethered to your wrist. This is important since the camera is not buoyant (it’s not that heavy so it won’t sink that fast, but if you let it go underwater, it’s not going to bob to the surface). Sony also includes two AAA rechargeable batteries, a travel battery charger, a USB 1.1 interface cable, and a meager 8MB Memory Stick (you’ll want to get either a 64 or 128 MB Memory Stick for practical use). Finally, Sony includes its ImageMixer software, which allows you to edit photos and digital video from its camcorders together into videos and slideshows. Personally, I think there are better programs out there to create slideshows, such as MemoriesOnTV (http://www.picturetotv.com) or DVD X Show (http://www.dvdxcopy.com/show.asp).
Camera Operation
Power-on performance of the camera is quite good, within about two seconds of pressing the Power button, you are ready to shoot. Combined with the camera’s fast auto-focus you can be taking pictures while other cameras are still powering on, allowing you to capture spur-of-the-moment pictures. You also can change the focus mode to auto-focus, 0.2m, 0.5m, 1.0m, or infinity depending on your needs. Once you press the shutter button, the word “RECORDING” flashes across the screen and you’ll hear a “bleep” shutter noise (you can turn the sound off). The display also shows you the camera’s battery level and the available pictures that can be stored in the remaining Memory Stick space.
Since this camera does not have either an optical or digital zoom, you’ll have to use your feet or arm to frame the shot (physically moving farther or closer to the subject). The lens has a very wide field of view, which is good for capturing landscapes, but I wish the camera had at least a digital zoom since sometimes it’s impossible to get close enough to a far-off landmark to get a decent photo.
In addition to different creative effects (black & white, sepia, negative, solarize), the camera can capture in several modes: 640x480 pixels, 640x480 burst, and 2.0 megapixel (1632x1224). The five-image burst feature is good for capturing an action sequence at 2 frames per second, but the low resolution makes it only good for web pages, e-mailing, and the like. I just leave the camera set to the 2-megapixel setting. With a 128 MB Memory Stick, I’ve been able to record more than 250 shots at that resolution with room to spare.
There are also several specialized “Scene” modes that offer preset settings to use in different situations. The ones we use the most are the underwater and sports modes: the underwater setting compensates for the blue tint underwater, while the sports mode captures high speed motion better (we use it to take pictures out the car window).
The movie mode is useless for anything other than web or e-mail use since it records MPEG videos of only 160x112 resolution without sound. Still, combined with the underwater abilities of the camera, it’s better than nothing. We used it to give our friends and family an idea of what it was like to swim through schools of colorful fishes during our snorkeling adventures.
Speaking of snorkeling, the Cyber-Shot U is rated to a depth of 5 feet. That means you can safely take it to the beach, use it during a rainstorm, take it to the ski slopes, or do some shallow snorkeling or swimming. It’s not going to hold up during scuba diving however, or in cases where water could enter the case at high pressure (such as waterskiing). There were a few occasions where I took the camera up to 10 feet for a few seconds at a time and the camera is no worse for it, but I didn’t take it when we were scuba diving due to the much deeper depth.
Battery life is pretty good: with the backlight turned off and minimal flash usage, we were able to get about 150 2-megapixel shots per charge. Since there is no optical viewfinder and the LCD screen is on all of the time, I thought this was reasonable, although you should make sure you have a fresh set of batteries in the camera during an underwater outing since there’s no way to change dead batteries on the fly.
Image transfer from the camera is accomplished via either the included USB 1.1 cable or by removing the Memory Stick and using a third-party digital media reader. I found the USB 1.1 transfer rate of the camera to be a tad slow (250 photos at an average of 450KB each took about 5 minutes, for a rate of about 0.5MB/sec). However, unless you’re really impatient or are downloading a full stick worth of pictures, it’s not unbearably slow.
Finally, it’s worth mentioning that using the camera underwater adds to its preventative maintenance requirements. First, it’s important to rinse the camera after using it underwater to remove corrosive salt and to prevent algae growth. Second, if you use it in a sandy area, such as shallow reefs or beaches, you’ll inevitably get sand in the crevices of the camera, which must be removed with a cotton swab or compressed air duster. Finally, there’s a whole section of the manual devoted to how to care for the O-ring seal, which must be free of dirt, fibers, salt, etc., since they will compromise the watertight seal. It’s a bit of a pain, but the price we pay for being able to take an electronic device underwater.
Underwater and Land Results
So far, we have taken about 1100 pictures with the DSC-U60, about 40% of them underwater. The ones taken underwater in bright and sunny surface conditions and close to the subject turned out the best. Some of the photos we took in these conditions are so good they are “bragging” material: shots of turtles, coral, or fish that are magazine quality. However, the camera doesn’t work miracles: shooting upward against the surface is hit or miss, and in murky or dimly lit water the results are no better than a film camera (the flash doesn’t help underwater). Objects you can see with your eye that are more than 3-6 feet away tend to come out like fuzzy lumps in a blue field of ocean. Still, the advantage of this digital camera combined with a high capacity Memory Stick is that you can take a lot of photos and then later delete the ones that don’t turn out.
On land, the DSC-U60 performs well, although the 2-megapixel resolution and lack of zoom are its biggest limitations. In bright sunlight, it takes very detailed and vivid pictures that are perfectly focused. We’ve also found that it excels in taking photos from fast moving vehicles—perfect for sightseeing—and with it’s wide field of view, you have time to react to a passing object and still get a photo of it. We’ve even captured perfectly sharp images of highway signs at 75 miles per hour! Indoors and at night, it’s less effective, though with the flash and some color correction with your image editing software, you can take pictures that are pretty good for a low-end point & shoot digital camera.
The most significant out-of-water problem we’ve encountered is that because of the protective window covering the lens occasionally (5-10% of the time) the sunlight striking this outer glass will create an undesirable rainbow-colored sunburst flare on the image. Another slight problem is that the camera is oriented such that if you hold the unit perfectly vertical, the picture will be taken at a 10 degree angle from the horizon. Instead, you must hold the unit slightly cocked so that the LCD display is parallel to the horizon to get straight pictures. This takes a bit of getting used to, and you can usually forget about asking someone else to take your picture with the camera since they often can’t figure out how to hold it.
Other Options
For most digital camera models, either the manufacturer or a third party often offers a watertight enclosure specifically designed for them. They generally are a clamshell design with an O-ring seal to keep the water out. The disadvantages of this approach is that the enclosures are usually more than $200 and require desiccant (moisture-absorbing) packets to prevent fogging and damage to the camera electronics. Plus, if you lose the enclosure in the ocean, you would lose $600+ worth of equipment. However, these enclosures generally go much deeper than the DSC-U60, up to 100 feet.
Another choice is a digital camera designed specifically for underwater dives, but those are at least twice as expensive as the Sony model and are less useful on land (since they have large crosshair viewfinders, bright yellow casings, and oversized buttons). But if you are planning on scuba diving or serious underwater use, the DSC-U60 is not the right choice since the depth rating is only good for basic snorkeling depth.
Finally, if you don’t need the underwater features, but like the prospect of a compact digital camera with quick startup and fast image capture, the U60’s sister model, the U30 is more conventionally styled without the waterproof case. Suitable to hang around your neck or slip into your front pocket, the U30 shares all of the features of the U60 except the ability to be used underwater.
Conclusion
The Sony Cyber-Shot U (DSC-U60) is one of the most fun cameras we’ve owned. Once you get used to its operation, it’s very easy to use spontaneously. During our recent vacation, it was used as much as our main digital camera (a 4-megapixel Olympus C-750UZ), and my wife was able to use it to grab a lot of great photos during the several bus and safari tours we went on. It became an instant conversation piece when anyone saw it—we had a taxi driver in Aruba who wanted to buy it off of us! And being the only people with an underwater digital camera during our snorkeling trips, we had a lot of folks ask us about it.
Going back to the reason why we bought it in the first place: to take underwater photos, we’re very happy with the results, from beach photos in St. Thomas to picture-perfect images in the waters off Barbados. In addition to the instant gratification of seeing the pictures, it has allowed us to cut back on the $7-10 underwater single use cameras and processing. We figure that we can recoup the cost of the camera (which we paid less than $250 for) in a couple of years in film and developing savings alone.
If you’re into snorkeling or active sports and need a rugged, waterproof camera to bring along on your next trip, I absolutely recommend the DSC-U60. Hopefully, Sony will continue to improve on this concept—it’s a market niche that is sorely under-served and with a few tweaks, a future Cyber-Shot U might become the only camera you need to take with you on vacation.
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 230.00
This Camera is a Good Choice if You Want Something... Easy Enough for Anyone to Use
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Epinions.com ID:
esasaki
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Member: Eric
Location: Long Beach, California, USA
Reviews written: 36
Trusted by: 29 members
About Me:
35-years old, married with no kids, computer network manager, movie enthusiast, gadget lover.
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