Don’t get me wrong- I had a digital camera- and there was nothing wrong with it, except for the software started acting a little weird and not doing what it was supposed to do. But other than that, my camera was in excellent shape to be about 4 years old.
But, that was the thing- it was 4 years old- and that was when digital cameras first started to get big and there weren’t as many options as there are now. To be honest, I wanted a camera with a bigger viewing screen. So, on a whim I decided to buy a new camera and replace my still working fine 4MP camera.
I just started shopping on various websites and looking around then I spotted a really cool looking camera- The FujiFilm Finepix Z20 fd. The thing that drew me to it was the colors it was available in- green, blue, black, and pink! I had a really hard time deciding on a color, but I finally decided on a blue one to match my blue ipod- and I shopped around quite a bit and finally found the best deal at Amazon.com- and I paid $183 with free shipping. Amazon had it out to me within a week.
I had never even heard of this camera, but I liked the shape and colors available, and it also has a huge screen (well, huge to me) 2.5 inches, which was double the size of my old camera. It also is a 10MP camera. Not only can you take pictures, but you can also take movies with this camera as well. You have the ability to view your movies or photos on a television or computer (via the AV cables and USB cables included in the box).
The facts:
Camera height: 2.2 inches
Camera width: 3.6 inches
Camera depth 0.8 inches
Camera weight 3.9 oz.
It has 10 MP (as I mentioned earlier) and has an image resolution of up to 3648 x 2736. It has a 3x optical zoom and a 5.7 digital zoom. Has a 2.5 inch LCD screen with a 150,000 pixels. It comes with a rechargeable lithium-ion battery as its power source. You also get a charger for the battery, as well as a 2.0 USB cable, camera strap, instruction book, software CD, as well as some A/V cables. Let me mention here that this has a 1 year limited warranty as well.
Stuff it offers:
Face Detection: This camera can identify and frame up to 10 faces in the shot, making sure no one has red eye in the pic. The website says that “Behind Fujifilm's Face Detection technology is a newly developed LSI chip combined with patented software that allows the FinePix Z20fd digital still camera to reach a level of performance in digital photography never before possible. And the sophisticated, intelligent software algorithms detect red-eye and correct it in-camera. More than just red-eye reduction...this is red-eye elimination, after the image has been captured, to assure every picture looks its best.”
I find that this does a good job of detecting faces, but it may take it a moment or two to find everybody. Also, I found that this will also detect other round objects- the other day I was shooting in front of my car and it detected the tires as faces, but it really did not cause any harm in the shot. Just note that it will detect other round objects out there.
This camera also offers ISO1600 at full resolution. I find that this does a much better job shooting in low light areas than my old camera did. Our living room is especially dark at night, and even with the flash on my old camera the pictures still came out rather dark. With this camera though, the backgrounds and subjects don’t seem so dark. But, on the other hand, the flash is really strong on this camera, and I find it can be a little too ‘harsh’ in regular lighting or outdoors. For those occasions I just turn the flash off. This also has a ‘picture stabilization mode’ available, which I use a lot during outdoor activities- this will reduce camera shake, freeze subject movement, and improve low light detail. I was able to use this while taking pictures of my kids swinging, and it was able to catch them in action without blurring them.
Shooting modes:
With this camera, you can find a good shooting mode for any situation, it has way more offered than with my old camera. This offers a manual mode, which you can control and adjust all the shooting settings, including exposure compensation, white balance, and AF mode, but to be honest, I don’t use this; I’ll use the auto mode instead, which does all that for me. But, in the auto mode, you have the choices of Standard, which has standard color and contrast, then you have Chrome, which has vivid contrast and color- and this mode is suggested for outdoors, such as flowers or landscapes. You also have a black and white selection available as well. You also have the ability to turn off the face detection mode as well as the red eye function.
Natural and Dual Shot mode takes two pictures at once, one shot without the flash to preserve natural lighting, and one shot that uses the flash.
Natural Light mode this is good for areas such as my living room during the day when the blinds are open, and it is pretty bright. This mode does not have flash on it, and I find it works best outdoors or in well lit, naturally lighted areas.
Auction mode is something I tried out just recently when trying to sell something on EBay, and turns out it is pretty cool. If you auction a lot, this would be a camera I would recommend using for that. You cave the ability to combine up to four consecutive shots into a single 640x480 pixel shot. You can have four smaller squares in one shot, two squares that have a shot on each side, one large shot, or one large shot on the left and two smaller ones on the right. It really is useful for when you want to show more than one picture of an item, but you don’t have to buy another spot to put another pic on EBay, you can just do it all in one frame. I found the picture quality to be pretty good here even when blown up down at the bottom of the auction. This is a feature I’ve never seen available on a camera before.
Flower mode, well obviously is for close ups of flowers, and I haven’t gotten to use this mode myself, basically because all I can grow well are weeds! But, this mode is for vivid close ups of flowers.
You also have text mode, where you can take clear pictures of text or drawings in print.
Stamp mode is pretty cute- you have the ability to add bunny ears, speech bubbles, or lipstick kisses on the subjects in the picture. My oldest thought this was pretty funny to have bunny ears on her head.
I’ll go ahead and be honest about the movie mode and tell you I don’t use it- mainly because I have a video camera as well and since I do I really don’t worry about this mode, but you do have the ability to record up to 60 minutes worth and edit it as well. I’ll also admit I haven’t hooked this up to my TV and viewed movies or pictures either, but that would be something I’d consider doing, since the cables are included.
Playback on the Camera:
You do have the option of going through and deleting your shots on your camera, like all other cameras out there. Also, when you hook it to your computer and they get downloaded, you have the option of the shots getting deleted off the camera after downloading, which is what I use; otherwise they’ll be downloaded twice.
Anyway, back to playback on the camera, you can make cool slide shows with music to watch on your camera, and you have the ability to choose all the effects like you would with a slide show on the computer. I found that really cool. You also can look at your pics several ways, one by one, two by two, or sort them by date and look at smaller icons and then focus in on the ones you want to view.
Installing the Software/ viewing pics on the computer:
The included software was easy to install, and it only took a couple of minutes, but be sure to do so before connecting the camera. As far as the software goes, it’s pretty simple to use and just some toying around with it and you can figure out everything about it. From here you can order prints, email, crop, rotate, and edit all your pictures.
Experience:
Durability:
At first I was really worried about getting a camera with such a large screen, I thought in no time it would be full of scratches even with good care. But, the screen on this camera has a hard screen, so it’s not as fragile as I thought it would be. The slider on the front of the camera not only turns it off, but also keeps the lens protected. This camera is a nice size and can fit in the pocket with ease. Just note though if you do put it in a pocket and move around a lot, the cover may get scooted back and the camera will be turned on by accident. This camera does come with a bunch of beeps and noises that go off with every function, but you do have the ability to mute them.
I’ve had a pretty easy go with this camera, I find it is really quite simple to use and I haven’t had to refer to the manual much, but the manual is pretty explanatory about the camera.
Picture Quality:
Wow, what a difference a few megapixels and a few years make. I was really impressed with how clear and how much more defined pictures were with this camera, and gosh it ran circles around my old one.
Battery life:
Believe me, I really wasn’t that excited to see that the camera takes the rechargeable battery- I would much rather it take regular AA batteries, because replacements for these can be rather hard to find and expensive. At the moment Fuji does offer a replacement battery for this model, but 5 years from now, who knows. Technology seems to move so fast now that downright everything is disposable these days it seems. I had the same problem with my old camcorder- the battery got to where it didn’t work or charge and it was just easier to buy a new camera than having to buy another battery, because I couldn’t find one available. Right now the battery is working fine, and I don’t find myself charging it all that often and the battery life is really good. At least they did include a charger in the deal instead of making you buy one.
Emailing Pictures:
Now, this is something I use a lot when it comes to camera software, and I will tell you that Microsoft Outlook is the default email program, and this is not what I use. But, you do have the option of backing up pictures to a folder on your computer, and then I just upload my pics from the folder and it works fine.
Digital Prints:
To get decent 4”x 6” prints, I find you need to have the camera set on 5M (640 resolution), which will hold 36 frames in the internal memory, and 49 frames using a 64MB xD card, which I saved from my old camera. One of the benefits of this camera is that you can use an xD or an SD memory card. But, the camera does hold a good amount on its internal memory as well, but I just use my card since I already had one. Let me also note that you have the choice of hooking up your camera via a USB to a printer and printing pictures directly, or you can go through your software and order. Myself, I just use Snapfish like I always have and have had no problem doing so. Also, if you have another device that has high speed infrared support, then you can send pictures from your camera to the other device- now note I haven’t done this because I don’t have anything else in the house for the camera to ‘talk’ to, but that was cool nonetheless to have it available.
Overall:
I have been pretty pleased with the performance of this camera thus far, and I think it has a lot of cool options, and it is really easy to use. True, I’m not really all that pleased that it uses a strange type of battery, but haven’t had any problems with it yet. Overall, I would really recommend this.
My old digital camera review:
http://www.epinions.com/content_220118486660
And what did I do with this old camera? Well since my kids were already playing with one other than this, I looked online and found that Best Buy does have a recycling program available, and if your camera is still in good condition, works, you have the software, manual, and cables to it and is relatively modern, and you can get some cash back on it. I ended up getting a $21 gift card for returning my old camera. Not nearly what I paid for it, but much better than chunking it in the garbage. I know Olympus also offers this service as well, only you put the money towards the purchase of another Olympus camera. To find out more about the Best Buy Trade-In program, go to the Best Buy website and click Trade in Program or here:
www.bestbuytradein.com
