F10: a great choice (Fujifilm Finepix F10)

Member Name: rod88

Product:	Fujifilm Finepix F10
Date:	05/12/05 (177 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: small size, great picture quality, range of features

Disadvantages: a few small gripes

Bought as an upgrade for an old MX-1200, this camera is highly recommendable.

It has a solid feel without being heavy owing to its cast aluminium casing. Start-up is ultra-quick and images are displayed on a 2.5” lcd screen which, although of low resolution, is quite adequate for picture checking. The lithium battery seems to last just about forever.

It certainly helps to read through the manual & understand how the camera operates, especially with regard to exposure and focussing.

The camera offers ISO sensitivity up to 1600; useful for hand-held pictures in low light without flash (in a theatre, for example) and is also flexible on shutter speed, normally down to 0.25 second, 3 seconds in night mode & manually extendable up to 15 seconds. Noise (graininess) only becomes significant at ISO800 and then only at full picture resolution.

The ‘auto’ mode will suit most people most of the time, but there are also semi-automatic ‘scene positions’ (natural light/portrait/landscape/sports/night) as well as full manual mode & these enable superb results to be obtained. The instruction manual, however, does not give much information on the camera’s ‘thinking’ on the SPs. For example, in landscape mode, the camera sets white balance to ‘fine’ (daylight), sets exposure metering to average (instead of pattern) and tends towards a smaller aperture (larger f-number) for greater depth of field.

Video mode is superb, the full resolution 640x480 mode being suitable for full screen viewing. There is a small amount of electronic noise audible in quiet conditions but this is only a minor point when you have the advantage of such a compact unit.

The few small gripes detract little from an excellent overall product. Well worth five stars.

Summary: The F10 is a small, well-featured camera that is excellent value for the money.

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