Blast from the past! (Mustek VDC 200)

Member Name: andrewl

Product:	Mustek VDC 200
Date:	09/07/09 (32 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Perfect for my purposes in its day

Disadvantages: The day was 12 years ago...

This is a very old review, and I'm embarrassed to admit it is cross-posted from Epinions. It has taken rather more editing than usual, nothing dates quicker than digital technology, it seems...

I bought this camera during a brief period when I was really enthusiastic about the Internet in the late 90s. I was going to plaster my home page with astoundingly clever touched-up photos of my mates with horns sprouting from their heads and stuff like that.

I found this camera ideal for my purposes. I was lucky to get it very cheap indeed for reasons too long to detail, and I was impressed with the clarity of the pictures, even if the level of colour wasn't always what it could have been.

The camera's stock plummeted when I realised how hard it was on batteries. Even with the LCD screen switched off, the thing could eat four high quality AA batteries in one day with no problem at all. Its habit of beeping at an ear-splitting volume when taking photos was also annoying (bearing in mind I was mostly using it when working with amateur dramatics groups).

I use this camera when I'm working with amateur dramatics groups. By opening the iris and turning the brightness up to full, you can great pictures of a theatre stage without having to use a flash, which could distract performers. I took pictures for several local productions, and we were pleased with the results (we even added ghostly hands and horns sprouting from actors' heads, it was cool).

As well as the adjustable iris, this Mustek camera has most of the features that you would expect of any modestly-priced traditional camera. There is automatic focussing (it's sadly not possible to adjust the focus manually) and a flash. Unfortunately, the automatic flash is a little abritrary. Bitter experience has taught me to judge for myself whether lighting conditions require flash photography. It goes without saying that there is no red-eye reduction feature, on-board editing, video capture or any of the other myriad functions that we now take for granted from our digital cameras.

The camera itself is quite lightweight but sturdy. The buttons controlling the LCD are well-spaced and large enough to be easy to use. The power button is placed strangely, on the top of the camera. It's very easy to switch it on accidentally, so be sure to follow the instructions and remove the batteries when you're not using it!

This camera also comes with the option to upgrade the number of pictures you can store with cheap memory cards. Unfortunately I have never bothered with these, so I can't really comment on them. The machine's internal memory can store 20 images at what the manual calls high-resolution (600 x 480!) and 50 'standard' resolution images. I have no illusions about my skill as a photographer, and 20 is many more pictures than I am likely to take in a single session. Fifty is a stupidly huge amount, and it must be noted that the standard resolution is more than adequate for web graphics or homepage profile thumbnails...

The pictures taken with this camera are not always of excellent quality, but they provide an excellent basis for post-development tinkering. It's perfect for a beginner in digital photography, and mine was packaged with plenty of easy-to-use software (Iphoto+).

The other main problem, apart from the short battery life, concerns the software. It's easy to download images on to your computer, but you can only transfer one image at a time from the camera software to Iphoto+. This is fine if you're only choosing the best images from a busy session, but if you want to download all your holiday snaps, you're in for a long haul in front of your monitor. If there is an option for copying all the image files into a folder on your hard disk, I've not found it in three years of using the machine.

This camera is now utterly obsolete, and I'm slightly gobsmacked it's available to review, as I'm sure it will not be available to buy. You almost certainly have a camera many times more powerful on your mobile phone, and I would urge you to try that instead. In fact, that's why I'm cross-posting this review, so obviously out of date, in order to make sure no one purchases this device by mistake from eBay or something, thinking they've found a bargain.

In its day, this camera was perfect for my purposes, it's in my drawer and I do still use it very occasionally as a webcam or to take pictures of my cat to email to people with dial-up connections who can't accept huge files. Other than that, it pretty much belongs in a museum, I'm afraid.

Summary: A solid digital camera but massively obsolete

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