Compactmate for easy access (Olympus µ[MJU:] 1050 SW)

Member Name: gemsarchitect

Product:	Olympus µ[MJU:] 1050 SW
Date:	04/02/09 (244 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: ultra compact design

Disadvantages: As per the tradition, Higher ISO problem

Olympus µ[MJU:] 1050 SW
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Olympus is a very reputed brand in digital cameras in every field with Professional digital SLR cameras, middle range compact cameras and ultra compact pocket cameras.

Here I am going to share some of my experience with ultra compact Olympus µ[MJU:] 1050 SW, a very slim and beautiful compact camera.
This camera is very light with ultra compact body and the thickness of the body is about 2.3 cm, very slim like mobile phones.

Camera has a total resolution of about 10.1 megapixel CCD and there is about 5 X optical zoom. Now have some discussion about this lens.
10.1 megapixel resolution is an average at present time, some time before 5 megapixel camera were considered as good or best resolution cameras. There are many reasons of having good resolution cameras at the moment and there were average resolution cameras at about 2 years ago. First I bought a digital camera of canon, with canon powershot A-400. The price of the camera was something about 150 pounds. But we can get excellent resolution camera with larger features at present time. Mine old camera is still working and it is gold for me. The tell of 'old is gold' is true for me about my camera.

Now have a look of other features of this camera, it has almost all features of digital compact camera with ultra compact body. 5x zoom in such a slim body is really appreciable and I really like it. I have reviewed a camera before of Sony in T series, Sony DSC T-500, that camera also have 5x zoom in slim body just like this one.

Screen size of the camera is very attractive and large with TFT active matrix 2.7" color display but the Sony camera, T-500 has something about 3.5" of TFT display. But the main differences in both screens are its functionality. This camera doesn't have touch screen but Sony camera has large touch screen. I personally don't like touch screen camera as it is very bulky feeling.

I really appreciate this display screen with bright and clear pixel display. If you want high resolution screen than it will be good choice for you to go for Panasonic Lumix DMC TZ-5, that camera has very high resolution display screen.

Next feature to discuss about the camera is its ISO speed and its results. As like many other cameras this also have problem with high ISO setting and there are range of ISO 100, to ISO 1600. But I am unable to understand that why all camera manufacturers are trying to provide more and more ISO speed in digital cameras as they give very noisy and unacceptable results at all. I don't know why, but this camera also produces noisy details after ISO 200 and higher. There are no mean of having photographs as higher ISO setting but in emergency condition where you are not allowed to use flash or you don't have appropriate flash range than you can increase ISO setting.
This camera is completely meant for point and shoot purpose so there are enough scene modes available in it, like Landscape, portrait mode, beach or snow, landscape-portrait, self-portrait, fireworks, panorama assist, night scene, sports mode, sunset, indoor, cuisine, candle, behind glass, night scene with portrait, auction, snow, available light portrait, anti shake, underwater snapshot etc.

You will see that after taking of picture with one of these scene mode, there will be very disappointing results. The problem is in almost all cameras and we need to put some settings in manual mode to capture these scene. For setting manual mode you require little bit knowledge of photography like ISO setting, exposure, flash use etc.
The camera has average flash with range about 0.2 m - 5.3 m, we can't use external flash in compact or ultra compact camera so that keep satisfy with an average flash.

Over all this is a good compact camera with an average feature. There is no any camera with perfect result, so that don't worry about the result as almost all cameras in compact and ultra compact category have similar problems.

Summary: Good compact camera

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