Rating: Summary: Excellent travel digicam Review: I have both the Olympus E-10 and the C-700. They are complimentary, with each having its strong points..... but I prefer the C-700 for trips because of its small size, light weight, AA power, 10x zoom, and fast responses. Playback is impressively fast (esp compared to the E-10). It has impressive point and shoot qualities, which is what you do on trips. recommend that you get a couple of 128mB SM cards, as well as a couple sets of fully charged AA's before you leave for the day's outing. Image quality is excellent for outdoor shots as long as you stay below 8 x 10... but then this is not the unit to take for commercial quality shots. One drawback: ALL of your settings are lost if you take out the batteries for over an hour.... a real pain. Something you do not see in other branded models. .All in all I think it is a great camera for us ordinary folks.
Rating: Summary: Love this Camera Review: I looked at quite a few.... I love the ease of this camera, the easy to read menus, and especially the 10X zoom. I like to take pictures of flowers and still lifes and this camera does everything I want it to..... Love it. I am having so much fun.
Rating: Summary: Experienced or newbie, this camera rocks Review: I got this camera 2/2/2002 and have had a great 6 weeks with it. It compares very favorably in features to cameras selling for much more. It does suck down the batteries pretty quickly, so I got 8 RayoVac NiMH AA batteries and a 1 hour charger at [local retailer] for about $... extra, and now I never run out of fresh juice. It has incredible optical zoom which does not degrade the pixels. Sure you can get a 3 megapixel camera, but digitally zoom it to see something, and you may be using less than 2 megapixels. Not the C-700. Fits the hand well, has good but not great software. Would have been better with Windows XP compatibility included, but it works if you select the camera as a removable drive. Great ability to stitch pictures together to make an awesome panorama picture. The buttons on the back do different things depending on the selected feature on the dial on top, so be careful, you can easily format the SmartMedia card and erase all your photos, like I did once. There ought to be a "do you really want to lose your photo's?" question, but I can't fault the camera for my stupidity. The colors are excellent, the price great.
Rating: Summary: Does almost exactly what I bought it for Review: This was our first foray into a digital camera. I am an experienced amature photographer with 35mm slr's, but my wife always had problems with even a simple point-and-shoot film camera. The short story is that we are both very pleased with this camera.My wife has really learned how to take decent pictures because of the instant feedback of a digital camera. Some of her still-life's are quite good. I have been enjoying the 10x optical zoom--a range I never had on an SLR. One caveat for inexperienced or impatient photographers--you had better really practice holding the camera still if you plan to use higher zoom ratios anywhere but outdoors in bright light. If you really need the higher zoom in lower light, pick situations where the flash will be effective. Yes, there are some much higher priced digital cameras with a 10x zoom and built in image-stabilization, but as I said, they are much higher priced. Pictures are "sharp as a cat's whisker" -- and I have a closeup of our cat's face that proves that. color is good. My biggest complaint is the viewfinder. It uses an LCD like the preview screen, which is fine in low light, but can totally wash out when you're outdoors in bright light. One use we had planned for the camera is pictures while snow-skiing, but the viewfinder makes this very difficult because of the wash-out effect in bright light. If you buy this camera, invest a few dollars in a couple of sets of rechargable batteries and a recharger.
Rating: Summary: The C-700 is a really powerful camera Review: What's really great about this camera is the control that it gives you. Change the depth of field, blur the image or make it crystal clear. You can set the f stop & shutter speed to whatever you wnat & see just what the picture looks like in the viewfinder. It's one of the few through the lens systems. That, and the fact that it's really small and light weight for a camera with such a long lens( the 10x zoom). I take the camera with me on my mountain bike all over the Bay Area. It's taken quite a beating, bouncing over rocky mountain trails and so far, I've taken thousands of photos with no complaints. The through the lens viewing lets you see just what you're taking when you do close-ups. I just wish the resolution of the viewfinder was better.
Rating: Summary: Stay away from any Olympus promotions! Review: Stay away from any Olympus promotions! I bought my daughter a camera for Christmas and put the rebate in the mail right after the holidays. I am still waiting, waiting, and waiting for my FREE 64 MB memory card!
Rating: Summary: 10x zoom sharp only in bright light or with tripod Review: I bought this camera because of the 10x optical zoom, which you just don't find on consumer-quality digital cameras. Alas, now I know why. It's almost impossible to hold the camera still enuf to get a clear picture at maximum zoom unless it's in bright sunlight (quick exposure) or you're using a tripod--quick 10x zoom shots in less than perfect light are almost always a little blurred. No image stabilization like in the nicer video cameras. If I had it to do over again, I would have bought the highest megapixels I could (now there are some that are 4+ megapixels) and a 3x optical zoom. That way, I'd have the sharpest pix, and a reasonable chance of getting a sharp zoomed in shot, even tho it wouldn't be as close as the 10x.
Rating: Summary: Best Value in consumer digital camera Review: This is my first digital camera after using several SLR's for many years. While the resolution of my SLR pictures is better, I have no complaints about this camera. There are many reviews complaining about the delay between the time the shutter release is pressed and the time the camera takes the picture. These people need to learn how to use their camera. Turn on full time auto-focus and the delay is eliminated. I used the camera at the Salt Lake Olympic games and it performed admirably for action shots, even freezing a luge slider going by at about 70 mph only ten feet away without panning. I also got good shots of ski jumpers at full zoom without a tripod. The viewfinder is a little annoying in low light, but it is a minor drawback. The 10x optical zoom is fantastic. I would highly recommend this camera for its small size, big zoom and many features often found on pro-sumer models. Other things you will need: larger smartmedia card, rechargable batteries and a case. Plan on playing with the camera to learn how to use it, the manual won't give you much beyond very basic operations.
Rating: Summary: Excellent Wide Angle Performance Review: My work group tested many digital cameras over the last few years. We looked at resolution, image distortion, color saturation and accuracy and evaluated zoom lenses at the extremes of their zoom range. In general, the Olympus cameras performed better than the others tested, including Canon, Nikon and Kodak. Manufacturers can advertise how many megapixels their cameras have, but the real test is to take a resolution test image, then enlarge it to 800% and print it on a high quality printer. Our results showed that Olympus cameras performed very well "per pixel". Also, the Olympus cameras gave excellent results at the widest angle of zoom, an area where many consumer cameras fall short. Apparently, the optics used are superior, resulting in lower barrel distortion. The C-700 is an excellent choice for people willing to spend a more than the minimum.
Rating: Summary: The only low cost, small digicam with 10x and A/S/M Review: To enjoy this camera, take the time to learn to use its many features. Almost all camera settings can be displayed in the viewfinder in A/S/M mode. Great for learning how to use the camera. User preferences can be set in A/S/M mode and retained when the camera is turned off. Shutter response is fast after autofocus is locked in. Prefocus the camera for action shots. Manual and continuous auto focus are also available. I found the manual focus to be an easy one-hand operation, unlike another reviewer. Sharp, hand held 10x pictures can be taken by most people at shutter speeds of 1/100 sec and higher. Experiment to find your limits. I have not experienced significant chromatic aberrations or moiré effects noted by another reviewer. Use the flash or a tripod or other support when low light requires shutter speeds slower than your hand held limit. Takes great flash pictures in Auto mode, but do not use the Auto mode in low light conditions without the flash. The result will be grainy, blurred pictures. Do not use ISO 800 in low light conditions unless you can accept some graininess. Autofocus will fail in complete darkness, but works under most practical conditions. Manual focus is available for really tough lighting conditions. The viewfinder and LCD brightness can be increased for low light conditions. If you want a small, 10x zoom camera with A/S/M this is your only choice. You won't be disappointed unless you expect it to do something it is not designed to do. If you take a lot of low light pictures without flash and can accept a larger, more expensive camera (I couldn't), a better choice might be a 10X camera with all the features of the C-700 plus more mega pixels, image stabilization, optical viewfinder, remote shutter control, IR focus assist and a hot shoe for an external flash.
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