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Kodak EasyShare P880 Digital Camera Preview |
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Kodak P880 - Page 3/10
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Wednesday 2nd November 2005
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Written by Dennis Hissink
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| Kodak P880 Scenes |
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Kodak P880 Focus |
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| Kodak EasyShare P880 Scenes |
Kodak EasyShare P880 Focus |
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| On top of the Kodak EasyShare P880 camera you will find the famous 'wheel of main programs'. On cameras like the P880 this wheel is almost a basic. It can be turned 360°, either to the right or to the left, giving a click with every program or scene. The EasyShare P880 has a full Auto program (green) together with A, S and M settings. Furthermore we see built-in Scenes and other programs like landscape and a Custom mode. The programs comprise of Portrait (portrait, night portrait or anti-shake portrait), Landscape (landscape or night landscape) and Flower (flower, super close-up). Though the program mode mentions Anti-shake the P880 has no built-in Anti-shake mode! The Scenes include Sports, Sunset, Backlight, Candle light, Text, Manner/museum, Snow and Beach. The Custom mode (C) is a user-created mode that lets you save settings in P, A, S, M plus all Custom and menu settings which are saved independently from other camera settings. If the settings are created in a different mode, you can transfer and save them to any of the C modes using Copy to Custom. And finally the video mode in which you can capture video clips in a resolution up to 640x480 pixels. |
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Besides using the auto focus system of the camera you can do more than that. On top of the camera you will find a focus button which is used to set the focus for close-ups and far-away scenes. Normal AF mode is good enough for taking a picture from a minimum distance of 50cm to infinity at wide angle or tele photo. The macro mode ensures you to be able shortening the distance between the camera and the subject. The close-up distance for wide angle or tele photo is 25-50cm. Activating the Flower mode (Super Close-up) offers you a closer range at wide angle. It is only possible with the available light in stead of the light of the built-in flash. Kodak was clever enough to deactivate the built-in flash in the Flower mode, due to the fact that the effective flash range exceeds the minimal focus distance in Flower mode. Another focus mode is the infinity mode for distant subjects. The last focus mode is manual focus. The focus is at center position of the camera's field of view. When you rotate the Manual focus ring, a magnified part of the screen, a bar to show the focus range, and a gauge to show the sharpness of focus are displayed. The higher in the plus, the better the detected focus.
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| P880 External flash |
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P880 Built-in flash |
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P880 Drive mode |
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| Kodak P880 External flash |
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Kodak P880 Built-in flash |
Kodak P880 Drive mode |
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The Kodak P880 digital camera has a built-in flash, but on top of the camera you will find a hot shoe. When you want additional or specialized lighting, use an external Kodak P20 Zoom flash unit (sold separately), that uses a hot-shoe unit or an External flash connector. You can use the camera's built-in flash and external flash at the same time to provide extra fill flash. The external flash connector is located at the side of the Kodak P880. Just remove the rubber top and plug the external flash cable into the external flash connector port. The connector accepts all standard flash cables with a maximum of 500volts.
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Using the Kodak EasyShare P880 with its zoom lens will sometimes give you the need for extra light. The P880 has a built-in flash that you manually have to lift to open and push down when deactivated. In situations at night, indoors, or outdoors in heavy shadows you will definitely need some extra light. At wide angle (24mm) the effective range of the built-in flash is 0.5m - 4.0m. Zooming in to 140mm, the effective range will decrease to 0.5m - 3.1m (100 ISO). In Auto mode the P880 doesn't warn you for underexposure, neither does it give you a signal for the need of a flash. By lifting up the flash the P880 automatically fires the built-in flash.
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Pressing the Drive button on top of the camera (right) will give you access to the Drive mode. The menu appears on the back of the camera and you are able to choose from various settings. Two self-timer modes; the standard 10-second delay to capture yourself for eternity and the 2-second delay, ideal to use in combination with a tripod. It allows a steady, auto shutter-release and minimizes the chance for blur. Other settings are First Burst and Last Burst, Exposure Bracketing 3 and Exposure Bracketing 5. The Time Lapse burst completes the list of Drive mode settings. In this mode the camera takes a specified number of pictures (2–99) at specified intervals (10 seconds–24 hours in JPEG and 1 minute–24 hours in TIFF and RAW).
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| Kodak Software |
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Transferring pictures |
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Kodak Histogram |
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| Kodak P880 Software |
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Kodak P880 Transferring pictures |
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Kodak P880 Histogram |
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One thing that is absolutely a top achievement of Kodak, is the software that is delivered with all Kodak digital cameras, and as a matter of fact also with some other brands. The Kodak EasyShare software is truly easy-to-use and offers exactly what the average consumer is asking for, user-friendliness and results. The interface is good, the explanation thorough and easy to understand and after using it you wish you had used it earlier. Compliments to Kodak for their EasyShare software!
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The new Kodak P880 offers a USB interface, type USB 2.0. I couldn't find out what the speed of this interface was. It says PIMA 15740 which means it is a common communication mechanism for exchanging images with and between digital still cameras. Other sources claim USB 2.0 Full Speed, in other words slower than the Hi-Speed USB 2.0 interface. You could use a USB cable to transfer the images to a computer, or the optional EasyShare dock. When you use the SanDisk Ultra II SD Plus card you can just take the card out of the camera and plug it into a free USB port, no cables or hard/software needed.
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When the Kodak P880 is set to Capture or Review mode, the Histogram function shows the distribution of the subject's brightness. You can read the graph like this: if the peak is to the left, the subject is dark. If the peak is to the right of the graph, the subject is bright. Normally optimal exposure would lead to a peak that stands in the middle of the histogram. The Histogram function is available only in P, A, S, M and C modes. For (advanced) users it is a handy tool to check the exposure in the camera, in stead of checking it afterwards on the computer.
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Kodak P880 |
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| Editor's comment: |
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"Working with the Kodak EasyShare P880 is comfortable. Compared with an entry-level digital SLR it doesn't give you the same look and feel, but for those who want something more than the average point-and-shoot; the camera is worthwhile considering. The P880 is not the fastest camera on the planet, but it will do the job. Features like manual zoom ring, external flash mode, in-depth settings like A, S and M modes and EasyShare software form a strong combination. And also considering the attractive price level of the Kodak EasyShare P880 compared to an average advanced Megazoom digital camera, I believe that Kodak succeeded in introducing this new P-series as an attractive, affordable new line of advanced digital cameras...."
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Kodak EasyShare P880 24-140mm optical zoom |
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< previous page - Kodak EasyShare P880 |
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