Fujifilm Finepix Z5fd
Fujifilm Finepix Z5fd Review: Fujifilm Finepix Z5fd has 
a very cool feature: the face recognition, it works very nicely. I have been toying with it just for fun and the camera recognizes most of the faces as long as they are fully facing the camera or not looking away more than 50% to the sides. It’s a very cool feature and it does it’s best job in focusing and color compensating to make the faces look better. The Fujifilm Finepix Z5fd camera is very slim and fits nicely in any of my pockets. To turn it on you just slide the cover to the side and are ready to shoot. Plenty of manual settings and some buttons to get to specific functions. With a 2Gb memory card I get almost 30min of video at VGA resolution, more than enought to get the funny little videos and show panoramic views of a place.
Another cool feature is the “normal & flash” option, which takes one picture with ambient light and immediately another with flash, so you can be sure to get a good picture at least. I’m very happy with this camera. Only low grade I can give is the lack of an optical viewfinder, I find that the large LCD display is not very useful on harsh daylight (as I’m used to reflex cameras) and I don’t like to hold the camera so far away from my body because of the instability that causes. It would be nicer to hold the camera against my face to provide support.
Fujifilm Finepix Z5fd Review: Fujifilm Finepix Z5fd camera is great! In terms of photo quality it’s not going to best a bigger bulkier camera - but it’s VERY good, I would say better than most subcompact cameras in its class. The best part about this camera is that it’s quick. It’s quickness is a combo of two factors, design and processor. The sliding lens cover doubles as the power switch - it’s very easy to pull it out and slide back the cover very quickly. If you have the flash disabled it’s ready instantaneously, with flash it’ll take just a second to charge. The focusing mechanism functions very fast and the auto exposure is very robust and can handle many situations - faster and better than other cameras I’ve used (the exposure is notably better than the F series in regular or high light level situations)
The construction of the Fujifilm Finepix Z5fd camera (build quality) is incredible at this price point. It’s really built solid - and has the finish of a luxury product. I have it in the brown color and have gotten many compliments. The logo on the front also lights up at power up and when a photo is taken. It’s a nice touch that adds just a little extra polish; you can disable it if you like (another nice touch!). I’ve used Sony’s offerings in this class (W50, W80) and they feel cheap by comparison.
I bought this a couple months ago - it’s not a super new camera at this point, but it’s still very current - especially with the “lower” resolution - you avoid the noise and file sizes of those first generation cameras with the 10-12 megapixel CCDs. Plus you’re not paying out the nose for that higher pixel count which really doesn’t help the quality of your photos. There is a newer version of this model (Z10), but I’m not a big fan of where they’re taking it design-wise.
My only quibbles with this camera are that the lens cover can sometimes slide open in your pocket, it would have been preferable to make it slightly harder to open, but it’s minor - only happened a couple times so far. I also wish that there was another quality setting for the 3:2 aspect ratio - for the lowest compression level (best quality) you have to use the standard size. Fuji has another camera coming out that is similar in design to this model (I think it’s going to be the Z100 - it’s not on the site yet), but adds optical image stabilization. I’ll probably pick that model up after it drops in price a bit. I really love my Fujiflm cameras, very high quality in every regard, definitely the best value out there.
Product Features:
* 6.3-megapixel CCD captures enough detail for photo-quality 14 x 19-inch prints
* 3x optical zoom; 2.5-inch LCD display
* Face Detection Technology; up to 1600 ISO at full resolution
* Real Photo Technology; i-Flash (intelligent flash); blog mode sizes photos for posting online or e-mailing
* Stores images on xD Picture Cards (includes 26MB internal memory); powered by lithium-ion battery (battery and AC power adapter included)
Technical Details:
* Number of effective pixels: 6.3 million pixels
* CCD sensor: 1/ 2.5-inch Super CCD HR
* Number of recorded pixels: Still image: 2, 848 x 2, 136 / 3, 024 x 2, 016 (3:2 format) / 2, 048 x 1, 536 / 1, 600 x 1, 200 / 640 x 480 pixels; Movie: 640 x 480 pixels (30 frames per second), 320 x 240 pixels (30 frames per second)
* Storage media: Internal memory (approximately 26MB); optional xD-Picture Card (16MB - 2 GB)
* File format: Still image: JPEG (Exif Ver.2.2); Movie: AVI (Motion JPEG); (Design rule for Camera File system compliant / DPOF-compatible)
* Still image recording capacity on 256MB xD Picture Card (not included): 6MP(F) = 85; 6MP(N) = 169; 3:2 = 169; 3MP = 325; 2MP = 409; 0.3MP = 1, 997
* Movie recording capacity on 256MB xD Picture Card (not included): 640 x 480 = Approximately 223 seconds; 320 x 240 = Approximately 7.3 minutes
* Lens: Fujinon 3.0 x zoom lens, f3.5 - 4.2
* Lens focal length: Equivalent to 36-108mm on a 35mm camera
* Focus: Autofocus
* Focus distance: Normal: approximately 60 centimeters / 2.0 feet to infinity; Macro: approximately 8 centimeters / 3.1 inches (W) / 45 centimeters / 1.5 feet(T) to 80 centimeters / 2.6 feet
* Shutter speed: 4 seconds to 1 / 1000 seconds (depending on the shooting mode)
* Aperture: f3.5 / 5.0 / 8.0, 3 steps
* Sensitivity: AUTO / Equivalent to ISO 100, 200, 400, 800, 1600
* Exposure control: 256-zone TTL metering
* Exposure modes: Programmed AE
* White balance: Automatic; Manual (Fine, Shade, Fluorescent light (Daylight), Fluorescent light (Warm White), Fluorescent light (Cool White), Incandescent light)
* LCD monitor: 2.5-inch TFT (approximately 230, 000 pixels), approximately 100% coverage
* Flash: Auto; Effective range: Wide angle: Approximately 0.3 meters to 3.5 m / 1.0 feet- 11.5 feet; Telephoto: Approximately 0.6 to 2.8 meters / 2.0 to 9.2 feet; Flash mode: Auto, Red-eye Reduction, Forced Flash, Suppressed Flash, Slow Synchro, ; Red-eye Reduction + Slow Synchro.
* Self-timer: Approximately 10 seconds/ 2 seconds delay
* Video output: NTSC / PAL selectable
* Digital interface: USB 2.0 High-Speed
* Power source: Rechargeable battery NP-40 (included) or AC power adapter for the FinePix Z5fd
* Dimensions (W x H x D): 92.8 x 55.0 x 19.4 millimeters / 3.6 x 2.2 x 0.8 inches
* Weight: Approximately 148 grams / 5.2 ounces (excluding batteries and xD-Picture Card)
* Digital zoom: 6.2x
* Shooting modes: Normal: Auto, Picture Stabilization, Scene Position, Macro, Movie, Burst/Continuous.; SP: Natural Light, Natural Light and with Flash, Portrait, Landscape, Sport, Night, Fireworks, Sunset, Snow, Beach, Museum, Party, Flower Close-Up, Text Continuous: 1. Top-3 (maximum 2.2 frames per second, up to 3 frames), 2. Final-3 (maximum 2.2 frames per second, up to 3 frames), 3. Long-period (maximum 0.7 frames per second, up to memory card size)
* Color modes: B & W / Chrome / Standard
* Movie Recording: 640 x 480 pixels, 30 frames per second; 320 x 240 pixels, 30 frames per second; with monaural sound, AVI format (Motion JPEG)
* Voice memo: Up to 30 seconds WAV format
* Playback functions: Intelligent Face Detection, Infrared communication, Trimming for blog, Single frame, 9 Multi-frame, Sorting by date, Image rotate, Voice memo, Trimming, Slideshow
* Optional accessories: xD-Picture Card: 16MB, 32MB, 64MB, 128MB, 256MB, 512MB, 1GB, 2GB; Rechargeable Li-ion battery NP-40; Soft Case
* System requirements: Factory installed USB port; IBM PC/AT compatible computer; CPU Pentium, 200MHz or higher; Window98, 98SE, 2000Pro., Me, xP HE/Pro.; RAM of 256MB or more; 450MB of free hard disk space; CD-ROM drive
* System requirements for Macintosh computer: CPU of Power PC; Mac OS 10.2.8 to 10.3.7; RAM of 256MB or more; 400MB of free hard disk space; CD-ROM drive
* What’s in the box: FinePix Z5fd digital camera, Li-ion battery NP-40, AC power adapter for the FinePix Z5fd, hand strap, USB cable for the FinePix Z5fd, AV cable for the FinePix Z5fd, CD-ROM, FinePix Viewer, Image Mixer VCD2 LE for FinePix
Fujifilm Finepix Z5fd Description: Featuring a 6.3 megapixel Super CCD HR imager in place of the 5.1 megapixel sensor used in the previous Z3 model, the Fujifilm Finepix Z5fd retains the same Fujinon 3x optical zoom lens and much the same styling as its predecessor.
Another significant change in the Fujifilm Finepix Z5fd is the addition of the company’s Face Detection function, first seen in the FinePix S6000fd model. Achieved with a dedicated LSI chip in the camera, the feature can detect up to 10 faces in the photo simultaneously, with Fujifilm rating the feature as capable of achieving this in just 1/20 of a second. With the feature enabled, the camera indicates the faces detected in the scene by framing them with rectangles in the display white for all but the top priority face, which is framed in green. The locations of faces are then used by the Fujifilm Finepix Z5fd to confirm the appropriate location for focus and exposure detection, so as to ensure that your subject is correctly focused even when off center. In Playback mode, the feature can be cleverly used to automatically zoom images to the primary face in an image (for confirmation of pose, focus, etc.), and can also be used to automatically crop a shot for optimum portrait framing. Face detection can be disabled if desired.
On top of the face detection feature, the built-in storage memory in the Fujifilm Finepix Z5fd is more than doubled as compared to the Z3, from 10MB to 26MB (and is of course still supplemented with optional xD-Picture Card storage). One other slight change is that the minimum ISO sensitivity is now 100, rather than ISO 64 as in the FinePix Z3. The digital zoom has also increased in strength slightly to a maximum of 6.2x (was 5.7x), and a couple of new modes have been added: Blog mode allows creation of a reduced size duplicate image in playback mode, and dual-shot mode captures two images in succession, with and without the built-in flash firing. While camera size is almost identical to the Z3, the Fuji Z5fd is just a few grams heavier than that camera.
Fujifilm Finepix Z5fd Review: I wanted to like the Fujifilm Finepix Z5fd sleek looks, nice interface but the images it produces are awful. I am aware of the noise issues that all digital cameras have to a greater or lesser extent, but this camera produced only adequate images and all showed substantial artifacts and noise when viewed ‘100 %’ in any image viewing software.
Fujifilm Finepix Z5fd Review: 
Fujifilm Finepix Z5fd thing is surprisingly rugged. For people that complain about LCDs breaking, I have worn this thing all over in a small bag on a belt loop. Outdoors, it takes fantastic pictures. I travelled through France and the dynamic range and color are very good. I own a digital SLR but this thing is tiny and easy to carry. Low light performance is dependent on playing with the settings which people looking for a point and shoot normally don’t want to do. It still has the great Fuji option of offering a dual picture with natural light and then with flash. Results will vary with user’s ability. Finally, some people overlook the user interface. This is probably a personal preference but I like not having any tiny dials to turn. Everything is pushbutton.
Fujifilm Finepix Z5fd Review: Fujifilm Finepix Z5fd is a decent camera. Like most compact cameras is suffers a bit in low light but it’s still better than any I tested in the Sony line. Every time I pick the camera up, I’m blown away by how light it is. It almost doesn’t feel like I’m holding anything. The point that I gave up the 8mp Sony T20 for this 6mp. This cam doesn’t take pics as fast as the Sony but it is still unlikely that you will miss a shot. This camera isn’t slow, the Sony is fast. I always say go to a store and try before you buy as I did and I can say I’m pretty satisfied with this buy.
Price: $129.94