Review: Nikon COOLPIX S100

Taking photos is becoming less specialist with ever-increasingly straightforward and compact solutions. However, these devices have to do something to set themselves apart from competitors, beyond the ‘easy to use’ tag. The COOLPIX S100 goes some way in doing so, by streamlining functionality that is powerful yet simple to understand.

The simplicity of this camera’s guts is personified by its exterior shell design. Smooth and slimline, it’ll easily slot right into your pocket at 18.1mm. This will appeal to those interested in ergonomic design and is complemented by a choice of three contemporary colours: classic black, Ferrari red, and hot pink.

The COOLPIX S100 looks to match competitors through its powerful HD screen, with multi-touch taking it a step further. This experience is personified through a nice big application space of 3.5 inches, allowing you to tap to take a snap (touch shutter). It’s extremely responsive (8 fps) and far more comfortable in operation than we thought it would be.

This affords you the luxury to scrutinise more clearly than the viewfinder – the camera’s wide-viewing angle with Nikon’s Clear Color Display technology means
you can see what you’re shooting in all conditions. Users can also touch-swipe through on-screen photos, as well as pinch to zoom in and out.

 

Other cool functions include HD Movie options that record at Full HD 1,080p – choose either to film fast or slow, and the camera records at speeds from 15 to 240 fps. To be honest, that is advantageous for such a camera size, but you will only have around 20 seconds of shooting time at the Full HD capacity (VGA is at 1.5 minutes). This also eats up a lot of camera memory, so an additional Flash Memory card is essential. With this extra capacity you can then make the most of the camera’s built-in HDMI connector with HDMI-CEC support for output to an HDTV.

The NIKKOR wide-angle 5x zoom lens system provides you with precision and sharp resolution, and the camera boasts a number of resolution settings suitable for varying displays – up to 16 megapixel, assuring users of outstanding high-quality for a range of scenarios.

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