In summary
“Twist-and-shoot” convenience, above-average picture quality and use of AA batteries make this long-zoom lens camera a good choice for travellers.Nikon has returned to ‘twist-and-shoot’ styling for its 6-megapixel Coolpix S4 camera, which is the first ‘slimline’ model with a long zoom lens. With a maximum aperture of f/3.5, the 38-380mm (equivalent) lens is relatively fast and it’s partnered with a 2.5-inch LCD monitor to allow easy shot composition. The lens isn’t stabilised, although electronic vibration reduction is available in Movie mode. No viewfinder is provided. . . [more]
Full review
Nikon has returned to ‘twist-and-shoot’ styling for its 6-megapixel Coolpix S4 camera, which is the first ‘slimline’ model with a long zoom lens. With a maximum aperture of f3.5, the 38-380mm (equivalent) lens is relatively fast and it’s partnered with a 2.5-inch LCD monitor to allow easy shot composition. The lens isn’t stabilised, although electronic vibration reduction is available in Movie mode. No viewfinder is provided.
For a long-zoom digicam, the Coolpix S4 is surprisingly compact when folded flat, although not quite shirt-pocketable. The lens module rotates through 180 degrees, allowing both forward and backward (‘self-portrait’) shooting. Three shooting modes are accessed via a slider on the top panel: auto, scene and movie. The only control provided for setting apertures and shutter speeds is exposure compensation. Sixteen scene modes are provided, four of them (Portrait, Landscape, Sports and Night Portrait) with optional Framing Assist outlines to help novice users.
Colour settings include standard, vivid colour, black-and-white, sepia and cyanotype (blue). There are also four movie mode settings offering VGA, QVGA and QQVGA resolution or a time-lapse movie at VGA resolution. Interval times can be set from 30 seconds to 60 minutes.
The S4 also includes Nikon’s Best Shot Selector modes, along with Face Priority AF and D-Lighting settings to help users obtain good shots for printing. A nifty Help function displays a text explanation of a selected control when you jog the zoom level. In-camera red-eye correction is also available and the camera can record movies with sound. Voice memos can be recorded with shots in both capture and playback modes.
The zoom lever surrounds the shutter button on the top panel, while the rear panel carries buttons for accessing the display, delete, menu and quick review modes. A tiny four-way controller has a central joystick that opens the self-timer, flash and macro menus. Two AA batteries (rechargeables supplied) slot into a compartment on the camera base, while the SD card is installed behind a sliding hatch on the side panel. Above it is the USB port, which is covered by a plastic plug. A central tripod mount is located on the base panel.
The test camera produced sharp, colourful pictures with relatively high contrast and saturation levels that caused loss of both highlight and shadow detail in sunlit subjects. We found visible barrel distortion at the wide angle setting but very little pincushioning at the tele end of the zoom range. We also detected some minor softening in edge-to-edge sharpness in wide-angle shots. Image noise was visible in low-light shots at ISO settings of 200 and 400 and digital zoom shots were both noise-affected and rather soft.
Imatest showed the test camera’s resolution to be generally good but detected low-to-moderate levels of lateral chromatic aberration. This was worse at the wide angle setting than mid-way along the zoom range. Tests also showed high saturation levels for hues from red through to purple. This resulted in a slightly pinkish caste to skin tones, which was quite noticeable in open shade when the white balance was set to auto. Other hues appeared to be relatively neutral in normal shots.
The white balance system turned in above average performance, with the pre-sets removing most colour casts and the manual mode delivering an impeccable performance with both incandescent and fluorescent lighting. Residual colour casts remaining with the auto settings would be easily removed with editing software.
We measured an average capture lag of 0.9 seconds, which reduced to 0.2 seconds with pre-focusing. Shot-to-shot times averaged 2.4 seconds. The burst mode recorded shots at 0.7 frames/second but the buffer memory filled with eight high-resolution shots and took roughly 10 seconds to clear. You can keep shooting but the frame rate slows to one shot per 3.5 seconds, which is pretty slow.
Flash coverage was excellent at ISO 400 and slightly dark at ISO 100. It took just under eight seconds to recharge the flash after a full burst at this sensitivity setting.
Video performance was acceptable, although the 15fps frame rate was slightly jerky when viewed on a TV set. Battery performance was modest. Nikon claims you should get approximately 290 shots from a fully-charged set of the supplied AA NiMH cells, which we found to be close to the mark. [27]
Specifications
Image sensor: 5.34 x 4.01mm CCD with 6.4 million photosites (6.0 megapixels effective)
Lens: 6.3-63mm f3.5 Zoom Nikkor (38-380mm in 35mm format)
Zoom ratio: 10x optical, up to 4x digital
Dimensions (wxhxd):111.5 x 68.5 x 37mm (with lens in storage position)
Weight: 205g (without battery, lens cap and card)
Image formats: Stills – JPEG (Exif 2.2); Movies – QuickTime/WAV (VGA at 15 fps)
Shutter speed range: 2-1/1000 second
Focus system/range: Contrast-detect TTL AF; range 30cm to infinity, macro to 4cm
Exposure metering/control: 256-segment matrix metering linked to AF area; Program AE plus 16 scene modes (4 with Framing Assist)
White balance: Auto, daylight, incandescent, fluorescent, cloudy, flash, pre-set (custom)
Flash modes/range (ISO auto): Auto, red-eye reduction, off, fill flash, slow sync; range 0.4-3.0 m
ISO range: Aust, ISO 50, 100, 200, 400.
Sequence shooting: 1.3 fps to memory capacity
Storage Media: 13.5MB internal memory plus SD card slot; internal memory holds 4 high-resolution images or up to 123 VGA shots.
LCD monitor: 2.5-inch 110,000 dot TFT LCD with brightness adjustment
Power supply: 2x AA EN-MH1-82 rechargeable NiMH batteries
Retailers
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Electronics Warehouse
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Ted’s Cameras
1800 186 895
Big range of cameras and photographic products with stores in most states and online.
Rating
Rating (out of 10):
- Build: 8.5
- Ease of use: 8.5
- Image quality: 8.5
- OVERALL: 8.5