For beginners or anyone that just wants to "point-n-shoot" there's the Simple exposure mode (the red heart icon on mode dial.) The camera sets almost everything for you, the Simple menu options are shown below.

Simple menu options:

Pict. Mode - Enlarge, 4x6", E-mail (no image resolutions to confuse the user, just 3 choices: Enlarge for big prints, 4x6" for standard prints or E-mail for 640x480 images)

Battery Type - Select Alkaline/NiMH or Oxyride

Beep - Camera makes "beep" sounds, Off, Low, High

Clock Set - Set the time and date

Normal mode (the red camera icon on the mode dial) is also an automatic exposure mode but the user has a wide array of menu settings available (see below.) The screen here shows the flash is turned Off, image size is 5M, image quality is Fine, the battery level is at full, there's room on the SD card for another 62 shots, and the image stabilizer is set to Mode 1 (shaking hand icon.)

When the shutter is half-pressed and the focus is achieved, the AF target brackets in the center turn green (red if AF fails) and a focus confirmation "green dot" is displayed. The shutter speed and aperture values will also be displayed.

Normal menu options:

White Balance - Auto, Sunny, Cloudy, Incandescent or Manual set
Sensitivity - Auto, 80, 100, 200 or 400 ISO equivalent
Aspect Ratio - 4:3, 3:2, or 16:9
Pict. Size - 5M, 3M, 2M, 1M, 0.3M
Quality - JPEG Fine or Standard
AF Mode - Select the desired AF-area sensor combination
Slow Shutter - 1/8, 1/4, 1/2 or 1 second shutter speed (use of a tripod at these speeds is highly recommended)
D. Zoom - Digital zoom option, On or Off
Color Effect - Off, Cool (bluer), Warm (redder), B/W (monochrome), Sepia
Picture Adjust - Natural (softer), Standard, Vivid (sharper)

Turn the mode dial to the SCN position to access the scene mode presets. This 4-page menu is displayed, chose from: Portrait, Soft Skin, Scenery, Sports, Night Portrait, Night scenery, Food, Party, Candle Light, Fireworks, Starry Sky (15, 30 and 60 second shutter speeds), Snow, and Baby 1 or 2. An explanation of each mode is displayed by depressing the right button of the 4-way controller.

Press the 4-way controller "Down" to enable the Quick Review function to view or delete the last image taken.

Macro (close up) focus mode lets you get as close as 1.97 inches (5cm) from your subject.

Movie mode captures QuickTime format video at QVGA resolution(320x240 pixels), with a frame rate of 30 or 10 frames per second. The LS2 does not feature a built-in microphone, therefore audio is not recorded. The zoom also may not be used during recording, but preset before hand. The length of capture is limited only by the amount of available memory.

Movie Capture Capacities

Movie mode recording options:

White Balance - Auto, Sunny, Cloudy, Incandescent or Manual set
Pict. Mode - QVGA 30fps or QVGA 10fps
AF Mode - Select the desired AF-area sensor combination desired
Digital Zoom - Digital zoom option, On or Off
Color effect - Off, Cool, Warm, B/W, Sepia