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Pentax Optio S50 Review
Record Modes & Menu Options
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The "point-n-shoot" Auto mode screen. Beginners or anyone that just wants to take a
picture without setting anything will like this mode. The only menu option is
shown in the next frame.
In Auto mode the only menu option is for image quality, the S50 will recognize
several shooting scenes and select appropriate settings for landscape, portrait,
night scene, or general subjects.
Auto mode has an informative Help function that is invoked by depressing the ?/Fn button.
All functions of the Mode dial, 4-way controller and buttons on the camera's back
cover are described.
Program recording mode is also an automatic mode but the user has many menu
and function options available. Onscreen icons indicate
space for another 105 pictures on the SD card and the battery
level is full. The white brackets in the center is the auto focus area.
When the shutter is half-pressed and the auto focus is locked, the AF bracket
will shrink and turn green, the selected shutter speed and aperture value
is also displayed.
Pressing the DISPLAY button turns the color LCD on/off and also controls
how much information is shown on top of the live image. Here we have all
the exposure information enabled including the real time histogram.
Pressing the ?/Fn button in other than Auto mode brings up this shortcut menu to
quickly change image size, image quality or exposure compensation. The functions
assigned to the 4-way controller are registered via the Setup menu.
Press the MENU button to access these options: Recorded Pixels - 2560x1920, 2304x1728, 2048x1536, 1600x1200, 1024x768 or 640x480
If you find the menu options difficult to read,
touching the telephoto zoom control enlarges the font.
The PICTure Modes available are: Flower, Self-portrait, Surf, Snow, Sunset, Museum,
Text, Food, Landscape Portrait, Marine.
The Digital Effect Modes are: Black and white, sepia, Red, Green, Blue,
B&W + red, B&W + green, B&W + blue, 2 in 1, Panorama assist.
In Super Macro Mode you can close focus from 2.4 to 8 inches with excellent
results. The regular Macro mode covers a range from 7 to 20 inches.
Movie mode lets you record motion JPEG at 320 x 240 resolution at 30 or 15fps;
monaural audio is also recorded. The length of movies is limited only
by available memory space.
The S50 can be used as a voice-only recorder too. |
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