Fuji Finepix HS10
First impressions are important, and the HS10 leaves a very good first impression. It is heavier than most similar cameras (Olympus SP800-UZ, Nikon Coolpix P100), which, unless you have to carry it great distances, is a good thing. It has a good feel, looks good and is designed to look like an SLR. The 30X zoom has a simple, conventional twist to zoom in and out, which is excellent, and probably saves lots of power. And unlike the Olympus, the Fuji has an eyepiece and a screen, and, brilliantly, your view changes automatically when you put the camera to your eye. A very nice touch.First impressions, however, are not everything. Our remit is to look for cameras that are affordable and easy to use. So we turned the camera on, took 2 photos and ... Got a message that our internal memory was full. What is the point of that? Why sell a camera with virtually no internal memory? So we found an old SD card and went out to play.
Reader review - I Like it
I would like to comment on the 'review' of the HS 10 camera. I felt it was very unfair and not a true representation of the camera's ability. The default setup of the camera is to shoot JPEG images which save very quickly and the camera is ready to shoot again almost immediately. It is clear from what your reviewer found is that this camera had been setup (by a previous reviewer?) to shoot RAW+JPEG. This would certainly give only 2 pictures, as oppose to 20 or so on default settings, and definitely slow the wright times down. It is also worth mentioning that virtually all cameras only include a demo memory; the Olympus range is the exception, not the rule. I therefore strongly suggest that that 'don't like' is changed and indeed the whole review edited to reflect the true capabilities of the camera.The Fuji HS 10 with 10 MP (plenty enough), very powerful zoom and excellent image quality is currently the bridge camera of choice.
Mark Worthington - Olympus SP 550, Olympus E30 and Nikon D90 user.
Wildlife Extra answers
We take your point about the RAW images, would it be OK to publish your comments alongside the review? Our review is aimed at people just moving into the market, who don't understand much of the more complex side of cameras, so we stand by our reviewer's main themes. The Olympus is the exception, which is why we like it.
Too complicated
We turned the camera on, pointed it, and took some more photos. We then wanted to try to change a couple of settings, but it wasn't intuitive at all. There are 13 buttons, 2 dials and a mouse. If you can find the setting that you want, you need two hands to change the settings while concentrating on the screen. But the most frustrating thing we found was once we had taken 1 photo (On auto setting), we had to wait 6-7 seconds before the camera was ready to take another, which is not good for wildlife. There may well be a way to change this, but ...?
Poor instructions
So we tried to find out what they all do, but that isn't easy. There is no printed manual, no bad thing, but there is no onboard manual (that we could find anyway), so you need a PC to read the CD manual, which stretches to 150 pages.
Unlike the Nikon and the Coolpix, which have been designed from the ground up, it seems that the HS10 was designed from the roof down. If you are an expert photographer who already has a good SLR, the HS10 would be much easier to use, but why would you want one? However if you are just moving up from a point and shoot, the HS10 is too complicated. It has been designed to look and behave like an SLR, but that isn't what we want. It is a sheep in wolf's clothing.
To see the full specifications, click here (Fujifilm website).
Usually available for £3-350 online (August 2010.). To buy from Amazon, click Fujifilm FinePix HS10
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