General comments:
Small, easy to handle, unobtrusive, one charge of the battery = approximately one full 256mb CF card = approximately 125 shots at the 330RS max quality settings. Slow zoom, "wide" isn't very wide, good flare control, good auto focusing even in fairly low light, good auto exposure.
Underwater I had a bit more trouble getting the focus and even the field of view, but when you are a not-too-strong swimmer with high buoyancy and severe near-sighted astigmatism, chasing a school of fish does not make for ideal conditions. Also, when using the UW case on the camera on the sail to the snorkel spot, I had trouble getting my eye close enough to the optical viewer without hitting my glasses with the buttons on the back of the UW case. Good news was that the case does not leak, almost every function works even when the case is on, and there is no relearning needed to switch from a bare camera to one in the case. All the controls re basically one-for-one to what is one the camera. I did
BTW - I'll be selling the underwater case. I bought it just to use for this one snorkel trip, have no particular reason to keep it. Anybody interested, contact me off-list and we can discuss price.
I have not noticed a big discrepancy between the optical viewfinder and the image. Of the 1200+ images I've taken so far, probably 25-30 were done using the LCD screen. Biggest single problem I have had was when I wanted to shoot faster than the camera could support. To speed things up, I mostly set the camera on "infinity" focus setting so that I wouldn't have to wait on the AF.
I think this camera is definitely a "keeper". As I had hoped, it will nicely fit the ecological niche once filled by a succession of Minox 35mm zone-focus cameras: simple, easy, fast to use with surprisingly good quality. It won't replace my 645.
BTW, my vacation was on Sint Maarten/St. Martin. The whole island, both the French and Dutch sides, are a duty-free zone. Best deal I found on the 330RS was $310, best on the 430RS was $475, best deal on the 330GS was $395 or something like that. I did buy the UW case there, also a 20-35 FA/4 zoom. I saw no other Pentax cameras or lenses of note - Canon and Nikon dominate.
Stan
on 11/19/02 12:41 AM, Michael Perham at [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
Well I have been playing with my new toy for a couple weeks now and overall I am pleased with my purchase. I particularly like the intuitive controls that seem to be a Pentax trademark, and I like the solid feel and overall quality of this digital P&S. Image quality is good and I really like the skin tones it produces.
On the down side, the optical viewfinder seems to show only about 70% of the image. I guess for critical framing, such as in macro work, I will have to use the LCD screen which shows a true image and for everything else I can crop tight and know I am not cutting off heads or hands etc. My other complaint is the camera wont auto focus in the subdued light of my living room at night. No problem with the MZS, but we are comparing apples and oranges here and I think I will simply have to manually set the focus to an appropriate distance and rely on DOF to do the job.
Any one else have any observations on the Optio series �good or bad?
Cheers, Mike.
