Fuji FinePix 4700Fuji packs a 2.4 million pixel "SuperCCD" sensor and 2400 x 1800 images into an ultra- compact digicam!<<Optics :(Previous) | (Next): Shutter Lag & Cycle Time Tests>> Page 6:Exposure & FlashReview First Posted: 10/7/2000 |
Exposure
The 4700z offers good exposure control, with several exposure modes to accommodate a variety of shooting situations, although it stops short of advanced modes such as aperture- or shutter-priority. Normal shutter speeds range from 1/4 to 1/2000 of a second, but extend down to 3 seconds in Night Scene mode.
Auto exposure controls everything, from white balance to shutter speed, giving you very little control except over the flash (which you can simply open or close). If the pop-up flash is released, the camera will judge whether or not it's needed, although you can override that decision by forcing the flash to fire via the flash mode control. You can also access the self-timer, macro mode and digital telephoto settings. Manual exposure mode simply means that you have control over white balance, exposure compensation, ISO, flash intensity, etc., everything except aperture and shutter speed. In all capture modes, aperture and shutter speed are reported on the LCD monitor whenever the shutter button is halfway pressed and the LCD is enabled. In manual mode, this information is displayed even if the LCD viewfinder function is turned off, since Manual mode uses the LCD for its menus anyway. While we personally prefer to have complete exposure control, we do understand that many users prefer the simplicity of a point-and-shoot camera that assumes more of the responsibility for the exposure selection.
We were a little puzzled by the Portrait and Landscape modes: Generally, modes of this sort bias the exposure system toward large apertures (shallow depth of field) and small apertures (greater depth of field) respectively. In the case of the 4700 though, we didn't see this effect, but rather a slight tendency to expose for the highlights in Portrait mode and to expose for shadows in Landscape. (Slightly shorter and longer exposure times respectively.)
In Manual mode, white balance can be set to Auto, Daylight, Cloudy, Daylight Fluorescent, Warm White Fluorescent, Cool White Fluorescent or Incandescent values. Exposure compensation is adjustable by +/- 1.5EV in 0.3 EV increments and ISO can be set to 200, 400 or 800. Metering can also be adjusted, with options of Average, Spot and Multi available. The Average metering setting simply takes an average exposure value of the entire subject while Spot metering bases the exposure on the very center of the image. The Multi setting lets the camera assess the entire scene and then select the optimum exposure, using a sophisticated algorithm to decide what is most likely important in the picture. Auto bracketing takes three shots of the same image at different exposure variables, which you can select (choices of +/- 1/3, 2/3 and 1 EV increments). A sharpness option lets you adjust the image sharpness to high, normal or low (-, 0 or + settings). Compared to some cameras we've tested, the low and high sharpness options appear to be a bit more subtle, and hence perhaps a bit more useful: Use low sharpness if you're planning to do more manipulation of the image after capture, in a program like Photoshop(tm), applying sharpening there after you've completed your manipulations. Use high sharpening for images that will be printed immediately. (We actually found the high sharpness setting to be of some use in sharpening images which were a little softer than we'd have liked, particularly in low-light situations such as our indoor portrait shots.)
Finally, a 10 second self-timer is accessible in most of the exposure modes by pressing the right arrow button. Once activated by the shutter button, the self-timer lamp on the front of the camera lights solid for five seconds and then blinks for the remaining five. A numerical countdown is also displayed in the small information display panel. An interesting feature on the 4700z is that after firing the shutter in Manual exposure mode, the LCD optionally displays the image and asks whether you want to record it or delete it. Because this feature could be helpful in some situations but annoying in others, it can be turned on or off through the Manual exposure settings menu. You can zoom into a captured image while in Preview Display by pressing the zoom controls. (Having that full 15x playback zoom is really handy in preview mode, particularly for focus-critical work like macro shooting!)
Flash
The 4700z features a built-in pop-up flash with Auto, Red-Eye Reduction, Forced, Suppressed and Slow-Synchro modes. In all exposure modes except for Manual and Night Scene, the flash is always set to Auto and can only be controlled by popping it up or closing it. In Manual mode, all the flash modes are available, as well as an intensity setting in the Manual exposure settings menu (from -0.6 to +0.6 in 0.3 EV increments). In Night Scene, the Slow-Synchro flash mode can be combined with the mode's slow shutter speed to illuminate subjects in front of a dark background.
Fuji lists the 4700's flash range as being from 0.7 - 13.1 feet (0.2 - 4.0m) in wide angle mode, and 0.7 - 9.8 feet (0.2 - 3m) in telephoto mode. These numbers agree well with our own tests using the telephoto setting, in which the camera did well out to about 10 feet before falling off. (As you might expect, increasing the ISO speed to 400 or 800 proportionately extends the flash range: At ISO 400, the telephoto range should extend to about 14 feet, and all the way to 20 feet at ISO 800, albeit with the increased levels of image noise that the higher ISO settings bring.)
Special Exposure Modes
The 4700z features several special exposure modes to accommodate a variety of shooting scenarios, all accessible by turning the mode dial on top of the camera. As noted earlier, we're not sure just what Portrait exposure mode does: We went so far as to speak with the Fuji product manager for the 4700, and he thought it was supposed to set a bias in the exposure system toward the larger aperture setting. (As we'd also expected.) Extensive experimentation with our test unit showed that this wasn't the case however. Likewise, Landscape mode is supposed to select the smaller aperture setting and the daylight white balance option. We can't speak to the white balance setting, but the aperture appears to be free to assume whatever value the auto exposure system sees fit... Night Scene mode uses a slower shutter speed (maximum of three seconds) to capture subjects under low-light conditions. Continuous Shooting allows you to take up to three consecutive shots at approximately 0.2 second intervals (depending on SmartMedia space and the amount of image information to process). A framing guideline function is available in Auto, Portrait, Landscape and Night Scene to help frame particular shots such as group portraits or a large scene.
Movie mode sets the image size to 320 x 240 pixels and records at approximately 10 frames per second with sound. The amount of recording time varies with the amount of SmartMedia space and is displayed on the LCD panel when entering the mode. Fuji estimates that a 16MB SmartMedia card (supplied with the camera) should provide approximately 90 seconds of shooting time, with larger memory capacities holding proportionately longer movies. (Up to 364 seconds on a 64MB SmartMedia card.) The movies are stored in a standard AVI motion-JPEG format, and can be viewed on a computer using Quicktime 2.0 or later.
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