Kodak/Z710 Review

[Josh Miller]

My only previous Digital camera was a Kodak CZ7430. It was a nice, simple camera that served me well for about two years and 6000 photos. Unfortunately, it took more of a beating than it really should have and started flaking out on me.

Still, I’ve used several other Digital cameras from relatives and work.

Originally I wanted to upgrade to a Sony Alpha dSLR since it’s compatible with my film camera’s lenses. However that proved to be more cost prohibitive than expected. I also received this camera in the mean time as a family gift for Christmas.

I’ve been using this camera for about 3 weeks now and I will say I’m very satisfied with the results I’ve gotten. I most appreciate the 10x Zoom capabilities since I do a lot of photographing of small toys and action figures. This camera will produce a 3072 x 2304 pixel photograph with top notch quality all the way through.

It also works well for non-macro photos of course and the zoom is certainly useful for taking detailed photos of distant subjects.

In addition to photos this camera will record video with a maximum resolution of 640×480. While that isn’t huge, the quality on the video is passably usable for casual use. If you’re really wanting quality digital video I’d recommend a regular camcorder however. Also of note on the video, this camera eats through batteries pretty quickly while recording video. While the batteries I had on hand were not the best quality, They were dead after recording a half hour of video.

I do have a few gripes. The LCD image tends to be a bit grainy in live view mode, especially in the eyepiece view. I’d imagine this is to help conserve battery power but it can be a bit distracting when trying to judge the quality of the picture you’re about to take.

There is a lack of Anti-Shake built in for this camera so if you’re trying to take photos at a great distance or in low light without the flash you’ll want to invest in a tripod.

The lens cap doesn’t stay on well at all. It has these two squeeze clips holding it in place. It takes hardly any jarring to get it off and turning the camera on while the cap is attached will cause the cap to pop off.

The flash pops up automatically any time the camera is turned on. This is kind of annoying since you may not always want to use the flash. I find the easy way to remedy this is to simply hold the flash down with one finger.

Another minor complaint, compared to most point and shoot style cameras, this one is kind of large. My old CX7430 would fit into my jacket pocket easy, this one is a load in there (and these are big pockets). Still, it’s smaller than my Minolta film camera and likely smaller than the Sony Alpha I had been looking at.

So in conclusion, this is a really nice camera with a really nice zoom function for a decent price, but ti has a few convenience style issues going for it. Still, I’d recommend it.

Some sample photos taken with this camera here...

Rating - 7/10

[googlit]

check out this camera's usage stats on flickr.

[Josh Miller]

Yeah, it's been getting more popular. I've got two fo the top 18 photos there too, including the number one spot (been there for a while).

[pooja84]

Thanks for the detailed review. Kodak is one of my favorite brand. This camera seem to be having nice features. Recording videos is great, image quality is also very nice.