Product Description

The CoolPix S50 is equipped with a huge, bright 3.0-inch LCD great for viewing images anywhere, anytime. The impressive 170 Degree wide viewing angle makes it easier for everyone to see and enjoy images. The larger high resolution LCD lets you make the most of smooth, sharp movies, great-looking stills and exciting Pictmotion shows. The CoolPix S50 features 15 specially programmed modes to automatically handle focus, exposure, white balance and other adjustments that help you take great pictures easily. Pictmotion allows you to select your favorite images and movies, decide on a style, and pick one of five pre-installed music files or add your own. Pictmotion automatically combines a polished production with transitions and style synced to your music. Digital Zoom - up to 4x (35mm format picture angle - 456mm) Focus range from lens - 1 foot (30cm) to infinity Macro close-up mode - 1.6 inch (4cm) to infinity ISO sensitivity - ISO 100, 200, 400, 800, 1600, Auto (auto gain ISO 100-800) Built-in flash - Wide Range 1 to 19 foot 8 inches (0.3 to 6.0m), Tele Range 1 to 13 foot 1 inch (0.3 to 4.0m) High-Speed USB 2.0 & 802.11b/g Interface System Requirements - Macintosh Mac OS X version 10.3.9, 10.4.x, Windows Vista (32bit), Windows XP Home Edition/Professional and Windows 2000 Professional Dimensions - 3.6 x 2.3 x 0.8 inch (92.5 x 59 x 21 mm) excluding projections Weight - 4.4 ounces (125 grams) without battery and SD memory card

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #25429 in Camera & Photo
• Brand: Nikon
• Model: 25558
• Released on: 2007-04-13
• Dimensions: 2.30" h x .80" w x 3.60" l, .75 pounds
• Display size: 3

Features

• 7.2-megapixel CCD captures enough detail for for photo-quality 16 x 20-inch prints
• 3x optical zoom through a quality Zoom-Nikkor lens (zoom is equivalent to 38-114mm in a 35mm camera)
• 3.0-inch LCD display; exclusive Nikon In-Camera Red-Eye Fix
• All-new Pictmotion creates in-camera slideshows with your music
• Sleek, all-metal design

Manufacturer Description
The new Coolpix S50 features 7.2-megapixel performance and a 3x optical Zoom-Nikkor glass lens. Optical VR Image Stabilization technology minimizes the effect of camera shake. The huge, bright, high resolution 3.0-inch LCD offers 170-degree wide angle-of-view, making it simple to compose and share pictures. High ISO up to1600 allows for shooting in lower light.

The Coolpix S50 also features feature 15 specially-programmed modes to automatically handle focus, exposure, white balance and other adjustments that help you take great pictures easily.

Nikon Coolpix S50 Highlights

VR Optical Image Stabilization Stability advanced... images enhanced. You can shoot sharper, clearer and without blur with Nikon’s ingenious VR Optical Image Stabilization technology improves stability by automatically compensating for camera shake.With Nikon Optical VR Image Stabilization you can shoot at shutter speeds up to three stops slower than other wise possible without camera shake blurring your pictures.

3x optical Zoom-Nikkor glass lens High-quality lenses deliver high-quality pictures. The Zoom-Nikkor glass lens gives you the power of 3x optical zoom lens (38mm-116mm; 35mm equivalent) while Macro capability lets you get as close as 1.6 inches. This combination is supported by Nikons’world-renowned optical technology delivering crisp, clear images.

New 1600 ISO capability See what you’ve been missing. High light sensitivity up to ISO 1600 opens up a whole new world of photo opportunity. Allowing you to tackle scenes and situations far beyond the capabilities of conventional compacts, high ISO offers you new power to capture fast-moving objects with outstanding clarity and gives you great exposure in significantly lower light.

Wider enjoyment with huge, bright, high-resolution LCD The Coolpix S50 is equipped with a huge, bright 3.0-inch LCD great for viewing images anywhere, anytime. The impressive 170-degree wide viewing angle makes it easier for everyone to see and enjoy images. The larger high-resolution LCD lets you make the most of smooth, sharp movies, great-looking stills and exciting Pictmotion shows.

Nikon In-Camera Innovations

• Rotary multi selector Swift circular scrolling action allows speedy image browsing at up to 10 images per second. On-screen icon with cursor tracks scrolling for easy feature selection.
• Auto image rotation Detects pictures that have been taken with thecamera held vertically and automatically rotates the image for in-camera LCD playback.
• Anti-Shake button overcomes camera shake by activating optical VR image stabilization, High- Sensitivity mode and Best Shot Selector all at once, providing images that are steady and sharp.
• In-camera cropping Allows you to crop out the part of the image you don’t want and keep the part you do.
• Blur warning Alerts you to a burry image.
• Noise Reduction mode Minimizes digital artifacts in long exposures.
• Best Shot selector Enables the camera to take a series of photos and automatically select the one with the sharpest focus.
• Voice Memo function Records up to 5 hours of sound that can be then attached to an image, or played back alone as a wav file.
• Date and time imprinting Available to document the exact time and date that your photo is taken.
• In-Camera Red-Eye Fix This in-camera feature automatically fixes most typical occurrences of red-eye.
• D-Lighting Compensates for underexposed images or insufficient flash by automatically adding light and detail to selected shots where needed -- without affecting properly exposed areas.
• One-Touch Portrait Your shortcut to three unique innovations, it offers instant access to Face-priority AF and In-Camera Red-Eye Fix for optimized image capture and lets you transform exposure with Nikon’s powerful D-Lighting advantage.
• Face-Priority AF Automatically finds and focuses on people’s faces to ensure superb portraits with clear, crisp focus.

Pictmotion Reshape the way you share. Pictmotion allows you to select your favorite images and movies, decide on a style, and pick one of five pre-installed music files or add your own. Pictmotion automatically combines your elements in a polished production, with transitions and style synced to your music.

Customer Reviews

Potential King of the Compacts
Nikon's two newest 3" LCD entries have a tough act to follow, the very popular S7c. The first of these two is the S50. Nice sized camera that easily fits a pocket or purse. But here's what really makes it stand out:

1) Good quality 3x optical periscoping lens with true VR. The periscoping feature means the lens zooms inside the camera body, not outside. This protects the lens from damage if dropped or accidently turned on while in a case (or restricted area like a purse or pocket). The VR is of the optical shift variety, which is far superior to the "anti-blur" modes that simply boost the ISO. But this camera can also go to ISO 1600, getting the best of both worlds;

2) Large 3 inch screen you can see reasonably well at poor angels (such as when holding the camera at low angles or above your head), and better than average outside (at least well enough to take your photographs);

3) Reasonably prices accessories. Nikon reasonable? Yes. Nikon is very reasonable on additional batteries and replacement items. Additionally, they use the SD memory cards, the easiest to find and the most price competitive out there;

4) Great in camera editing. No, it's not a PC-in-a-camera, but it does allow the best in camera editing of any point-and-shoot digital. The D-Lighting is particularly good as saving photos where the important areas are too dark without washing out the light areas.

I also prefer the black finish of the S50 to the silver finish of the S50c. The latter camera features a wireless capability that will not be useful to most, for about $50 more.

Marvelous little critter
My reason for buying this particular camera was the "anti-shake" image stabilization. Too many of my picture are, eh, taken during an earthquake, as the old joke goes. Well, the very first time that I gave this camera a road test, I found myself at the coast, wanting to take pictures with full zoom, while strong sea winds almost blew me off my feet. "Captain, permission to engage image stabilization?" "Make it so, number one!".

And miraculously, none of my pictures were shaken or stirred. I love this thing.

Another big plus is the big LCD on the back. It's big, it's gorgeous, and it makes you excited about your pictures while you're taking them. There is something psychological going on there, but the fact is that the LCD makes you fall in love with the camera and your own picture taking capability, even before you have seen the result.

I'm giving this thing 4 stars instead of 5 because of two niggles. One: turning off the flash is confusing. Bizarrely, it seems you can not change flash settings when the anti-shake is engaged. Two: the lens is placed to the edge of the camera body, and I regularly find a finger of my left hand dangling in front of it. As a result I need to hold it in a somewhat unnaturally feeling way.

But on the whole I'm very happy with this camera. And small and black it looks very sexy.

An awesome camera
I received my new S50 and left the next day on an extended trip. Having upgraded from a Coolpix 4300, I found the S50's picture quality stunning. The 3" viewing screen is easy to use for framing shots as well as viewing the results in all except the strongest direct sunlight on it. The menu options, while extensive, are easy to understand for various shooting options, although I use the manual to understand the less-often-used features. While I miss the ability to use a viewfinder as well as the view screen for composing pictures, the 3" display is so vivid and clear, and the camera such a convenient size, it's a sacrifice I'm willing to make. The interface cable allows you to plug into a USB port or the video/audio ports of a TV. It and the battery charger fit nicely into my travel backpack. I have ordered a spare battery as the 3" display uses some juice. I found I had to recharge the battery every night (I was shooting a lot of pictures and showing them off). I also recommend a slim case to prevent scratching the display screen. I put in a 2 Gb card and at fairly high resolution it looks like I can shoot 600 to 800 shots.
This is a great product, it takes great, crystal clear pictures which crop and blow up well.