Camera Labs

Now here she is, the Fujifilm F200EXR.

A whole page about her and the specifications:

http://www.fujifilm.com/products/digita ... index.html

What are your thoughts about the new camera?

regards,
HTG

Here's my take - didn't have time yesterday to go into details:

I waited about 5 months till now for Fujifilm to come out with the specs of their F200EXR. So far, I thought the Panasonic LX3 would be the best fitting P&S camera for me since I like low light photography and shooting close-ups.

Since Fujifilm had announced months ago that the new F200EXR would be a "premium" camera, I was waiting for Fujifilm to really deliver something stunning before I would consider really buying the LX3 or another new cam.

As it seems, Fujifilm has put the new EXR sensor into their old F100fd. The lens is not appealing to me for my purposes with its slow F3.3-5.1. Was hoping for at least a F2.8-4.0 here and a bigger camera.

The sample pictures they show on their official page are okay and some really good - if one always had enough light. But I wouldn't like to trade "too few light" for higher Isos.

To me, for now, it looks like it would be a really good camera for outdoors when being on vacation where you want to just take impressions without fiddling around.

This is just my view for now. I don't expect the miracle that the new sensor delivers more than I would expect from that camera.

And talking about the camera, I don't like the shape. It always reminds me of a banana boat somehow.

Don't think I'm grumpy. I am just deceived since I hoped for more to come. It seems Fujifilm was rather going the safe way since they had a big success with the F100fd already. The current financial times were probably dictating their decision.

Now I have all the time in the world waiting with my purchase of an LX3-like camera. Waiting for reviews of the F100fd EXR --- sorry, F200EXR - in the hope someone might miraculously detect a better result than I can assume from my own little knowledge about photography.

regards,
HTG

I do like the way Fujifilm is trying new things with their sensors, but the proof as always is in the pudding. I hope to review this sometime in the future...

Lately I detected somewhere how few money camera-producing companies are actually making with compact cameras.

From that point of view, I understand better now that is it a good thing when a company develops its own new sensor. One has to give them credit for the fact that they still do something in that sector, that's right.

And today I read that it's mainly/often the big electronic stores who are dictating the price - derived from customer expectations. I guess, it's not easy being green... ;- )

Looking forward to your review on Cameralabs.
HTG

THis looks very interesting. Congrats to Fuji for trying to do what most other manufacturers refuse to do: improve image quality (instead of just adding more and more megapixels). The new sensor is a very innovative concept. Hopefully it will produce the goods that it advertises.

I am really looking forward to reading Gordon's review here.