Fujifilm FinePix S9100

Reviewed January 2007

Test Photos

STILL LIFE PHOTO

This subject is photographed in a room that has a mix of fluorescent and incandescent light, but which is not brightly lit. The camera's flash is used to add fill light. The backdrop is 1.95 m (6.5 ft) from the camera.

In general, the FinePix S9100/S9600 gave us better images when set to JPEG than by converting from RAW. RAW images tended to be slightly more grainy, and were not easily processed using the bundled software (Hyper Utility 2) or the RAW plug-in for Photoshop CSII, which normally handles RAW images with aplomb.

ZOOM PHOTO

Now we zoom in on a specific area. The intent is to test the sharpness of the image at the zoom's maximum setting. The camera remains at the same distance as with the preceding photo.

As had been the case with the S9000/S9500, with this camera, the distance to this subject is too little to allow the lens to focus at the telephoto setting. To achieve focus, the macro setting has to be used.

The camera is able to record a good level of detail, the image even revealing details such as the paper fibres on the edge of the old envelope.

MACRO PHOTO

Two macro modes are offered on the FinePix S9100/S9600 a standard Macro that can focus on a subject approximately 10 cm (3.9 inches) from the lens, and a Super Macro mode that is able to focus on a subject only 1 cm (0.44 inch) from the lens. With the Standard macro mode, the camera captures a field of view — measured horizontally — that can be as narrow as 12 cm (4.7 in.).

Set to the Super Macro mode, the camera is able to focus even closer than 1 cm — the lens barrel can touch the subject — allowing it to capture a field of view of approximately 4 cm (1.6 inch).

BUILDING PHOTO

This image is our outdoor test. The architecture of the building, in particular the angled girders, immediately show the presence of jaggies. The shadowed entrance can also often reveal the quality of the exposure.

Once again, the images obtained from processing the RAW mode were not as good as those produced by the JPEG Fine images straight out of the camera.

For instance, compared side by side at 100% scale, the TIFF files resulting from the RAW images looked a bit more coarse than the JPEGs, and blue sky, as in the image below, showed some marbling that was absent from the JPEG image.

The RAW images produced by the S9100/S9600 are preset to produce an image size that is double the maximum image size captured by the camera. RAW images are preset to produce converted images that measure 4864 x 3648 pixel, or 18 megapixels.

Left to this setting, the image is interpolated and Hyper-Utility 2 produces an image that contains jaggies, while the 9-megapixel image is noticeably smoother and better.

ZOOM PHOTO

Zooming in on the entrance of the building, the shadowed entrance takes on a greater importance for the metering and can cause an overexposure of sections that are directly lit.

The 10.7X zoom of the S9100/S9600, like all long telephoto lenses, can easily emphasize the slightest movement of the photographer, resulting in an image ruined by camera shake. Since the camera has no stabilization system*, shots captured at the maximum telephoto setting require either a lot of light to maintain a high shutter speed, or the use of a tripod.

The S9100/S9600 yields an image that is detailed, and very well exposed. A bit of noise can be detected in the solid colour areas, but there is no chromatic aberration, nor is there any sign of pincushion distortion.

NIGHT PHOTO

Since this camera is capable of long exposures, a photo taken at night is included here.

The FinePix S9100/S9600 is able to capture exposures as long as 30 seconds when it is set to the Manual mode or the Shutter Priority mode. For night photography, however, control over the aperture is as important as control over the exposure time, and therefore the Manual mode is needed.

The photo presented here was captured using the RAW format, and then processed using the RAW plug-in for Adobe Photoshop CSII.

Using the "Image Settings" — those recorded by the camera as part of the RAW file — to import the image produced a 9.1 megapixel image with noticeable noise, so the settings for Luminance Smoothing, colour Noise Reduction and Sharpness were adjusted to lessen the graininess.

The result is an image that is quite good, but which still exhibits a bit of noise. Nevertheless, even after this processing, the image retains a very reasonable level of detail, and the outlines of the pine trees that frame the bright lights of the ski slopes of Grouse Mountain are visible.