Fujifilm FinePix Z1

Reviewed August 2005

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.

With the zoom lens set to the wide angle end, and the sensitivity set to 64 ISO to minimize noise, the Z1 captures a useable but relatively dark image. The flash provides an even light, but its effect at 64 ISO is limited, and the use of exposure compensation to brighten the image is ineffective.

Then, the only alternative is to set the sensitivity to Auto allow the camera to increase the ISO setting as required.

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.

To ensure an acceptable level of image quality, the zoom photo presented here is captured with the sensitivity set to 64 ISO. At the maximum telephoto setting however, the maximum aperture of the lens is f4.2, but the shutter speed remains the same as for the wide angle shot, resulting in a slightly darker image.

Looking at the image section shown below, the effect of the compression that averages colour hues to reduce the file size can be seen on the edge of letters, and in the appearance of various textures.

The Macro mode of the Z1 is engaged with the left direction of the 4-direction control while the camera is in capture mode. The Macro mode allows the lens to focus on a subject positioned from 8 to 80 cm (3.1 inches to 2.6 ft) when the lens is at the wide angle end, and from 45 to 80 cm (1.5 to 2.6 ft) at the telephoto end.

At the wide angle end, the camera captures a field of view of approximately 5 cm (2 inches), while at the telephoto end the field of view expands to 9.5 cm (3.7 inches).

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.

With a relatively distant subject such as this, the slight barrel distortion that can become noticeable with interior shots is not visible. Moreover, the 64-segment metering pattern evaluates the scene properly and produces a well balanced image.

Seen at a 100% scale, the photo reveals a small chromatic aberration — the purple fringe running below the beams in the full-scale section shown below — and the shadowed areas reveal a bit of noise, even at 64 ISO.

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.

Zoomed in, the chromatic aberration dissipates. The overall exposure is quite good, although the entrance area is a tad dark.

A close look at the full-size image shown (see section below) shows that some noise can be seen in the shadow areas and that the edges of objects in the image are a bit fuzzy, probably as a result of the compression process.

NIGHT PHOTO

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

Only the Night mode of the FinePix Z1 allows an extended shutter speed, of up to 4 seconds. However, although this particular subject is relatively bright, a 4-second exposure yields quite a dark image when the camera is set to 64 ISO the level at which it is the least sensitive to noise.

The only alternative is then to increase the CCD sensitivity as it is the only parameter available to the user to increase the image brightness since the Night mode does not offer access to exposure compensation.

To obtain a brighter image, sensitivity needs to be increased up to 200 ISO, but even at this level, the Z1 has difficulty focusing reliably.

But, noise already perceivable at 64 ISO increases considerably, and once the image has been processed by the camera, the resulting image is rather impressionistic.