Having owned many pro-level cameras in the past, it was difficult for me to find a solid and versatile point-and-shoot. This camera has everything I was looking for and just a bit more.
Pros:
I am impressed with the amount of control the H55 gives me.
Panoramic imaging built in (its nice to see the results right away rather than just eyeballing it) .
Image quality - wow @ 14MP, the images are gorgeous.
Color accuracy is great with good lighting.
The camera handles quite nicely and is very easy to navigate.
The wide angle lens is fantastic at this price. As a pro I would have spent a couple hundred on the lens alone.
Excellent range on zoom. I was quite happily surprised.
Battery life seems much more adequate than the W330 I previously purchased and returned.
Cons:
The flash is far from balanced and seems too hot to be used for fill. I'm new on this camera and I'm used to pro-level equipment, so I'm sure I'm expecting too much here. That, or I just don't yet have the hang of it.
Color accuracy breaks down at lower light levels. Since I didn't have a real meter with me, I couldn't tell at which precise number breakdown begins to occur. I would guess around 4 lux is about as good as it gets. Beyond around that, it gets pretty noisy. I'll experiment with some night shooting when I have it on a tripod. But I won't get my hopes up.
Doesn't seem to allow you to manually close the lens. Not a dealbreaker, but it would seem a fairly simple feature to offer. Sony Cyber-shot DSC-H55 14.1MP Digital Camera with 10x Wide Angle Optical Zoom with SteadyShot Image Stabilization and 3.0 inch LCD (Black)
This camera has an excellent Optical 10X zoom, images can be seen clearly and with rich colours. Also using the 20X digital zoom photos have many details, you can apreciate like lines in a wall or symbols in a stone. 720p video looks great when played in my laptop and it does not have blur or moving lines like in other camera's brands, thanks for the mp4 format, very, very portable. Nice panoramic photos, I use them as wallpapers. Only one thing I couldn't do with this camera was shooting the moon or filming it, may be I have to
read the manual with more calm. SD Cards supported, nice move!
Good: outdoor lighting, fantastic - nice color saturation, quick response, sharp images, panoramic motion interesting
Bad: slow, slow, slow in low light or indoor conditions
There was a noticeable lag especially in lower lighting when the flash went off. I have never returned a camera, and this one went back. I was disappointed in the indoor condition performance as compared to previous W-series Sony Cybershots and Canon PowerShots especially. I returned the H55 for a Canon S90. It's too bad because the outdoor lighting photos came out beautifully.
I have been looking for a replacement to my previous Sony 5.1 MP camera for which i paid the same amount that I paid for this camera. It's amazing to see a sea change in the quality of the pictures especially under relatively lower light conditions and outdoors. The zoom is outstanding. I can agree with the previous reviewer that the picture blurs, but I have a different take. If the object moves or if the hand shakes a little. In my view this is OK becasue multi-burst function has been disabled by default. But, I have taken moving pictures and it comes out fine most of the time.
A word of caustion that do not purchase this camera primarily becasue it has HD recording. The picture quality of HD recording indoor under medium to low light is noisy. And even in outdoor, the movie function can't replace what a full blown HD camcorder can do.
I recommed this camera to anyone who is looking for shooting great quality indoor/outdoor pictures. The smaller pocket size of the camera is really a big plus compared to it's predecessor, H-20 model.
I haven't utilized all it's features. I will right more when get to know more about this camera. One last thing that the black plastic housing looks cheap. I wish Sony had added some metal and hardness to the body of the camera. Overall, I give it 5 stars becasue the camera excels in its bottom line functionality which is to take excellent shots.
Well, I have some bad news. After a week of use, I noticed that the camera is washing away the colors if the person is wearing lighter colored clothings like light blue, light green, light yellow, or cream colors. It happens when taking pictures indoor. The lighers-colors in iMode settings don't come exactly the same. They appear whashed away. I am having a second thoughts about this camera. Not to mention that the outdoor pictures are perfect and even the indoor pictures are great if the person is in dark colored clothes.
This has been covered to death, so a few brief comments on my personal experience. I bought this to use as a point-&-shoot, and did not expect to get more than I paid for, but was pleasantly surprised.
1 - extremely easy to set up and use. Charge the battery, install a media card, and turn it on.
2 - Battery / memory card door is pretty cheesy.
3 - takes good pictures. pics have good color and brightness, need little to no post-processing.
4 - low light pictures are -really- good (for low-light pictures), waay better than I expected. Bravo twilight mode.
5 - panorama mode works well and is priceless if you do much shooting in tight quarters, or of large groups - however, no zoom. Wide-angle only, which maximizes cylindrical distortion. I still love it.
6 - I do mostly stills and had little interest in movie mode. Very much appreciated saving $100+ from the HX5V.
7 - Works as advertised. If this is what you want, buy with confidence.
. - Digital Camera - Wide Angle Lens - Sony Cybershot - Cybershot'
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