New Ceramic Lensed Exilim Ex-S100

stuart miles writes "pocket-lint has managed to be the first to review the new ex-s100 3mega pixel from Casio that uses a ceramic lens rather than the standard glass version. "

Comments

Skeptical

[Hao Wu]

Sounds like a gimmick. Can someone say if ceramic is truly better than glass, or just better "in theory"?

Re:Skeptical

[mysticgoat]

Sounds like a gimmick. Can someone say if ceramic is truly better than glass, or just better "in theory"?

I'm guessing, but I think in this case the ceramic is better than glass because production can be less expensive.

Cheap cameras of this size use plastic lenses formed in molds, where the chosen plastic has a relatively low index of refraction. The lens is thicker, but is tolerant of the surface imperfections from the molding process, and is generally lighter than a glass lens that had the same optical quailities.

If you molded glass lenses this way, you'd face an expensive polishing operation afterward.

I'm guessing that these ceramic lenses are molded as "green bodies" and then sintered to reduce them to their final dimensions. The shrinking would reduce the surface imperfections of the molding process, so ceramics with fairly high indexes of refraction could be used. The end result would be a thin lens with many glass-like qualities, produced by an inexpensive molding process (a sintering oven would not add much to the cost).

Re:image noise

[cujo_1111]

1024 x 768 is only 0.8 MP, not 3 MP.

3 MP is more like 2048 x 1536.

The image noise is probably more due to the ludicrously small CCD unit (4.54 x 3.42 mm) that Casio are using. As a comparison the 2.8 MP Nikon D1H uses a largish CCD of 23.7 x 15.5 mm and I know which one would give better photos, lenses notwithstanding.

The ceramic lens would impact the sharpness of the photo more.

uhhh digital?

[deglr6328]

Why is this story under the Digital Equipment Corporation category? Does the submitter not know of the once great now dead company?

Re:image noise

[cujo_1111]

You have a point, but if you have two 6 MP CCDs, one 5 mm x 5 mm and the other 25 mm x 25 mm. The larger CCD will take the better photo.

This is one case where smaller is not necessarily better.

Re:This is bad?

[Technician]

Since when is a 3.2 megapixel size bad, especially for a small digital camera?

My biggest beef with this camera is the battery choice. Re-chargable batteries self discharge. When I need shots, I need to grab and go. Expensive batteries that may or may not be ready to go are not an option for me. This camera takes a Li-ion battery. This means, dead camera at unexpected times, insufficient capacity for the birthday party, parade, sporting event, wedding, Burning Man weekend, etc. I'll take a slightly larger camera if I can use off the shelf batteries in a pinch as needed. I have several cameras. Any of them that can't share memory cards and batteries have been replaced. The type of battery and type of memory are the two things that are as important to a camera now as pixel count, low light, size and zoom range. If any of the requried features are lacking, I can't use it. When I go to shoot something, I take one or both of the cameras, the memory cards, 2 sets of NiMH batteries and a new pack of Alkalines, more if it's expected to be a big shoot. If the rechargables are dead, then I don't have a dead camera. If they are good, then I don't need the alkalines this time. I can't do this in an affordable way with a camera that uses a propritory battery. I can buy at least 4 sets of rechargable batteries for my camera for about the price of one propritory battery. Li-ion batteries are usualy $40 and up each. This significantly adds to the cost of ownership if you plan on having enought battery power to cover all the various needs. This is especialy true if you can't use off the shelf batteries in a pinch as needed.

Re:image noise

[arodland]

On a related note, if you have two CCDs, one 5MP, and the other 8MP, both 11mm diagonal, the 8MP one doesn't necessarily look much better ;)

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[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:This is bad?

[LtOcelot]

Under 5 MP "barely acceptible" onscreen? What resolution is your monitor, 2560x1920? Somebody better tell Nikon to recall the D2H. If you're not getting excellent onscreen images and 300 dpi 4x6 prints out of 3 MP, it's not the megapixel count that's the problem.

Re:This is bad?

[IamNotWitchboy]

That's the whole point. It makes no sense to include a tiny SD card with the camera that almost no one uses and it only serves to drive the price up.

Re:This is bad?

[wizrd_nml]

I've had the exact opposite experience. Because of their memory effect, NiMH are the most inconvenient batteries to use. You have to spend about 24 hours prior to using the camera to discharge and rechard them to make sure you have the maximum charge.

No thanks, I'll take a couple of Li-ion any day. Just plug them in a few hours before I intend to shoot and off I go. One Li-ion generally lets me take about 90 photos at 3.2 megapixel resolution, with a bit more than half using flash (Casio has pushed that limit even further with their Z3 and Z4 models, I believe over 200 photos with one charge). And if you're planning on taking more than 150 photos for an event, generally speaking you're probably looking for more than a compact (digital SLR maybe?).