Nikon S205 Review

The Nikon S205 digital camera is a 12 Megapixel (i.e. 4000 x 3000 pixels resolution) CCD camera and with an optical zoom of 4x. The optical zoom combined with the digital zoom, also of 4x, gives a combined effective zoom of 16x. This Nikon S205 review was done by inspecting a red colored model purchased for US$ 110 from Amazon.com. The Nikon S205 is of the point and shoot type digital camera. There are 16 still image shooting modes for all kinds of photography scenarios: Party/Indoor, Beach, Museum, Snow/Sand, Food, Night Scene, Sports Photography, Documents, Portrait, Dusk/Dawn, Fireworks, Panorama, Back Light, Landscape, and Night Portrait. Dimensionally, it is around 3.8 × 2.2 × 0.8 inches when all protrusions are fully retracted.

The weight of the Nikon S205 is approximately 4 ounces with the battery and an SD card inserted. The LCD screen is spacious at 2.7 inches, which is ample space for displaying information regarding Image Size, Zoom Indicator, ISO Setting, Number of Pictures Remaining, Focus Area, Shooting Mode, Aperture Setting, and Shutter Speed.

Nikon S205 Review: Controls

During this Nikon S205 review, we found the hardware and software controls to be intuitive and easy to work with. There is a power button on the top and there is also a shutter button just beside it. For zooming, there is a zoom ring button in circumferentially to the shutter button. The shutter button controls are standard like other digital cameras i.e. halfway press of the shutter button will bring the photo subject into focus while the full press will snap the image.

There are detailed camera and menu control buttons on the back side of the camera i.e. on the LCD side. There are 6 buttons in total beside the LCD screen in a plus shaped layout with a button in the center which is a common configuration in digital cameras these days. For this Nikon S205 review, these buttons control the on screen menu intuitively. In the menu mode, the 4 buttons on the plus shape nodes are for navigation, while the button at the center of the plus are for selection of the highlighted option in the menu. Apart from these 5 buttons, there is a 6th button which is for exposure control of the photographic sceneries. It allows you to brighten or darken the picture.

Nikon S205 Review: Battery

The Nikon S205 runs on a proprietary battery or through a DC adaptor or through a USB cable connected to a personal computer. For this Nikon S205 review, we operated the camera with a fully charged battery which is supplied with the S205. The camera easily took over 200 full resolution photos before the battery drained. Apart from the AC-DC power adaptor, the battery can be recharged through the USB cable connected to a computer as well. According to Nikon S205 review on Amazon.com, the SD card (which is required for shooting video) is not bundled with a new unit of Nikon S205.